I move as an unopposed motion—

I second.

I move—

I think this motion gives effect to the general wish of this House. We have reached a late stage of the session now, and we cannot take a long enough holiday to give hon. members from up-country constituencies the opportunity of going home, and in those circumstances it is the general desire, so I am informed, that we should also take Monday as a sitting day. It is not a religious holiday, and there is no reason why we should not sit on that day. In view of the late stage of the session which we have now reached it is the wish that we should lose as little as possible of the time that we have at our disposal. In the circumstances, Good Friday will be our only holiday. We hope to give hon. members the opportunity to get away at 6 o’clock on Thursday evening, and then Friday will be a holiday, but on Monday we shall resume our business as usual.

I should like to have some information from the Prime Minister about the probable date when this session will conclude. It is important to hon. members to know at this time of the session what the probable date will be when we will finish, so that they can make the necessary arrangements. I should also like to know from the Prime Minister when the Government intends starting with morning sittings. I must say that personally I am sorry the Prime Minister is making us sit on Easter Monday. Surely one day would not have made so much difference? I should like to know from the Prime Minister whether even now the Government would not consider the question of the House only resuming on Tuesday?

I only want to say in reply to the hon. member, that this motion was put up, as I was informed, after consultation with all the parties, and it was considered advisable also to take the Monday. In regard to his question about the length of the session and the beginning of morning sittings, I only want to say that we want to start the morning sittings as soon as the work of the Select Committees allows us to do so. We hope the Select Committees will soon have finished their work, so that we can make a start with morning sittings. If we car, start early enough with the morning sittings, then I think it is possible to finish our work towards the middle of April. I think that that is the date which the House can aim at—that the prorogation should take place towards the middle of April.

I move—

These Additional Estimates, the consideration of which I am now asking, are introduced to make financial provision for items of expenditure which, it was not possible to foresee when the first Additional Estimates were prepared, now more than two months ago. For the most part the items of these Additional Estimates are very small and of a minor character. There are only three items of a major character, and these account for about 80 per cent. of the total amount asked for. I want to say first of all that the acceptance of these Additional Estimates will have no effect on the Budgetary position as put forward by me a few weeks ago. Hon. members will see that our revised estimates of expenditure from Revenue Fund are still placed at the same figure as what I placed them at in the Budget, namely, £75,800,000. When that figure was given in the Budget we already knew all the most important items here included and such other items as have since come in can easily be met out of further savings which were then not contemplated. The position of our revenue fund remains unchanged. As far as expenditure on Loan Fund is concerned we are actually in a position that we can look forward to larger savings than we are asking the House to effect. In my Budget I gave the figure for expenditure from Loan Fund at £55,976,000. That amount, despite this additional provision, is now reduced by over £300,000. I said that there were only three major items to which it is necessary to refer. The first is in respect of Vote No. 21, Agricultural Assistance to Farmers. That, arises in connection with the expenditure which we have to provide for transportation rebate. Hon. members are aware that we have certain rebates in regard to the transportation of what one might call agricultural articles. These rebates are made in accordance with fixed tariffs, and in view of the fact that you cannot anticipate twelve months ahead what the amount of the articles to be transported will be, the estimates cannot be made with complete accuracy. That is why we have to ask for that amount more under that head. The second main item is under agriculture generally. That arises out of the importation of wheat. As hon. members are aware we have to import wheat on a fairly considerable scale, and it has been arranged that the imported wheat is to be supplied at the same price as the local article. That can only be done by our giving up part of the Customs duty. More than this amount of £80,000 specified will come in by way of revenue under Customs. This is portion of the additional revenue arising from importation of wheat which has to be rebated in order to make it possible to supply wheat at that price. Then the third main item is the item on Loan Vote P, Police, that is, the additional provision for the police standard stock. Out of that standard stock account purchases of clothing and materials are financed. Under present conditions these purchases which were made overseas have to be met on an F.O.B. basis, they have to be paid for forthwith by the High Commissioner. Of course it takes some time for them to get here and delivery to be made to the various departments and institutions. In the meantime the standard stock account has to carry the financial provision necessary, and that being so it is necessary under circumstances as they are for us to increase that provision by £50,000. I think that is all I have to comment on. As hon. members will see, for the most part we are dealing with matters of relatively small importance which could best be discussed in Committee.

I second.

Motion put and agreed to.

I should like to have a little more information from the Minister of Finance on this vote. I want to know from him how much it costs at the moment to import wheat. I may say that as we now find that wheat has to be imported to the extent it is being done it proves that the warning which we have continually been giving the Minister of Agriculture and the Government was well founded, namely, that they did not give the wheat farmers sufficient encouragement to produce wheat. The wheat farmers have time and again practically had to approach the Minister of Agriculture hat in hand to ask him to fix a reasonable and fair price for their wheat, but every time the wheat farmers were sent back disappointed. This importation of wheat is the fruit we are now gathering from the policy which the Government has pursued. I won’t say that it is always possible for the wheat farmers to produce sufficient wheat for this country’s consumption, but the wheat farmers have to produce today under particularly difficult circumstances. We waited on the Prime Minister personally on the labour question and we warned him that if they went on to recruit our coloured men for military purposes in the towns, even though they have stopped recruiting on the farms themselves—the result would be that farm labour would drift to the towns.

The hon. member can only discuss Vote No. 22 at this stage.

I only want to tell the Minister that that is one of the reasons why there is a wheat shortage in South Africa and why we have to import this wheat today. I want to know from the Minister at what price wheat is being imported, and how that price compares with the price which our farmers get.

When the Government drafted the regulations that we had to get the type of bread which we now eat in this country we urged the Government to encourage the farmers to sow more wheat. I discussed the matter with the Department of Agriculture and I said there was going to be a serious shortage of wheat; they understood the position and I told them that they should encourage the wheat farmers to sow more, but they refused to do so; we have been going backwards, and the farmers have not been sowing so much. Last year the position was worse than before. Now I notice in the Press that the Government, without consulting the Wheat Board, has fixed the price for next year at 30s. and 30s. 6d. respectively. I fail to see why the Government could not have anticipated all these things and why the Government did not encourage the farmers sooner to sow more wheat. It really looks as if the Government has been struck blind; all they realise is that we are at war. They should also remember that this war may last for a long time still, but they don’t think of making any provision so that we may have sufficient food in the country. What is the position of our wheat farmers today? The production is not what it could have been because our wheat farmers simply say that they cannot afford to sow wheat as they cannot come out on the price they get. They are producing at a loss. We approached the Government from time to time and eventually the Prime Minister came along and said: “No, I feel that the Minister of Agriculture with his economists who are practically the rulers so far as agriculture is concerned—because the Minister is only a figurehead there who has no say and who merely acts on the advice of those economists—I say that eventually the Prime Minister stepped in and realised that something had to be done. We got the report of the Commission of experts which enquired into the wheat position and their recommendations amount practically to this, that only certain parts of the country should produce wheat. It is due to that sort of thing that we have a shortage of wheat in the country today. We have many people in South Africa today who come from elsewhere. We have more mouths to feed and we say that if we have bread in the country then we have food in the country. In spite of that we find that the wheat farmers are not being encouraged sufficiently to sow wheat. We have urged the Department of Agriculture and told them that they must encourage the wheat farmers to sow more, but the Department has turned that request down, absolutely and completely, and now they are faced with a shortage of wheat. We really have a Government which cannot see any distance ahead. All it can see is what is right in front of its nose. The Government has appointed all kinds of boards, it has appointed a Board for instance to look after the interests of the wheat industry, and now the Government has gone over the head of that Board and has fixed the price of wheat at £1 10s. 0d. and £1 10s. 6d. per bag. That is not yet what the farmers should get for their wheat; that is what the farmers should have got last year. Last year the Government did not take any notice of the Wheat Board and of the representatives of the farmers, and as I said just now we now have the report of this Wheat Commission before us, and there we are told that only certain parts of the country can sow wheat, and that the other parts should go in for different kinds of crops. I realise that the Government is just as short sighted. They refuse to accept the advice which this side of the House gives them; they know everything. The Government reminds me of a perfect man on earth—the Government is a perfect man—whatever it says is right and nobody else can say anything right, and if anybody else says anything it is looked upon as hostile opposition. We are not allowed to advise or criticise the Government because if we do we are told that we are Nazis, or that we are in favour of Germany, Italy or Japan, or that we are doing something in conflict with the interests of South Africa. Those are the things which make our country weak and which have caused >:s all our difficulties for so many years and which have again landed us in our present difficulties. I want to tell the Minister that we have not always got party political objects in view when we make suggestions here. What I have done since I have come to this House has been to express my honest opinion about agricultural questions and to give the Government my honest advice, based on my experience so as to help the Government to improve matters in this country, but what have we got out of it? What I have already said—we are continually told that we are trying to make political capital. Now the Government comes here and it does things which we told it to do twelve months ago. We told the Government twelve months ago that, it should encourage the farmers to sow more wheat by giving them decent prices, and now the Government comes here and it passes right over the head of the Wheat Board to do so. We have many boards in this country and we are in favour of boards of control, but we have found that all those boards have made us desperate—and they have been used by a Government which itself has been in a hopeless position. The Government should rather have listened to us when we were exercising honest criticism. Today the government realises that we were honest and fair in what we said, and that the criticism and advice which we gave was in the interest of the country, in the interest of the settled section of the community, and not of those people who roam about from one place to another. I want to express the hope that the Minister will learn a lesson from these things and that he will in future accept the advice which this side of the House gives him. Our advice is given in the interest of that section of the population which in times like the present have to provide the country with food.

I do not think that we should anticipate the discussion on the general wheat policy of the agricultural department and of the Government on this vote. It will come up for discussion when the agricultural vote is considered next week. We are only dealing here with the provision which has been made in regard to the importation of wheat for this year. This is not the occasion to discuss the general wheat policy in regard to this matter. There will be an opportunity to do so when the agricultural vote, as we think, comes up next week. All we do here is to make provision for the payment of a rebate in respect of part of the Customs duties which are collected on the imported wheat. The hon. member for Malmesbury (Mr. Loubser) asked at what price the wheat was being imported. It is difficult to give a definite figure; it varies, because it is also a question of the country of origin, but it is round about 26s. and 27s. per bag. All we are doing here is to make sure that a rebate in respect of part of the Customs duties which have to be collected will be paid back. The importation of wheat is principally due to the inclement weather conditions of last year. We all realise that, and it is because of that that we have to import wheat today on a fairly large scale. As I have said, we are providing on this vote for a rebate in respect of the Customs duties which are payable on part of the imported wheat, and we are asking the House to vote that amount.

I, wish to admit the correctness of what the Minister said, that the wheat shortage is partly due to climatic conditions. At the same time we cannot get away from it that it is also due to the fact that our wheat farmers did not receive sufficient encouragement. The wheat industry is in an extremely difficult position today, and if the Minister wants to avoid being faced with a very precarious position next year he will have to see to it that the wheat farmers are given greater encouragement and that it is made possible for them to produce wheat. That is why I want to ask, Mr. Chairman, whether I am not entitled to point out that it is this question of the shortage of labour which is making the position of the wheat farmers so difficult, and when I point to the scarcity of labour and say that that is the cause of the position in which we find ourselves then I do so because I feel that the farmers are in the most serious trouble today so far as labour is concerned, in view of the season which is on hand.

The labour question can be discussed tomorrow on the motion of the hon. member for Prieska (Mr. Geldenhuys).

Very well, then I shall wait.

I wish to tell the Minister that we are going to have another wheat shortage if the Government fails to make provision for the farmers to get artificial fertiliser. There is not sufficient artificial fertiliser in the country today. Those parts of the country where wheat can be grown are now preparing to sow wheat and they find that they cannot get sufficient artificial fertiliser. They are being rationed and I think the Government should pay attention to it. I understand there is also trouble in regard to binding wire and I think the Government should give its attention to this matter in good time. Then there is another matter too; the farmers are now compelled to do their ploughing with animals, because they cannot use tractors and machinery of that kind, and now they find there is a shortage of horse shoes. I consider it my duty to bring this matter to the notice of the Government. We have iron in the country and we should make provision if the stuff cannot be imported. I had some people at my place yesterday who complained that they could not get it in Town. The Minister will also have to pay attention to these matters, and if he fails to do so the shortage is going to be very much worse than the Government expects it to be. That is why I consider it my duty to draw the Government’s attention to this fact.

The farmers need a great many things, and not only binding wire. They need a hundred and one things for agricultural purposes, and the Minister of Finance, the man who has control of our money, is the man who should help the farmers to make the necessary provision.

The hon. member cannot discuss all those matters at this stage.

I am coming to the rebate for which provision is being made on this vote. A question has been put about the price of the imported wheat. Can the Minister tell us what the price of imported wheat was last year, and how this year’s price compares with last year’s price? Last year we imported wheat from the Argentine, and we could not use that wheat for bread; it was not even sixth grade wheat. We could not mill it, practically speaking. I should like the Minister to explain this matter a little bit more. It is a matter of national importance that we should know what the position is. We find that the regulation has been made, under which we have to eat black bread. Many people simply cannot eat that bread; they have grown up on fine bread, and I say there is no need for us in South Africa to eat black bread, if only the Government would look ahead and take the necessary precautions. I want to draw the Minister’s attention to the fact that now is the time to look ahead. I understand that bags cannot be obtained; there are a hundred and one things which cannot be obtained. Production costs and everything are going up. Costs must have gone up by 20 per cent. or 30 per cent. over the last few months. We simply cannot get it into people’s heads that all these things are linked up with the food of the people. More and more people are coming into this country every day. I don’t want to anticipate the Prime Minister, but I expect that in twelve months’ time we shall have another 1,000,000 people in this country. They may perhaps bring a little food with them, but they will have to get most of their food here.

They take our food away.

Yes, that is also possible. I predict, however, that we are going to have more eaters here. I am not old Van Rensburg—he is dead now—but I predict that we are going to have another 1,000,000 eaters in this country, and we know what will happen then; and we know how things are going on in Cape Town today. We get people here talking every language in the world, but all of them have to be fed. The Government has to look out for the future. The Minister of Finance is about the only Minister in the Cabinet who can look ahead a little, but it really seems as if the Government has the idea that we only have to think of today, and let tomorrow take care of itself. We are going to be hungry in this country if the Government takes up that attitude. This importation of wheat is an urgent matter. The Minister of the Interior sits there and laughs. He does not eat bread because he has other kinds of food, but we on this side eat bread. I again want to tell the Government that bags are practically unobtainable. I understand that most of those bags come from India. Speaking from my own experience, I know that the Co-operative Society to which I belong ordered 150,000 bags last March, and those bags only arrived the other day. We are going to be selfish and keep those bags for ourselves. Nobody else is going to get them. I want to draw the Minister’s attention to all these matters. The Government must look ahead. If we have wheat, there are many other things we can do without. We can produce sufficient bread in this country, provided we give the producers a chance of making a decent living out of the production of wheat.

I am not at all surprised at our having to make provision for expenses in connection with the importation of wheat. We have been warning the Minister of Agriculture and the Government every day that this thing was going to happen, but neither the Minister nor the Government took any notice of our warnings. We accused the Minister of Agriculture of following an old-fashioned policy. They are in a groove, and they do not want to get out of it. The Minister and his department did nothing at all to encourage the wheat industry; the farmers had to be satisfied with very low prices. We on our side did everything we possibly could to prevent the sort of thing we are faced with now, but it was no use, and we have the results of the Government’s policy before us today—wheat has to be imported. I have a calculation before me that it costs £1 9s. 3d. per bag to produce wheat in the Transvaal, and what have the farmers been getting for their wheat? I hope the Minister of Finance, before he comes to us again with a request to approve of these things, will, first of all, wake up the Minister of Agriculture to follow a different policy, but how he is going to wake him I don’t know.

In regard to this importation of wheat I want to draw the attention of the Minister of Finance to the fact that we should bear in mind that when wheat is imported money has to go out of the country, and that it would be very much better to pay a higher price to our own wheat farmers than what the import price is, because at any rate the money will then remain in the country. Now another point I want to raise is this. I am speaking subject to correction, but I understand that a large proportion of the imported wheat gets wet at sea, and that the other day 900 or 1,000 bags of wheat came into the country, of which 714 bags were wet. Now I understand that a great deal of that wheat was useless for human or animal consumption, but that a certain quantity, about 240 bags, were only partly wet, and that those bags, together with the other lot, were thrown into the sea for the simple reason that if it had been landed here, it would have been subject to the duty of 6s. per bag. That I cannot understand. There is a great scarcity of food throughout the world today and as we have a position here under which many of our people are not being properly fed every day, why should we go to the length of throwing even half a bag of wheat overboard, if it is not necessary to do so? There must be something wrong. It reminds me of the 130,000 cases of oranges which were thrown into the sea. I want to know why those 240 bags were thrown into the sea, although they were only partly wet. Let us reckon that out of those 240 bags we might have got 150 or 130 bags which could have been used, yet all that wheat was thrown into the sea. I really fail to see why it should have been done. I want an explanation from the Minister why that wheat was thrown overboard.

I want some further information with regard to this £80,000 and what it contains. Is this the rebate on landed cost, or is it associated with any duty that should be paid on it in the first place or not? Perhaps the Minister would give the House some, further information on that.

I have tried to explain it.

How far is it associated with the duty?

This is part of the duty which we rebate.

Then I take it that it is not a rebate on landing. It is a rebate of duty. Will the Minister tell me further what the position of this wheat is when it comes here? Is it handed over to the Wheat Control Board?

Yes.

To the millers.

Where does the consumer benefit by this?

It is all part of the general scheme.

So it is really handed over to the Wheat Control Board and they hand it out?

I just want to tell the hon. member that this £80,000 is an amount which the Government loses. The Government has fixed a price for wheat and the wheat has to be delivered to the millers at that price. The Government has to import wheat and that wheat is more expensive than the fixed price paid to the poor farmers, consequently the Government has to pay in to the millers. The real cause for this amount appearing on the Estimates is that they cannot import at as cheap a price as that which is fixed for wheat in this country.

I want to put a few questions to the Minister of Justice and I want to see whether we can perhaps get some reply from him now which he refused to give us on other occasions. I notice an amount of £5,000 here — additional amounts for equipment, etc., for gaols. Now I want to ask the Minister to tell me who supervises the way in which the money is spent, and who supervises the purchases that are made. Who inspects the stocks, especially so far as food is concerned, and everything that is bought. The charge is made from all sides that the flour which is used for the prisoners in gaol is rotten flour. Does the Minister buy it because it is cheaper, or has he bought it at the price of good flour? Who supervises that? As the Minister has come here for an extra £5,000 I want to ask him how he considers our members of Parliament will be able to judge whether there is a waste of money or not, and whether the goods that are bought are worth the money or not if he refuses to allow us, as members of Parliament, to visit the gaols and prisons to ascertain for ourselves what the position of the gaols is. Without enabling us to get the necessary knowledge by visiting those places the Minister comes here and asks for more money. I am therefore putting this question to the Minister, and I hope he will not give us an evasive reply, because the other day when I put a question on the Order Paper in the usual way, asking why the Minister refused to allow members of Parliament to visit people in the gaols, he replied that it was not considered advisable. Will the Minister now tell us why he does not consider it advisable? Why does he not consider it advisable that the people who have to vote the money shall be allowed to make an enquiry so that they may know what the position is? I put a clear question in that regard, but I did not get a proper reply. I hope the Minister will show us proper respect and answer the question in the way it should be answered.

I thought that I had replied very courteously to the hon. member’s questions. Members of Parliament have never yet had the right to visit gaols, not under any government. The position would become impossible if we had to allow our 150 members of Parliament to visit our gaols when the strictest discipline has to be maintained. That is why we said that it was not advisable, and no government has ever considered it advisable. In regard to the flour I can assure hon. members that the prisoners get excellent food. The stories about bad flour and bad food are nothing but propaganda. It was also stated in regard to Bloemfontein that the people were not getting proper food. The prisoners can buy food through the gaol but they cannot get food brought in from outside. We have already had an instance of a revolver being sent in in a cake. It is therefore not advisable or desirable to allow food to come in from outside. A mistake was made in Bloemfontein and food was allowed to come in, and when we put a stop to it we were blamed for doing so. The food which is supplied is in accordance with the regulations for people who are detained to be tried. In regard to inspections the auditors go carefully into everything.

The Minister has perhaps never had the privilege of being in gaol and of getting the food which the people get there.

The hon. member can put a question but he cannot go into the matter any further.

But we are voting an amount here for requisites, and one of the things that is required most is proper food.

The hon. member can only discuss the increases.

I assume that the increase is connected with the supply of better food.

The hon. member cannot discuss policy.

Food is one of the most essential things.

The hon. member cannot discuss policy at this stage.

The Minister says that the food is so excellent, but I can assure him that the food that is usually supplied in the gaols …

The hon. member cannot discuss questions of policy now.

The hon. Minister replied in regard to the food supplied in the gaols.

He replied to a question.

Then I should also like to put a question. As the precedent has already been laid down that political prisoners get better food than ordinary prisoners, and as the Department of Justice in the past has allowed political prisoners to get food from outside, I want to know what objections the Minister has to those people who are now detained being supplied with food, because experience has taught us that the food which is supplied is not fit for human consumption.

Order!

That contention in regard to political prisoners is nonsense. The people who are sitting there are there on charges of violence, in connection with dynamite explosions, or the cutting of wires.

Without any charge having been made against them.

Many of them have been charged.

And many of them are innocent.

I asked the hon. member whether he wants charges to be brought against all of them immediately.

I want those matters enquired into immediately.

Does the hon. member want charges preferred immediately?

Yes.

That is done, but they are not political prisoners, they are there on charges of violence and they are treated in the same way as other prisoners who are awaiting trial.

In this connection I would also like to put a question and I should like to know from the Minister what is the difference between people who commit acts of violence with arms in their hands and who are caught in the veld like Gen. De Wet, and people who are being detained today? Gen. De Wet and others who were caught in the veld were recognised as political prisoners, but these people who are now in gaol have been arrested under the Emergency regulations. Emergency regulations in the very nature of things are political regulations. The Minister comes here and says that these people have been charged in connection with dynamite explosions and wire cutting, but in every instance they are charged in connection with political regulations and the Minister will find that no man in his sound common sense is prepared to accept a statement that a man who is caught in the field with arms in his hands is a political prisoner, but that a man who is arrested under the emergency regulations is not a political prisoner.

I did not think that anyone would have the impertinence to get up in this House and compare a man like Gen. De Wet with people who blow up railway lines. I think it is an insult to Gen. De Wet. I want to ask the hon. member for Vredefort (Mr. Conroy) who was arrested with Gen. De Wet, whether he agrees that the people who use dynamite can be compared with a man like Gen. De Wet.

May I also be allowed to put a question. Those people who are in gaol, have they been sentenced for acts of sabotage or are there a great many innocent people among them who will be released again afterwards?

There are no innocent people there.

Then why do you release them again?

Where individuals are in possession of information about acts of violence they can be detained under the regulations to give the information they have. They are not innocent. It is their duty to warn the Government if they know of acts of violence which have been committed.

I wish to put a question arising out of what the Minister has said.

Is that question connected with the increase on this vote?

It is only in connection with the increase. Will the hon. the Minister tell us in regard to this increase which is there apparently with the object of making room for more people, how many of those people, about whom he has talked with such a great show of indignation, have already been released because they were falsely charged?

Not a single one.

What about those eight at Vryburg?

Not a single one of them was arrested on a false charge.

On a point of order, I should like to draw your attention to the fact that all you said was “Those in favour say ‘Aye’. The Aye’s have it.”

The hon. member is under a misapprehension.

It is within your discretion to put it again and as it was put in such a manner that there was a misunderstanding I want to ask you to put it again.

I shall put it again.

A division was called.

Upon which the Committee divided:

Ayes—70:

Abrahamson, H.

Acutt, F. H.

Alexander, M.

Allen, F. B.

Ballinger, V. M. L.

Bawden, W.

Bell, R. E.

Blackwell, L.

Bowen, R. W.

Bowie, J. A.

Bowker, T. B.

Burnside, D. C.

Christopher, R. M.

Conradie, J. M.

Davis, A.

Deane, W. A.

Derbyshire, J. G.

De Wet, H. C.

Dolley, G.

Du Toit, R. J.

Egeland. L.

Faure, P. A. B.

Fourie, J. P.

Friedlander, A.

Gilson, L. D.

Goldberg, A.

Hare, W. D.

Hayward, G. N.

Hemming, G. K.

Henderson, R. H.

Heyns. G. C. S.

Hirsch, J. G.

Hofmeyr, J. H.

Hooper, E. C.

Howarth, F. T.

Humphreys, W. B.

Jackson, D.

Johnson, H. A.

Kentridge, M.

Klopper, L. B.

Lawrence, H. G.

Long, B. K.

Madeley, W. B.

Miles-Cadman, C. F

Moll, A. M.

Mushet, J. W.

Neate, C.

Quinlan, S. C.

Robertson, R. B.

Rood, K.

Shearer, V. L.

Smuts. J. C.

Solomon, B.

Sonnenberg, M.

Steyn, C. F.

Steytler, L. J.

Strauss, J. G. N.

Sturrock, F. C.

Sutter, G. J.

Tothill, H. A.

Trollip, A. E.

Van Coller, C. M.

Van den Berg, M. J.

Van der Byl, P. V. G.

Van der Merwe, H.

Wallach, I.

Wares, A. P. J.

Warren, C. M.

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

Noes—48:

Badenhorst, C. C. E.

Bekker, G.

Bekker, S.

Bezuidenhout, J. T.

Booysen, W. A.

Bosman, P. J.

Bremer, K.

Brits, G. P.

Conradie, J. H.

Conroy, E. A.

De Bruyn, D. A. S.

Dönges, T. E.

Du Plessis, P. J.

Erasmus, F. C.

Fouche, J. J.

Fullard, G. J.

Geldenhuys, C. H.

Grobler, J. H.

Hugo, P. J.

Labuschagne, J. S.

Le Roux, S. P.

Liebenberg. J. L. V.

Louw, E. H.

Malan, D. F.

Olivier, P. J.

Pieterse, P. W. A.

Pirow, O.

Rooth, E. A.

Schoeman, B. J.

Serfontein, J. J.

Steyn, G. P.

Strauss, E. R.

Strydom, G. H. F.

Strydom, J. G.

Swart, A. P.

Swart. C. R.

Van Nierop, P. J.

Van Zyl, J. J. M.

Venter, J. A. P.

Verster, J. D. H.

Viljoen, D. T. du P.

Vosloo, L. J.

Warren, S. E.

Wentzel, J. J.

Wilkens, Jan.

Wolfaard, G. v. Z.

Tellers: J. J. Haywood and J. F. T. Naudé.

I should like, in connection with the item appearing here for additional accommodation for the Gynasium at Voortrekkerhoogte, to put the question to the Prime Minister whether physical training is compulsory in the Defence Force. When I recently put the question the Prime Minister said that it was compulsory. I have a whole lot of letters here in which it is definitely stated that there no physical training is given. We know that an Army does not mean much if the men are not healthy and not properly trained. Physical culture is of the greatest importance. I have a letter here for instance in which the writer says that although the Prime Minister in reply to my question had said that physical training was compulsory in the Army and took place regularly, that was not so; and the writer contends that in one of the Coastal batteries there has been no physical training for the past eight months. May I be allowed to read this letter?

The hon. member is not allowed to quote a letter in regard to what happened in the House during this session.

Then I shall only point out that no physical training takes place, and that our men are consequently not fit to take the field. They sleep, eat and drink, and that is all. The Minister of Defence knows that it is so. I have letters here, but unfortunately I am not permitted to read them. I have a letter here from Voortrekkerhoogte in which there is a complaint about physical training being completely neglected. An additional amount is now to be voted for further accommodation at Voortrekkerhoogte, and I want to point out that the position no longer is what it was in the years 1914 to 1918. In this modern war heavy demands are made on the men and yet we are today neglecting physical training. There is a camp here in the Peninsula, too, where no physical training takes place in the mornings. The officers do not like getting up in the morning, they appear on parade at a quarter to nine, whereas physical training has to take place when it is getting light. Then they should be there. I am not talking about something I know nothing about, but I have received a lot of letters, and the Prime Minister’s reply to my question the other day was definitely wrong. I know how those answers are given. The Prime Minister asks his head office what the position is, but the reply which they gave the Prime Minister was definitely wrong. You see the soldiers and you see how they march. In the mornings they keep their heads down and their feet drag, and if they cannot even walk properly in the streets here, then I wonder how they are going to march in the desert? The Germans, at any rate, know the goose step, and they know how to lift their feet, so that they can get over the sand, but our people are not taught how to lift their feet. I hope the Prime Minister will look into this, and that he will see to it that the officers attend early parades, so that physical training takes place.

I have not very much more to say with regard to this Bill, except to deal with the final salient point of the Bill, namely, the Control Board. But, before I do that, I want to correct a possible impression that may be made by this very explanatory memorandum. I am indebted to the hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie), who has drawn my attention to the fact that a certain reference in the memorandum may be misunderstood. It is correct so far as it goes, but rather inclined to convey the wrong impression, and he has been good enough to give me the correct judgment. The reference made is on page 2 at the bottom. The memorandum says that in this case of the South African Mutual Life Assurance Society v. S. Herison, the court ruled that it would give a decision in favour of the tenant only when it has been found that the rent is unreasonable. So far as it goes, it is correct, but it does not convey quite clearly to the layman …

But what is clear in the memorandum?

There is nothing at all clear to my hon. friend. The greatest language purists in the world can never make anything clear to the hon. gentleman. Was that interjection necessary just at this point? My hon. friend is inclined to be impish, not critical. My hon. friend has been good enough to hand me the full judgment, and I won’t go through it all, but will just give you what was the actual finding—

Now, that is the same but different, but I am very grateful to my hon. friend for drawing my attention to it. Should there be any erroneous impression on the minds of hon. members, including the member for Swellendam (Mr. S. E. Warren) as to the interpretation of this matter, I have now quoted what actually happened. In other words, sir, a reasonable rent is not a reasonable rent under the old Act, unless the Rent Board has made a reduction. As no reduction had been made in this case, and the Rent Board had declared the rent already being paid as reasonable, according to the judgment in its narrow interpretation the complainant had no right to have judgment in his favour. I hope that is clear, evidently it is quite clear to my hon. friend. Now, sir, the last important point in this Rent Bill is the institution of a Control Board. That is not new, because we already have a Control Board in existence under the emergency regulations. We have come to the conclusion from experience that Rent Boards all over the country have been working haphazardly, and their work has no co-relation or direction from any central body, and they have been giving all sorts of different interpretations, and in point of fact, setting people by the ears. It is a very important function that will be imposed upon the Control Board, because it will have to co-relate and co-ordinate the work of the Rent Board.

[Inaudible.]

What are the qualifications of the members of the board? Decent fellows, does my hon. friend understand that, decent, sound fellows, men of good, sound commonsense, people we can rely upon.

Supporters of the Government.

I have sufficient nous to select the right sort of people. The question is no doubt a very pertinent one that was put by my hon. friend. Naturally, it is a matter of concern who will compose the Control Board. The Rent Boards will be selected from responsible people, and only after very fine sifting of their qualifications are these Rent Boards going to be appointed, whatever they have been in the past. If we have any condemnation of Rent Boards, such boards, I hope, will be removed under my wise jurisdiction.

What a boy!

My hon. friend’s testimonial is very valuable to me. In addition to this Control Board being a supervisory body, it will also be a court of appeal. Any lessor or lessee, if he is dissatisfied with the judgement of any particular Rent Board, may appeal to this Control Board, which will then go into the circumstances of the case, and will find for or against lessor or lessee, as the case may be. The board will have very important functions to perform, and its establishment is not a shot in the dark, because it has proved itself in the short time it has been in existence, of the utmost value. In order that my hon. friends may see the constitution of the board — my hon. friend down there is particularly anxious about the personnel — I would say that it is at present composed of men whom I will name to the House, and I see no good reason at the moment for changing it. The chairman is Mr. Kuschke, Secretary for Social Welfare, and his alternate, Mr. Van der Horst, the under secretary. Mr. Kuschke is a man of the highest integrity, of the broadest and soundest commonsense, and a man who will steer the barque of this Control Board very carefully between wind and weather. Then there is Mr. Van Zyl Ham, an ex-magistrate and ex-secretary for Mines, a man of many parts and of the highest qualifications, and that testimonial applies almost in an added sense to the third member, Mr. William Houghton, a man well known to most of you, and a man whose integrity and commonsense is undoubted. That is your Control Board at present, and as an indication of the manner in which we are going to select the personnel of the Rent Board, I give these names to you. I have nothing more to say with regard to this Bill, except to say to those who may be somewhat inclined to be adversely critical, on the ground that this Bill affects the sacred rights of profitmongers, I would like to say to them that the time for undue consideration in a favourable respect of their outlook on the question, is long past. Today we are concerned with human happiness, we are concerned, as a State, in seeing to it that no individual shall be bled, at all events bled unduly, and it is in that spirit that I consign this Bill to the tender mercies of hon. members of this House.

I would like to submit for the Minister’s consideration something that goes a little further than the provisions of this Bill, something which I hope the Minister will be able to persuade his colleagues to adopt as successfully as he has already persuaded them to introduce this Bill. Before making my suggestion, however, I want to make a few remarks on the Bill as it stands. Personally, I would prefer the Minister to have stipulated for a nett rental return on cost or value, whichever is the greater, instead of the complicated machinery in Section 1 of the Bill, so that both landlord and lessee could know exactly where they are, and not have to resort to the costly procedure of referring the matter to the Rent Board. In this way a rental value could be placed on all dwellings to let, and landlords could not depart therefrom without the consent of the Rent Board. I think in the Bill too much discretion is allowed to the Board. I am not a believer in leaving matters of dispute to the discretion of other people, because discretion is exercised by different people in different ways, according to their political or social leanings or otherwise. I would prefer an aggrieved party to have a right of appeal to a court of law, rather than to a board appointed by the Government. After all, every citizen in a country feels that he has a right to appeal to a court of law, where impartial judgment will be given. If he is referred to a court of appeal consisting of the hon. gentlemen whose names have been mentioned by the Minister, for whom, by the way, I have the greatest regard, I do not think he will be so satisfied. To deprive an aggrieved party or the parties concerned in a dispute of the right to appear before the courts is a departure from the customary and century-old procedure. I think, also, that a person should be given the right to appear before the controlling authority in person. It gives the parties concerned an opportunity of meeting the board and submitting their case either personally or through a representative. Now coming to the suggestion I want to submit, I want to point out that generally speaking, direct interference with private enterprise is undesirable. I realise there are certain cases where it will be necessary for the Government to interfere with private enterprise, but that should be done as little as possible. Where a position exists which is a matter of national concern then I think the State, rather than interfere with private enterprise, should first consider to what extent it would be the duty of the State to solve the problem by itself undertaking certain steps. It is here that I want to submit a suggestion which I hope the Minister will accept as coming from one who has as much sympathy for the poorer classes as any other member of the House. If rents are arbitrarily reduced, that will not provide decent houses for the poorer people to live in, and the object the Minister has in view will not be achieved, because this Bill may have the effect of retarding private enterprise in the matter of providing houses. The Minister, therefore, would be well advised to accept a suggestion which I feel sure will be welcomed by any of the workers who might be consulted on the subject, that is, that the Government should establish a non-profit working company and let them undertake housing schemes where necessary all over the country. The Minister is quite right in taking control over unscrupulous landlords, but the Bill may have the effect of discouraging private enterprise. We talk a lot today about industrial development, but I would like to take the Minister round some of our larger centres and show him how industrial development automatically makes great demands for housing accommodation. In Vereeniging, where there is considerable industrial development, there are no houses available and workmen have to travel several miles to farms outside the town. Others have to resort to living in any sort of house in order to be near their work. Imagine the expense of travelling 30 to 40 miles a day to and from your work. Those who travel by bicycle exhaust themselves physically and cannot render 100 per cent. satisfaction in their work. Is it not the duty of the State, if there is such a big demand and private enterprise no longer functions, to step in with housing schemes? The Minister may say we already have our economic and sub-economic schemes, and why don’t we persuade our municipalities to take up these loans and put up the necessary houses? My reply to that is, municipalities do not avail themselves sufficiently of money under these schemes, because they refuse to take the responsibility of guaranteeing repayment of the loans to the Government. Whatever the cause, the fact remains that there are not sufficient houses for our workers of the poorer classes. A non-profit making company of the kind I have suggested could build houses cheaper than any private enterprise. They could import all their requirements, cut out the middle man, and build economically. The question is asked, why don’t the industries do this, and my answer to that is that industries which are sufficiently strong financially do do this. They advance money to their workmen, who pay interest and redemption, and insurance, by a monthly payment spread over a period of 20 years, and that kind of scheme is welcomed by the workers; but where industry has to borrow at 5 per cent. the Government can obtain the money cheaper. There is that class of tenant that can afford to pay higher rents, and such tenants we can leave to private enterprise. But it is the workers and poor classes who must be looked after. Those are the classes I stand for, and for whom I want to appeal to the Minister. I don’t think I need go into the details of a public utility company such as I suggest, because the hon. Minister is acquainted with the working of such an organisation. It is not all industries that have wealth enough to spare from their capital for housing schemes. And in making this suggestion I am not only referring to workers in industry. Every workman in this country is entitled to have a decent home and live under decent conditions, and those who hire houses should be able to hire them as cheaply as possible, and this will help to keep down the rising cost of living. Where private enterprise fails, then the State must step in. I make an appeal to the Minister to examine whether he cannot do this, and I assure him that what I can contribute in the way of help or advice will be willingly given.

It has been clear for a long time that rents should be controlled. I want to say at once that we welcome every step that is taken to put rents under proper control, and that, at the same time, provision is made for adequate housing for the people. But I also have the same objection as the hon. member for Vereeniging (Lt.-Col. Rood), that there has not been sufficient provision made for housing in the past. In spite of all the schemes started by the State, by public concerns and by private individuals, there has not been sufficient housing accommodation, and consequently when there was no protection in the large towns there was a sudden increase in rents during the war years. I want to make one thing clear to the Minister, that this is what has happened in regard to the people whom we describe more or less as the middle-class individual. The increase so far as he is concerned has now set in, but as regards the poor man and the very simple worker, house rent has been too high for years. We have had the figures before us for years showing that in our poorer quarters house rents were tremendously high, and that class of person has had to pay high rents for rooms and houses. In regard to the middle-class man, the increase has come about particularly in war time, and it now has to be stopped. But as the Minister is now taking steps under this Bill to exercise control over house rent, it only amounts to this, that certain people can go and complain that their rents are too high, and now we can take it that the more advanced people, the educated people, will know about the provisions of the Act, and will be able to calculate how much rent they should pay. They are the people who will go and complain to the Rent Board, and they will get out of that trouble. But I again want to explain to the Minister that for every one who complains there will be ten others who will put up with these hardships without complaint. In regard to the poor, there will be ninety out of every hundred who are perhaps paying too much rent—they will not go and complain; they will simply eat less, and they will have less money to spend on other things, and consequently they continue paying a rent which is too high. That type of man does not understand the law, and he does not know what the provisions of the law are. If we have a Department of Social Welfare which is really a Department of Social Welfare, and which is able to function as such, which has its branches right throughout the country, with its social workers, male and female, right throughout the country, who can link up with the unofficial male and female workers of all the different institutions in the country, and who make use of all the forces available in the country, we shall be able to make real use of this Act to protect every tenant of a house and of a room in the right way, and to see to it that in two or three months’ time, after the coming into force of this Act, every one of those people will be given advice as to what their rights are as tenants. When I say that if we really have a Department of Social Welfare I do not mean to cast a reflection at the Chief of the Department, or at the department as it is now constituted, but what I mean is this: That we have not yet made it necessary for that department to function as it should function. We require the energies not only of the instructors whom the Minister is appointing, but of the instructors, together with the social male and female workers, the police, the magistrates, and all the Government officials, and the other agencies existing in the country; we require the efforts of all the different institutions, all of which can be used and linked together to bring the benefits of this Bill even to the poorest homes in South Africa. That will at once involve the lessor taking steps to improve the various places. The exorbitant rent which is now being imposed, not only affects the well-to-do classes or the people who are making more money during the war. We must ensure that the full benefits of the Bill are made available to those sections of the population which require it most, which have least money to live on, and which have to pay house rents that are too high, with the result that they cannot afford to get sufficient food to eat. In regard to the rents, 8 per cent. on capital is allowed, and 2 per cent. for depreciation. That is a total of 10 per cent., which I think is quite adequate. It is unnecessary, as the hon. member for Vereeniging has alreadysaid, to allow private initiative a completely free hand.

The 2 per cent. is not absolute. It is not 10 per cent. in the aggregate. The 2 per cent. is optional. It may amount to 2 per cent.

Yes, quite, I understand that. The rates and taxes and such things are added to the rent.

They are first of all deducted and the 8 per cent. comes after that.

Then I want to point out to those people who are so concerned about it not being enough, that people who are interested in investments never depend on more than 10 per cent. in the aggregate. That 10 per cent. includes all the taxes and repairs and profits. For that reason I want to say that the Minister’s 8 per cent. is more or less equivalent to the 10 per cent. gross. I want to make a further remark and it is this, that I think we need not fear that people will stop building merely because of the restrictions which are now being imposed. The plea put up by the hon. member for Vereeniging, so it seemed to me, was for housing schemes which, generally speaking, have nothing to do with this Bill, I have already remarked that the reason why this Bill is required is that Governments in the past did not sufficiently encourage housing and that insufficient houses of the different kinds have been built. Consequently we are now picking the bitter fruit of the neglect of the past. That is why we must naturally urge the Government on a really adequate scale to see to it that houses are built and we shall not stop insisting that this be done, but it appears to me that the cause which the hon. member for Vereeniging has urged can best be urged on the Budget where provision can be made on the ordinary accounts, or on the Loan Accounts, for such schemes. There is one other point I wish to raise. As the Minister said the rent is now attached to the house and not to the tenant. The rent which can be charged now is not allowed to be higher than the lowest rent charged since the 1st April, 1940.

Are you talking about freezing now?

Yes, but I am pointing out that there may be very many cases where only £2 was charged for a house which normally would have fetched £10 — there are many cases like that where out of charity the owner only charged a nominal rent. Such cases do happen, and I assume that the Rent Board will have the power, if it finds that a house has been let at a subnormal rent, to allow a higher rent being charged. I assume that although the Minister has said that rents are to be definitely fixed the Rent Board will have the right in extraordinary cases to allow normal rents to be charged. This is more a case of protection for the lessor. Now there is one other point I want to touch upon in regard to the protection of the lessor, of the owner, and it is this, that one gets people who turn out to be most irresponsible tenants; they roam about from place to place; one gets large numbers of them living in Pretoria, for instance, for a short while and many of them may be entirely indifferent. They don’t care what condition they allow their houses to get into. Now I think that the Rent Board should have the right to allow costs of repairs of an unusual kind, where one is faced with cases of special neglect, to be added, so that the lessor shall have the right to ask for compensation in such cases. We are trying to restrict the lessors but on the other hand we shall also try and give them protection where it is fair to do so. We welcome the Bill. Of course, we should have had legislation of this kind introduced long ago for the protection of the poorer people in this country, the people who have to rent rooms and cannot even afford to rent homes. The Minister held out the prospect that he would possibly accept an amendment also to include shops.

If we can get the necessary support; it is very difficult at the moment.

There is much to be said for such a step. I know that there already is a court which people can approach but it is a very round about procedure. One has to go round about to get certain things done, but if a provision of that kind is inserted in this Bill so as to include shops, we shall have to be very careful. We must take into consideration the type of business which is in many cases run in a place, and which may perhaps affect the whole block, which may affect other tenants. I want to warn the Minister in advance that he must be very careful, and I want to ask him to make provision so that a tenant will not be allowed to use a shop to the detriment of other people who have rented adjoining property. I am mentioning this because of the judgment of the court which the Minister quoted here. I therefore hone that if he accepts an amendment he will be extremely careful and will consider the consequences very thoroughly. I hope that this Bill will have the right effect and that the Minister will particularly see to it that the benefit of this legislation will be explained to the tenant by means of the machinery which we have at our disposal in this country.

I agree with the hon. member who has just spoken (Dr. Bremer) that rent control on sound lines is one of the things which this country wishes to have, but I want to appeal to the Minister to agree to the Act being modified in such a way as not to treat every landlord as though he is a scoundrel, and every tenant as if he is an angel. And from the final remarks the Minister made he gave the impression—at least, that is the impression he made on me—that that is the attitude he adopts. I hope I am mistaken in him. I only appeal to the Minister to recognise that we on this side of the House represent many tens of thousands of very decent people who have put their life’s savings into one or two cottages, so that they may have something in their old age to keep them in moderate circumstances as a consequence of the providence which they have shown in the days when they were able to save something, and therefore I hope that the Minister will do nothing which is calculated to injure people of that character.

On the contrary, I think your landlords are all angels.

Now, the Minister, in his opening speech, pointed out that there were instances in Johannesburg—and he gave them as a reason for the introduction of this Bill—where properties which were only worth £20,000 were bought for £25,000, and where rents worth £100 were taken over at £125 by syndicates with the object of increasing the rent. With due respect, I think the Minister has greatly mistaken the existing law. The Rent Board under the existing law is obliged to have regard only to the “actual cost of erection” of a building, and is not entitled to take into consideration the cost of purchase of a building, and if the Minister will look it up—if he will look up his own memorandum …

Oh, I have done so.

He will see that that particular point is emphasised on page 4, where it says that the lessor’s annual return of 10 per cent. is based on the “actual cost of erection” of the building. These are the words of the present law. So if a Rent Board in Johannesburg was influenced by the fact that property worth £20,000 was, by some irresponsible or unscrupulous people, bought for £25,000 in order to raise the rents, the Rent Board was not entitled to take that into consideration. I want to point out to the Minister that this Bill is intended to be permanent. It strikes at the root of ownership of land, and, as far as the ownership of dwellings is concerned, it practically nullifies the rights of the landlord, and hands over these rights to Rent Boards. Some Rent Boards are probably composed of sound and sensible people, but there are many that have acted in an irresponsible and unfair way, sometimes in favour of the landlord, and sometimes in favour of the tenant. The Minister pointed out to the House that the existing law was not adequate, but he went on to quote instances in which the Rent Board in Cape Town had made very substantial reductions under the provisions of the existing law. How, then, can it be said that the existing law is not being carried out? He quoted instances where rents of £8 10s. per month had been reduced to £6, and rents of 10s. per week had been reduced to 7s. 6d. per week. I make bold to say that wherever a case of hardship has been brought before a Rent Board, the inclination of the Board has been in favour of the tenant, and not of the landlord. That has been the experience, and for the Minister to take up the attitude that the existing law is proving worthless is wrong. The Minister also, as I understood him, said that the decision of the courts had made the carrying out of the existing law difficult. I have taken the trouble to look up some of the recent decisions which have been given after the passing of the 1941 Act. I have here a decision of the Algoa Building Company against the Port Elizabeth Rent Board, in which it was sought to review the decision of the Rent Board, and the decision of the Rent Board was upheld There was another case in Johannesburg. There, also, the decision of the Rent Board was sought to be brought into review and there again the decision was dismissed. Then there was the case of the South African Mutual Society in the Cape Provincial Division in August, 1941 in which they also sought to review the decision of the Rent Board and there again the decision of the Rent Board was upheld. In every case the appeal against the decision of the Rent Board was dismissed.

You might have passed on the names of those Rent Boards so that I could have congratulated them.

The Minister is in the position to find out the names of the Rent Boards but my point in drawing attention to this is not to object to anything in the nature of a fair consolidating Rent Bill but what I say is that the Minister should not bring into this House and try to push through hurriedly at the end of a session a Bill so far reaching in its effect as this one. I am not opposed to an 8 per cent. return plus 2 per cent. for depreciation. That is quite fair. But the point is that it is not an 8 per cent. return. The Rent Board can say “We only allow you 2 per cent.” The 8 per cent. is the “ceiling” as the Minister put it, and then there is the 2 per cent. as a maximum in respect of depreciation, and under those circumstances I say that the effect of this Bill is that housing is being practically handed over to the Rent Board— the lessor is being handed over to the Rent Board who will take complete control of all his property. I would have liked the Minister to have put on the Statute Book a law which would have been a model, which could be carried out for a number of years and which would hold fairly the scales between lessor and lessee, and I am not satisfied that this Bill will do this. I was particularly struck by the two quotations from the Bill which the Minister made. We know that the Minister is perhaps one of the most adroit politicians in this country. I have seldom heard a more adroit speech than the one he made in introducing the Bill. He made two quotations. The one was in connection with the definition of reasonable rent. And there the hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. S. E. Warren) pointed out that it was not in the Bill, and then the Minister said “Oh, I have had that clause redrafted.” Does that not show the Bill has not been sufficiently considered before introduction. He says this new definition of reasonable rent is what he now proposes putting into the Bill.

What is wrong with that?

It means you are running away from your own Bill.

It shows that this vital clause was not in the Bill as printed.

It was done on your request.

The original draft did not express what was intended and after a great deal of lottery—I was able to persuade the Minister to direct his officials to send the clause to the law advisers, to be redrafted. It is this redrafted clause the Minister now proposes, I say that that shows that the Bill has not been properly considered. There are several matters in connection with this Bill to which I think grave exception must be taken. The Bill introduces not only a maximum return, not only does it place in the hands of the Rent Control Board rights which it has never before had, but it establishes a Control Board and the Control Board is a body which has the right to review the decisions of the Rent Board, but the Bill goes on to say that “no party interested shall be entitled to appear either personally or by representation before this Control Board.” Have you ever heard of: n appeal body of the nature of this Control Board which can adequately exercise its functions without the parties appearing before it? Let me put a practical case. Supposing the Port Elizabeth Rent Board decides in favour of a landlord and the tenant wishes to appeal. He has to go to Pretoria; he cannot; and it is likely that the Control Board will interfere, without the case being adequately presented to them? Of course they will not do so. They will argue that the Port Elizabeth Rent Board has heard and seen the witnesses, it knows the locality, probably has examined the locality, and they are not going to interfere, and I say as far as that particular right is concerned it might as well be abandoned. I cannot for the life of me see why the Minister will not let the parties appear before the Control Board either personally or by representatives.

You have just told us that they cannot go. So why press it?

They can be represented in Pretoria or this should be a peripatetic court. Let them go to Port Elizabeth. Make it a body that can function efficiently. It is no use saying that they have to decide on the papers. We know that unless the case is properly presented by both sides it is impossible to judge fairly. Another point which the Minister mentioned was that the landlord should only be entitled to cancel the lease in the event of “substantial” damage being done by the tenant. Why should the landlord be compelled to have to wait until “substantial” damage is done? Surely the provision should be that a tenant must take reasonable care of the premises and if he does not take reasonable care that should be a sufficient reason for the landlord to step in, but to say that the landlord has to wait to take action until substantial damage has been done is whittling away a landlord’s rights in a manner that is not justified. I think also that the Minister might consider whether there should not be an entirely different basic rent. After all, the object of this Act is to provide a rent which will be a reasonable rent in normal circumstances. I think that is the way to approach it and he should instruct the Board that a reasonable rent in normal circumstances is the rent that should be allowed, provided it does not exceed 8 per cent. nett. Now a good deal has been heard, especially from the hon. member for Kensington (Mr. Blackwell) about the position in New Zealand, which is apparently the Utopia of the modern world, where conditions are so good for the underdog that probably no better example can be cited. I have looked up the New Zealand FanRents Act of 1936 and I find the basic rent there is fixed as the rent which prevailed at a particular date. It is provided there that in regard to a dwelling house the basic rent is that which prevailed on the 1st May, 1936, and it is on that rent that the Rent Board is directed to frame its decisions. That is in respect of old properties. And in respect of new properties they take into comparative consideration what would be a fair amount. There is also in New Zealand the provision that the jurisdiction of the Rent Board is limited to houses in respect of which the rent paid does not exceed £156 per annum. So the main object of the New Zealand Act is to protect the poorer type of tenant, and I would ask the Minister when he comes to the Committee stage to give serious consideration to the question whether some limitation of that character should not be made here. There is a very drastic provision in the Bill which says that the Rent Board shall receive and investigate written complaints by a lessee, by an inspector or by “any person other than the lessee.” And then the Bill goes on to provide that the Rent Board can order the lessor to pay to the lessee or to the person, not being an inspector, who lodged the complaint, a sum not exceeding £5 to indemnify the lessee or such person his expenses in connection with the lodging of such complaint. The effect of that is that you are going to have informers, spies and blackmailers encouraged by this Act.

You will have to scrap that.

I understand the Minister has taken up the attitude that the informer must be a representative of a class of trade union or something of that nature. Why should such a person be entitled to come and poke his nose into other people’s business and interfere where the relationship between the landlord and the tenant may have been perfectly fair and amicable? The landlord and the tenant may have been getting on very well, and then you may have a person of this nature interfering and upsetting the whole of the relationship. It seems to me that it is very much sounder to follow the lines of the New Zealand Act. In New Zealand there is a provision in the Fair Rents Act of 1936, Section 17, which provides that—

Why cannot the same provisions be made in this Bill? Let the inspector act for the tenant on his written authority. It seems to me that would be sufficient, and the tenant would be adequately protected if the inspector is told that he is not to take action except on the written authority of the tenant. If the tenant has not got the guts to try and obtain a reduction of the rent then he does not deserve it. But so far as I have heard, tenants are generally not backward in taking action in securing reductions of their rents. I also feel that as far as this Bill is concerned its result is going to be deleterious to the very poor whom it is intended to assist. I say that because I believe that the result of passing a Bill of this nature will mean that anyone who has his wits about him will never invest in housing property. Why should he do so? He will try to sell what he has. The speculator builder will put up houses only to sell, but the investor in house property will disappear. Everyone will try to get out of this type of investment and the housing position instead of being ameliorated will probably become more acute. The Bill is one which the Minister should send to a Select Committee. I don’t know why the Minister should hesitate to allow the Bill to go to a Select Committee, because he is carrying on quite efficiently today under the Emergency Regulations. The committee could sit, it could report on the Bill, and the Bill could be passed at an early stage next year. It will be a fair thing to do, it would be a gesture which would be very much appreciated, and I feel that if that attitude were adopted by the Minister he might put on the Statute Book a Bill which would be a model, not only of justice to tenants, but would enable those landlords who are fair and decent people, to feel that their rights have been protected. I think that to strike at the very basis of ownership, as this Bill seems to do, is a thing not calculated to promote good feeling or to advance the interests of tenants or of the country generally.

I have tried to study this Bill as best I could, and I have looked at it from every point of view. On the platteland we do not get the maximum of 8 per cent. I can quite understand that the poor people have to be protected so far as their rents are concerned. We on this side of the House are strongly in favour of that but I also feel that any legislation on this subject should be so drafted that the scales are held evenly. In other words, the Minister has the right to appoint Rent Boards over the whole country and I assume that he will do so on the platteland now, the trouble is this: If the Board comes there and creates any trouble about the matter we shall find that the position on the platteland will be worse than it is today. We have the greatest difficulty on the platteland to get people to build houses for others The Minister knows the old English saying: “Fools build houses for wise men to live in.” Consequently at times one’s houses stand empty. At the moment there is a scarcity of houses, and the position is that in the circumstances it is necessary, when one gets unscrupulous landlords, such as one often gets in the towns, to have such a Board. I can quite understand the necessity for such a Board in those circumstances. I largely agree with the last speaker that the people who are going to suffer are the poor, particularly if one makes the building of houses entirely impossible. The Government is not prepared to provide any money for housing purposes today while we are at war, and unless the necessary progress is made in the building of houses we are generally going to have the position that people will not be able to get houses. We on this side of the House are anxious to see the poor man assisted, so that he is not subjected to undue hardships. We want to help the poor man; but, on the other hand, I fail to see why we have to provide for people who pay £20 and £30 per month in rent. Those people are not poor. There is no need for the State to protect that type of man. The State need not interfere where people do not require its protection. I should like to see this Bill confined to a reasonable rent of £10 to £15 per month. The man who pays more than £10 or £15 per month is not a poor man. Then we can go even further than the Bill goes to protect those people, because if we deal with everybody’s rent, rich as well as poor, some of these provisions seem to be a bit drastic to me. I am anxious to help the Minister to ensure that people are not treated unfairly in regard to the hiring of property. Now let me come to the Bill itself. My first impression of the Bill is that it has been very loosely drafted; it has been very badly drafted. The language is not particularly good and the Bill is badly drafted. I know the Minister will tell me that the wording of this Bill largely follows the wording of existing laws and that the only thing that has been done is to introduce some amendments. I agree with the Minister that that is so, but that is no reason why I should not object now, when we are drafting a new law. Now I come to the question of reasonable rent. I have no objection to the 8 per cent. or 10 per cent., I am satisfied with that. We do not get 8 per cent. or 10 per cent. on the platteland. In places where rooms are cheap, one may possibly get one’s 8 per cent. or more. When one talks of a reasonable rent I assume that the Rent Boards will fix reasonable rents. The interpretation of reasonable rent reads as follows in the Bill—

1. (a) collection charges;
2. (b) cost of maintenance, repairs replacements and insurance; and
3. (d) depreciation, up to but not exceeding two per cent. per annum on the actual cost of the dwelling:

1. (i) of the actual amount of all rates and taxes and stand licences, if any, paid in respect of the dwelling, and of the land on which it is situate and which is occupied in connection with it; and
2. (ii) an amount deemed by the board to be a reasonable allowance for any furniture or services supplied by the lessor,

I assume that is where one has a flat and service is given as well. That can be deducted and then the landlord has to get a return of not more than 8 per cent. from the building or 6 per cent. from the value of the land. If the tenant pays part of the rates to the Council, for instance, if he pays for water and sanitary services, it is also reckoned to be part of the rent. Now what has the lessor to do with that? That tax is given to the tenant for services from the Municipality, just as one pays for lights, but it is included in the rent and in other words, it is deducted from the 8 per cent. Then there are other places too where the Bill has been badly drafted and I feel that if the Minister wants an Act which is not going to lead to the courts upsetting the decisions of his Rent Boards all day long, and if he really wants to maintain the balance he will certainly send this Bill, even after the second reading, to a Select Committee which will make sure that the Bill is so drafted that it will not leave openings for abuse everywhere.

Are you asking for a Select Committee — are you really serious in asking for that?

If the Minister wants a good Bill it should certainly be done. If he wants a good Act it should be done. It will not take long. I am not speaking of the principles contained in this Bill, I am speaking of the language and the way this Bill has been drafted. Let us take Clause 2 which says this—

The Afrikaans is so bad that I had better read it in English—

But the Minister is not given the power anywhere in this Bill to determine the area. It only says that he can appoint a Board and then he has to announce in the Gazette the area for which those Boards are appointed, but he has not the right to say which area it is.

Can he not do it by regulation?

He cannot do it by regulation; the Act does not give him the right. Show me where he is given that right in the Act?

Do you suggest that the Minister has not got the right to fix the area?

The Minister is not given that right anywhere in this Bill. Let me quote what is said in the Act of 1920. Clause 1 of Act No. 13 of 1920 says this—

The Governor-General has the right to determine the area, but here the Minister is appointing the Boards, not the Governor-General, and the Bill does not say either that the Minister has the right to determine the area where the Boards will have the right to have their instructions carried out. The Board determines the area where every judge and magistrate has the right to judge, and it is determined by the law in which area the magistrate or the judge has jurisdiction. In the Magistrate’s Court the same principle prevails. In this Bill there is no such provision. It may be said that it is contained by implication in the Bill, that people can assume it, but the Act does not confer that right. Now, I feel this, too: that when the areas are determined it should be compulsory for the hon. the Minister first of all to get the right from the Municipality or Divisional Council concerned which has control over the area. That to my mind is essential, because otherwise the Minister may appoint a Board in an area which does not need a Board, and which does not want a Board at all. At the same time, it protects the honest people from the dishonest ones. I therefore feel that the Minister should first of all consult the Divisional Council or the Municipalities before appointing the Boards in any area. He should get their consent to do so. I don’t want to go into this matter any further, but I only want to tell the Minister that there are many instances in this Bill of bad draftsmanship which will have to be changed to put the Bill in order. I do not even want to talk about the translation. I have quoted here and there from the Bill, but one cannot understand it because the translation is too bad. Now I want to ask the Minister why a Control Board should be appointed at a time when the whole world is crying out against Control Boards, and when the duties which they have to perform can be performed by the department. The Minister proposes appointing people who come under his department. If that is so, then why should a special Board of Control be appointed? Then I also want to point out that the Minister assumes in this Bill that these Rent Boards will not do their work. He assumes that.

May I be allowed to put you right? Only one department is involved.

But the position is that all the departments are under the Minister’s control. If the department can do this, the heads of the department can be used, and it will be cheaper. There will be clerks receiving small salaries, and consequently it will come out cheaper. Let me quote Clause 4 of the Bill in English: The Afrikaans is so poor that I prefer to read it in English—

What is wrong with that?

Hon. members will notice that it is said here that the Control Board must “endeavour”. Why is it put in that form? Why is it said that they shall “endeavour”?

That is quite right. You “endeavour” to persuade me, but you won’t succeed.

That is quite different. Here we have a legal document, and one should make sure that the language is correct.

Do you object to the word “endeavour”?

It seems that the Minister takes it for granted that the Rent Boards will not do their duty, and it seems to me that he takes it for granted that the Control Board will not be able either to do its duty, because all it has to do is to “endeavour”. When an Act is drafted in terms of which, for instance, a court is appointed, one does not expect the Act to say that the court shall “endeavour” to perform certain duties. The Afrikaans of this clause reads as follows—

Rather let me quote it in English from here—

Hon. members will notice it is said here “in its discretion.” It is not necessary to appeal. They can enquire without an appeal being lodged. Even though the people have not appealed they still have the right to say that the rent is too high and that it shall be reduced—

Now I just want to say this to the Minister, that here in the Cape Province he cannot determine the value of property on the valuation of the Municipality or of the Divisional , Council, because the valuator appointed by a municipality is told how he has to value. He does not value in accordance with the value of the land, the market value of the land. He values according to what it would cost to put up a house there; in other words, replacement value; that is what he takes. Consequently, the value determined by a municipality or a divisional council in the Cape Province is not the market value of a property. The valuation is made for the purpose of levying rates. It does not matter how low or how high it is, because everybody pays more or less in accordance with the value fixed by the valuators. When, therefore, the hon. Minister refers to those valuators, he looks for trouble. Yesterday the Hon. the Minister for Native Affairs had to get up here and say that valuation was not an “exact science.” If the valuator values the land at a certain value, after all it is only his personal opinion. It is not the market value of the land. The valuator takes into account the value of land generally in those areas, then he takes the size of the land and he works it out at so much per square foot. In other words, the best evidence of the market value of any property is the value which is acquired at a public sale. Everybody has the right to go there and the price paid there can be taken as the market value. That at any rate is admitted by the law. The Government assumes that the value at public sales is the market value of that property and on that one pays one’s 2 per cent. transfer duty. The hon. the Minister will tell me “I realise that I am going to have trouble, but one must have trouble anywhere.” All we have tried to do is to maintain the balance. I should also like to say a few words about this right which is being given in this Act and which will eventually result in a system of espionage. One can quite understand that if another man has a property which is exactly the same as mine and the other man gets £4 for his property, and I get £5, objections are going to be raised. The neighbours will cause trouble. You will get people “busybodies” who will raise all kinds of objections and who will go to the rent boards. One may perhaps get an instance of a tenant being perfectly satisfied with the rent he is paying and the lessor being perfectly satisfied, but one of those people who is at loggerheads with the tenant or with the lessor may come along and start raising objections. And if he wins his case he gets £5 costs. In other words, he can start looking for trouble in order to earn £5. I fail to understand why this provision has been put in. The name of such a person is not announced. In other words he is a spy. We are living in times where espionage is playing a great part, and now we are introducing espionage in this Bill. It is unreasonable. The Minister, so far as costs are concerned, is supposed to have taken over the provision of the old Acts, but there is nothing in the old Acts about inspectors, news carriers, complainants or busybodies. And now you are going to give those people costs on top of it all. What is the position today? That man can get costs and he may roam about and cause trouble in order to get costs. Now I want to ask the Minister, if a witness is subpoenaed, who pays for the costs of the witnesses? Who pays witness expenses? There is no provision for that in the Bill; it does not say who has to subpoena the witnesses. I want to know who pays the witness expenses. Let me read what sub-section (2) of Clause 7 says—

That has to be proved. But how am I going to prove it? If I bring a case against somebody else I am awarded costs if I win, and I have to pay costs if I lose. One goes further and admits that there are tenants whom one does not like to have on one’s property. If a man does not pay his rent and I sue him for ejectment and he goes to the Rent Board I cannot eject him. The case before the magistrate is stopped immediately and it may perhaps take me a month or more before I can eject the man. By that time he has not paid me for a few months and before I am able to get rid of him a few more months have passed and I cannot get anything out of him. This sort of thing does not seem to me to be fair or reasonable. It does not seem to me that the scales are being kept even. When people are ejected from their houses in an unfair manner I want to help and I want to help in every reasonable way possible. But take the man who rents a house for £25 per month. He does not pay me at the end of the month. I allow another month to pass, and then he owes me £50. Now I have to apply to the Rents Board to get the man ejected and the tenant then says that the rent is unreasonably high and another month passes before anything can be done. By that time he owes me £75. I have to lose all that money and I have no chance of getting anything out of him. In other words this class of person who is well-to-do and who is able to pay the rent is getting rights under this Bill to which he is not entitled. If it were a question of a poor man paying £3, £4 or £5 per month for a house, and if we gave him such rights, I could quite understand it, but why give those rights to a man who can afford to pay £25 and £30 per month in house rent. Some scale will have to be inserted in this Bill so that the poor man can be assisted, but to prevent injustices being done and to prevent the man who is able to pay and help himself from being covered by this Bill to the detriment of another section of the community. In those cases ordinary business principles should not be disturbed. I assume that the Minister is not anxious to disturb ordinary business practices, but that is what this Bill is going to do, and if we are compelled to do so we should do it as sparingly as possible. The only man who is entitled to this protection is the poor man. The man who is not skilled enough, or who for some reason or other is not able properly to look after himself, but the man who has got a certain amount of knowledge, who is able to look after himself, and pay £25 per month in house rent—that man should not come under the provisions of this Bill at all. That is not right. While I am in favour of a Rent Board and while I am in favour of people being protected and while I am prepared to go even further to help the poor people, I see no reason for giving those rights to people who can pay £20 and £25 per month in house rent. I therefore ask the Minister to send this Bill to a Select Committee which can go into those matters and send it back as soon as possible if he wants it to be put in force during the present session. If that is done we shall be able to put the Bill right where it contains matters which should be rectified. In principle we are in favour of the protection of the poor people. We are in favour of putting a stop to the unscrupulous landlord who tries to force money out of people when there is a housing scarcity. We are prepared to help, but for the reasons I have adduced I think I have the right to ask the Minister to send this Bill to a Select Committee so that we may be able to get an Act put on the Statute Book which is not going to cause trouble all day long and give rise to cases which continually have to be brought to court. We want to be able to put an Act on the Statute Book which will be useful and helpful. I also think that when we are dealing with such large house rents there should be a right of appeal. In the case of the poor man I can quite understand why the Minister makes this provision. The poor man cannot afford to engage Counsel for an appeal case. That is why the Minister places this cheap machinery at his disposal, but when we come to the man who pays £25 per month in house rent, then it appears to me that he is able to defend himself and to go to the High Court. In the circumstances I do not think there can be any objection to such a provision. I think that with these few remarks I have shewn that I am entitled to feel that the Bill should be more closely scrutinised. I again want to say to the Minister that we realise the need for legislation of this kind. We want to assist the Minister to turn this Bill into a good and useful Act. We do not think 8 per cent. is an unfair rent, but in that connection I should like to know this: and my question refers to the definition, to the interpretation of terms: I understand that the Minister proposes introducing an amendment. The provision now appearing in the Bill is that I can get 8 per cent. per year on my money by way of house rent. Now, assuming a place is vacant for six months. What is the position going to be? Let us assume that the house costs £300. That means that I can get £24 per year in house rent, or £2 per month. Assuming that house is vacant for six months, shall I then be allowed to claim £4 per month for the other six months so as to get my 8 per cent? I should like that point to be made perfectly clear. I do not know what the position in the towns is, but on the platteland there are many poor people who out of their small savings have bought a little house which they have let to others. Those people don’t ask unfair rents and they are not the sort of people whom we want to subject to all the pinpricks involved in a measure of this kind. I have in mind an old lady who has two houses which she lets. She gets £8 per month for the two and that is all she has to live on. In addition to her own house. Say somebody gets her into trouble, perhaps because she has killed some fowls which have destroyed her flowers; supposing those people go and complain and this old lady is brought under the provisions of this Bill with all its complications and difficulties. If she does not get the rent from her houses, she has nothing to live on. People like that also have to be protected. We should not look at the one side only, one should look at both sides of the case. Those poor people are just as much entitled to assistance and they need assistance just as much as the people who have rented houses from them. The wage, the earnings of a person like that is £8 per month. Surely we want to encourage people to save their money so that they can have their own house. Even the old age pension allows an individual to have a house valued at £400 before any reduction is made in the amount of old age pensions granted to such individuals. It is something to encourage people to have their own houses, and as we are doing this we are not entitled to pass legislation which is going to make the position impossible for people who have invested their small savings in a house. I think the best thing the Minister can do is to send this Bill to a Select Committee. I agree with the hon. member for Pretoria City (Mr. Davis) that as the Minister wants the Bill passed during the present session, we should send it to a Select Committee and lay down a time limit for the Select Committee, so that the Bill can be back before this House within a certain time. I should like to see the Bill so drafted that we are not going to have all those difficulties and law suits which we have had so often in connection with measures of a similar kind. I have not studies the translation of this Bill but when the Emergency Regulations were before the House we drew attention to the translations, and the first time those regulations came before the courts the courts gave a different interpretation of the Afrikaans, and the case was thrown out. We don’t want to have that sort of thing in connection with our legislation. The Minister of Social Welfare is very astute and he speaks well, and we don’t want his Bill is to be useless and worth nothing, so that everybody can find fault with it. No time need be lost. At any rate we are still going to be here by the middle of April and there is an opportunity and time to give the Select Committee a chance to put these things in order. If that is not done and the Bill is passed as it is now, the Government will have to take the responsibility and not we. The Government is prepared to take that responsibility, but I think it is going to have trouble in regard to the matters I have mentioned, and I fail to see why we should not put these things straight beforehand.

I think we can assure ourselves that the Bill has had rather a mixed reception, but I suppose that that must be expected in a Bill of this character. I would, of course, be very glad to see this Bill go to a Select Committee, but I wish to support the Bill, and as the Minister has decided that it shall not go to a Select Committee; well, I must leave it at that. One was almost frightened by the description of what will happen if this Bill is put on the Statute Book, particularly by what the hon. member for Pretoria, City (Mr. Davis) said. Still, I have no fears in that regard. My fears are of a different character. My fears are both with regard to dwellings and with regard to shop rents —my fears are that there might be no Act at all, and I think that would be very much more disastrous than anything else that could happen. There are several things in the Bill with which one cannot quite agree. I rather endorse what my hon. friend for Swellendam (Mr. S. E. Warren) said with regard to the constitution of the Committee. And I think one might say that one could regard the Control Board as something of an unwanted body. I shall deal with the Rent Board in a moment, because that is the basis of the Bill, but it seems to me that you are filling a warehouse with assistants, and then refilling it with managers.

What about directors?

No, there are no directors here. And another feature is this: If you have one Control Board I don’t see much objection—but my fear is the expenditure. If I read Clause 4 (d) it seems to me that you clearly provide for a whole host of Control Boards and not merely for one Board. And if you do that, then surely we are going to double or maybe treble the expense. That is all wrong. I leave that question for the moment. I think the House should hesitate before agreeing to this twoedged sword of expenditure and management. But when you come to the Rent Board, that, after all, is the basis of the Bill, and I would say to the Minister that if the Rent Board is properly constituted, if it is composed of what one might call the good men throughout the country, you will find that there will be very few appeals from the Board, if any. If you have a provision for appeal, what will happen? You will have plenty of appeals. The Minister will say that it will cost nothing, but it will benefit no one. I do think that the Control Board must disappear, and more especially if my reading is correct, and if you are going to have Control Boards all over the country. There is just one feature which to me is serious. Say you have a lease. That lease expires, and yet the tenant may stay on. Whatever arrangements you may have made—and you certainly would make arrangements for dealing with your property —the tenant may say: “No, I am staying here,” and where are you then? And here you provide a penalty of £50. Would it be very rude to say that it is very foolish?

No, my dear chap; say it if you like.

And unreasonable. Is that rude? And surely there is such a thing as sanctity of contract? But that seems to be thrown to the wind.

That is rude.

Of course, I know the Minister will take that out of the Bill. Then the Bill says that there will be no application of the Act unless you have a Rent Board in a particular part of the country. Well, surely you can make better arrangements than that. If you want your Act to be effective at all, you have to arrange for Rent Boards everywhere. Surely provision should be made through your courts for these things to be dealt with? I don’t want to say much now on this return of property, but I do know this, that it is wise not to do anything that will kill investments throughout the country. You cannot put anything in any Bill that will do more harm than that. I am not saying that I disagree with this, but do not let us represent to the country that there is going to be 8 per cent. on property, less certain expenses, because we know there is going to be nothing of the kind. I think in all probability, when this measure comes to the Committee, the Minister will be glad not to put 8 per cent. on property and 6 per cent. on land, but in all probability to put 8 per cent. all round with certain deductions, that will level the matter at any rate something. Those really are my only objections to this Bill, and I see no reason why they should not be eliminated during the Committee stage, but what the Bill should have dealt with is left out. The position in regard to houses is to my mind nothing like as serious as that in regard to shop rents. Let hon. members realise what may happen in the next few years. There will be very little building, indeed. A complete change has taken place in the position. In the old days on the Rand one went out to Benoni, Boksburg, or Krugersdorp, and one met with Mr. Geldenhuys or Mr. Bezuidenhout, or some other owner of a property there, and bought property from him if one wanted to. But what is taking place now is this. And that is the only reason for suggesting that shop rents should appear in the Bill. It has become an investing factor. The smaller shops have become an investing factor. They have been sold over and over again. I think the House will realise what that means. First of all, how unfair it is; and, secondly, it is a position which cannot be allowed to go on without detriment to the country. Why leave this out of the Bill? It is a most urgent matter, and in all probability it will be very seriously affected in the next few years, particularly if there are depressions and so on. That position is going to be affected very badly. That is a factor I want to put to the Minister. I support the Bill and I know that the objections to certain clauses can be put right, but the Bill does not fulfil the function it should fulfil unless shop rents are also dealt with. So I ask the Minister to include shop rents in the Bill.

There are a few things in this Bill which I wish to bring to the Minister’s notice. This is a consolidation of the Rents Act in connection with houses. This Bill does not deal with shops at all. The year before last we passed Act No. 26 of 1940 which contained a very good provision in regard to lodgers in boarding houses. Now I notice that in terms of Clause 23 of this Bill a number of Acts and clauses are being repealed, and among those, Clauses 1 and 2 of Act No. 26 of 1940 are also to be repealed. The result is that to all intents and purposes we shall be restoring the old position in regard to lodgers. They will again be left to the mercy of the boarding house keepers. I know that the Minister will say that provision is made under the Emergency Regulations for certain boarding house charges and that those charges cannot be exceeded. The Minister should, however, be made aware of the fact that especially on account of the housing scarcity in Cape Town, there are thousands of people who find it totally impossible to get houses at all and who have to live in boarding houses, and they can now be given notice to leave. They are not protected at all. I feel that this is the place where we should make provision for these people and if that is not done, then the Minister should introduce a Bill in connection with that matter, either now or at some later stage. The Minister must be aware of conditions in the large towns; he must be aware of the fact that lodgers are in one boarding house one month and next month in another one. Those are the poor people drawing small salaries who cannot afford to have a home of their own —they live in boarding houses and they are not protected under this Bill. The only protection they get is that which they receive under the Act of 1940. And that protection is now being taken away so that all we have to fall back on is the Emergency Regulations.

But the Act dealing with boarding houses, hotels and shops, still exists.

No this Bill has nothing to do with shops. This Bill only deals with the Acts in regard to rents for dwelling houses; it has nothing to do with shops. So far as shops are concerned the existing Acts are not being repealed. All the old provisions in regard to shop rents will still remain in force. This Bill only deals with rents of dwelling houses, and now I want to tell the Minister that Act No. 26 of 1940 provided that lodgers would come under the Rents Act but the Minister is now withdrawing that provision and he is not providing at all for lodgers. I know that the Minister of Commerce and Industries in terms of the powers granted him by the Emergency Regulations made provision that the prices paid by lodgers would not be allowed to be increased by more than 10 per cent. or 15 per cent. But all that is temporary and I want to remind the Minister that he should remember that class of people who are obliged to live in boarding houses today, and who may be given notice to leave. I do not want the Minister to deprive the boarding house keepers of anything, but these people living in boarding houses are now asking why they should be obliged to move from one place to another, month after month. If they get notice they have no remedy. I should like the Minister to give his attention to that aspect of the matter. Then there is another question. The Minister knows that under the Government’s housing schemes provision has been made for subeconomic housing, and the people living in those houses must not earn more than a certain wage. Those houses are intended for people drawing small salaries—I am referring to housing schemes such as the Vredehoek and Brooklyn schemes—and the idea is that these people shall be able to get houses at a reasonable rent. But what is happening now? The incomes of those people have to a certain extent been increased in times like the present, so that they exceed the limits which have been laid down. Consequently, the people living in those houses are earning more today. They are not entitled to live in those houses because they earn more and we have had quite a number of cases in Cape Town where attempts have been made to get that class of man out of the houses and this Bill is going to assist that type of man. The sub-economic housing schemes are undertaken to assist a man who has a small salary, and to enable him to get a house, and it is therefore necessary sometimes to stop other people from getting into those houses. Now I want to ask the Minister to enquire to what extent people with larger incomes will be able under the provisions of this Bill to remain in those cheap houses. I want to tell the Minister that some of the councils which deal with those housing schemes have had difficulties and that they have had to go to court to get some of those people ejected. Is this legislation going to make it more difficult for those councils properly to control those housing schemes, and to make them answer their purposes? Is it going to be more difficult to eject people who do not come under the class for which those houses were built? I am pleading for the people with small salaries who are entitled to get those houses which were built under a sub-economic scheme. I hope the Minister will go into that question. It has been said that this Bill may possibly interfere with the building of houses. I am not very much concerned with that possibility, but the hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. S. E. Warren) expressed the opinion that people with money might be scared away by the provisions of the Bill and that they would not invest their money in houses. Personally I think that on the platteland there are quite a number of houses today where the rent does not amount to 8 per cent., and it is quite possible that the adoption of this Bill will mean an increase in the building of houses on the platteland. For that reason I do not share the fears of the hon. member for Swellendam. But there is something in this Bill I don’t like at all, and that is Clause 12 which provides for appeals from the Rents Boards to the Control Boards. We appealed to the Minister last year when we had similar legislation before us and we asked him not to exclude our High Courts. These control boards will now be given full power and there will be no appeal from their decisions, and, what is worst of all is this, that if there is an appeal from a Rent Board to the Control Board it is said in the Bill that—

It is laid down, therefore, that the person concerned is not even to be allowed to appear before the Control Board. If I am not satisfied with a decision of the Rent Board, I can appeal to the Control Board, but I cannot appear in person to explain the matter nor can I appoint anyone to appear on my behalf.

The facts will be there.

No, that is an unheard of system, to say that when there is an appeal one is not allowed to attend personally or to send a representative. Whenever an appeal is heard before the High Court, whenever an appeal goes to the Appellate Division, all the documents are prepared, sworn statements are put up, and the findings of the judges are forwarded, but in spite of that the court requires the advice of a representative of the appellant to explain the matter, and the barrister appearing in the case has to submit his contentions to the court. Does the Minister want to suggest that the members of a control board are more competent than our judges? If the judges consider it necessary to obtain the assistance of the party concerned through his advocate, why should not the control board also receive such assistance? I want to tell the Minister that I am just as anxious as he is to get this Bill on the Statute Book, but I consider that if the measure were more perfect than it is, it would give greater satisfaction to the country—it would give the tenant or the lessor more satisfaction if he knew that he eventually had the right to go to a court of appeal, to go to a High Court, where he could be properly represented. Our Supreme Courts are free from any influences but one is not convinced that that will be the case to the same extent with a Rent Board or a Control Board. However well intended the Minister may be, and I accept his bona fides, I want to point out that his successor may perhaps not take up the same attitude, and he may possibly appoint people for some reason or another so that in future there may perhaps be people on those boards who may allow certain influences to prevail. The Minister should make that impossible. Make it possible for the public to appeal to the court in the final instance. Then we shall know that right and justice will be done.

If I were convinced that it would not involve the parties concerned in costs I might perhaps be inclined to accept that suggestion.

Mr. Speaker, I rise not to bury Caesar, nor to unduly praise him, but I think the hon. Minister will probably be surprised to hear me say that I can see some good points in this Bill. At any rate I think the least I can say is that this Bill is an improvement on the other measures which this one seeks to replace. I am very glad to find that in this measure the property owner has “a place in the universe.” I think probably the Minister has come to the realisation that property owners are not all rack-renters, a large percentage of them are honest people and all they ask for is to get a fair return on their outlay. Unfortunately all measures that have been passed already have treated all land owners alike and classed them all as rack-renters, consequently few people have a good word to say for the owner. I would like to deal with one or two of the definitions in this Bill, and the first is “reasonable rent.” It is certainly not an easy matter to define what a reasonable rent is. I speak as an ex-estate agent and valuator, and I hope I know something about the business. It is certainly not an easy matter to define, but I think in this Bill the Minister has been able to evolve a set of clauses which should enable the Rent Board to define a reasonable rent, that is, unless some clever lawyer manages to find a loophole through which to upset the whole thing.

They will do that all right.

The other definition is that of “value.” I am very glad to note that in the Bill the opinion of a qualified valuator is introduced. I have no doubt that that innovation will assist the Rent Board very considerably, and it is something which will also help the landlord in standing up for his rights. In the Bill there are three ways in which the Board can determine the value. One is the original cost, the other is the municipal valuation, and the third is by means of an independent valuator. But the Bill does not state which of these three methods is to be taken, nor who shall decide which of the three is to be taken.

The board will.

I have not noticed that it is definitely stated who is to decide which of these methods should be taken. I would like to mention to the Minister that valuators engaged for rent board purposes should be subject to the approval of the Rent Boards, and if I might say so, the Master of the Supreme Court has a panel of valuators, and if the Rent Boards were to adhere to these panels, they won’t go very far wrong. Another point which has been a very sore one with property owners in the past is this. A party rents a house and sub-lets the top floor, while he, the original tenant, occupies the ground floor. We will say that the tenant pays £10 for the house, and he sublets the top floor for £7 10s. Then the original tenant complains to the Rent Board that he is paying to much, and I understand that the Rent Boards, in the past, have refused to take into consideration the fact that the tenant is sub-letting half the house at more than half the rent. I understand they have refused to consider that the tenant, himself, is doing a bit of profiteering.

They reduced the rent of the rooms, though.

I cannot see in the present Bill how that matter is to be overcome. When settling a rental the board should be compelled to take into consideration what the tenant is getting in the way of subletting. If the hon. Minister can tell me where that is in the Bill, I shall be very much obliged. Then as to this question of 8 per cent. and 6 per cent. I think that under conditions of the money market and the cost of living, these percentages are fair, 8 per cent. on the building and 6 per cent. on the land, but I think this provision ought to be made elastic and I think the Minister or the Governor-General should have the power to vary this if circumstances warrant it. As to the appointment of the Control Board, that is a very important matter, and I am glad to hear the Minister say that only the very best men are going to be appointed. I do not think that has been the case in the past, because there have been a good many appointments in the nature of “jobs for pals,” and very often people who are not capable of giving a sound judgment when a case is put before them, have been appointed. I would like to commend the decision of the Minister in appointing magistrates as chairmen of these boards; that is a move in the right direction. I don’t know, however, why this should be called a Control Board, and I suggest the name be changed to reviewing board, or some other more suitable description. I have been told that the Minister is adamant on this subject, but I would like to suggest that there should be at least one member of the board who is versed in estate matters. I don’t mean that he should be an estate agent, but he should be somebody who knows something about the value of property, a valuator or somebody who has acted for a building society. I think that is the least the Minister can do, to have somebody on the board who knows something about property. Another grievance against the present system is not met in the Bill. The Rent Board declines to give any reasons for its decision. Now I think it is only fair to the tenant or the property owner who appeals to the Rent Board, that when a decision ?s taken the parties should be given, in writing, the reasons for the decision. I give an instance that happened not long ago. It was a case where a tenant occupied a flat and applied for a reduction in rent. It was decided to visit the block of flats, and the board came to the conclusion that the rents charged were not excessive, but they nevertheless reduced the rent to the complaining tenant. I cannot see the consistency of that, and I think it should be laid down that Rent Boards must give their reasons for their decisions in writing. Another item which I welcome is the clause which states that the Board may have sworn valuators to assist them in coming to their decision. That is a very useful innovation, and I am pleased to see it in the Bill. In Section 7, also, I see that the rights of owners are recognised. If a tenant presents a frivolous complaint, he can be ordered to pay a penalty of £5, and that, again, I commend. It is a recognition that the property owner has rights as well as the tenant. With regard to the appointment of inspectors, this may or may not be a good thing, but I think the Minister has to be very careful in his choice of inspectors, because of the very wide powers given to these inspectors, powers which may be greatly abused if he gets the wrong men in the job. As regards Section 18, which lays down the powers of these inspectors, I think those powers are far too wide, and I think the Minister ought to consider modifying those powers. It seems that one of these inspectors can walk into private premises at any reasonable hour and ask all sorts of questions, and demand to see books and documents, and so on. I hope the Minister, in the Committee stage, will be prepared to modify that in some way.

He must have plenty of power or he will be useless.

The Minister would not like an inspector to walk into his house and ask his servants, or possibly his wife, for all sorts of information. That is what this Clause 18 permits him to do. There is one thing I want to appeal to the Minister about, and that is this. The Bill has been brought in at very short notice, and towards the end of the session. The people in South Africa have not had an opportunity of studying this, and I ask the Minister to allow the Bill to go to a Select Committee. That would enable those interested to lay their views before the Minister, and that will possibly obviate coming next session with an amending Bill. I commend this to his favourable consideration, and ask him to allow the Bill to go to a Select Committee to report within a fortnight, and then to come back to this House.

We consider the principle of the Bill to be correct. We are in favour of the capitalists not being able to get too much rent out of the poor man, but I agree with the hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. S. E. Warren) that the Bill has been very loosely drafted, and that as a result of this Bill many difficulties may arise, which may land people into court and lead to a lot of unnecessary expense. For instance, there is the question of valuation. Would it be right to accept the municipal valuation? It is generally admitted that the municipal valuation represents about three-quarters of the actual value of a property, because that valuation is made for taxation purposes, and in most cases does not represent the real value for which the properties can be sold. I feel that the owner should have the right to have a valuation made by a sworn valuator, and that that should serve as the basis for the fixing of the rents. Then there is another point, namely, that the lessor will not have the right to eject a tenant if he does not pay his rent. We also regard that as unreasonable. Then there is the question of rates. The Bill provides that certain rates can be deducted, but what about sanitary fees, for instance, and the fees for the removal of refuse? It is usual for water and electricity to be paid by the tenant, but the landlord pays sanitary fees, etc. I should like to know what the Minister intends doing in that regard. We think the request for the Bill to be referred to a Select Committee is a reasonable one, but we also feel that the Select Committee should present its report to the present session, because we realise the necessity of legislation of this kind.

I regard this Bill with disapproval because I think that legislation of this kind has the effect of creating the evil of high rents, which the Minister says he is trying to remedy. The reason is that Control Boards constitute an interference with the liberty of contract and form a deterrent to people who would otherwise invest their money in property of this kind. For that reason the Bill has already operated to limit the supply of houses, so that at present in the towns the supply is not equal to the demand. It also hits the small property owner, and not the rich man who puts out his money on mortgage. The rich man in South Africa does not invest in small property. It may be right to have control in abnormal times, and I only want to criticise this measure as one which is not designed to deal with abnormal times only, but is inteded to be a permanent feature of our legislation. I regard the high rents prevailing in our urban areas as one of the greatest evils in the country, and I do feel, sir, that nothing effective has been done by either the central Government, whom I criticise with great respect, or the local governments. They have done nothing to get to the heart of the evil and to provide a remedy. I would remind the House that Judge Bacon that great philosopher and economist, said that no man should pay more than one sixth of his income by way of rent, and if he desires to acquire affluence he should not pay more than one-eighth. I venture to say that in the town I live in, Durban, no small salaried man or artisan can get a house at less than one-fourth of his income, many of them pay more. I do not welcome the Bill, because it will add to that shortage of houses that I deplore so deeply. There are three main reasons why we have a shortage of houses in our towns, and the first is that land, the most important factor in the cost of a dwelling house, is so costly. The local authorities at Durban — again I think of Durban — conspire with the land owners to put up the price of land, and they have sold it at £4,000 and more an acre, land intended for building dwelling houses. It is quite impossible to get a house at a reasonable rental when the land on which it is built is sold at £4,000 an acre. I feel that we should face this problem and tackle it at its root. If we provided the land at reasonable cost, private enterprise would do the rest.

When the House rose I was dealing with the question of land which should be made available for building purposes. In a town like Durban there are thousands of acres of land in the neighbourhood which could be made available and accessible by reasonable transport facilities. We have sugar lands which are within six miles of Durban and I can see no reason why these lands should not be expropriated and I suggest that that is a matter which is deserving of the most earnest attention. Land should be expropriated and be taken over at a reasonable cost and reasonable terms could be arranged in such a manner that when action is taken the sharks would not be able to get a bite. The point I want to make is transport facilities. It should be the duty of local authorities to provide transport facilities for their citizens in the neighbourhood of the towns. We have an illustration — again I fall back on Durban — we had a tramway service which stopped at the Tollgate. Just beyond that limit hundreds of people live in small houses to escape the Borough rates. The Borough was not concerned with them — they said: “You live outside the Borough, so you can walk.” I think it is wrong, it is the local authority’s duty, and if they are not prepared to carry out their duty and provide transport facilities then no obstacle should be placed in the way of private enterprise to carry out that duty. We have to see that our citizens in the big towns are properly housed, and the only way to do it is to destroy the obstacles. Another obstacle is provieded by the absurd building restrictions in the towns. We find that they have brick areas, and the unfortunate people have to build their houses in brick with 9 inch external walls and all sorts of other foolish restrictions. When I came here we all lived in iron houses lined with brick and they were cheap, cool and comfortable. And I can see no reason why our citizens should be deprived of that freedom of action; Why they should be deprived of the right to build the kind of house they want to live in on their own land. I think these restrictions are deplorable and if we probe into them who is interested? If we look into many of these things we see that the big brick and stone companies are monopolists and are responsible for these restrictions. I listened to the Minister and I do not want to be in the least disrespectful, but I heard him run a tilt against the profit-mongers, and it seems to me that I can draw attention to the story of the description of a boxing contest where one of the combatants was described as a man who worked like a beaver but could not knock a hole in a tub of butter, and I think that that is very descriptive of the Minister’s attitude.

Well, I think I should knock a very big hole in your argument.

I have not heard any answer to my argument. I would call this Bill a shadow boxing Bill — that is my idea of it. It is designed to overcome the great difficulty which citizens have in providing themselves with dwellings at a reasonable rental, and it is as useless for that purpose, to my mind, as a shadow boxer — it dances around the problem and then punches the air. If we removed the obstacles, private enterprise would soon supply the demand for houses and rents would fall to a reasonable figure.

The hon. member who has just spoken could very much more appropriately have made his speech on the Durban Savings Bank Bill. That is all I want to say about his remarks. I want to deal with the Bill before the House straight away. We have listened to much lukewarm support and more candid criticism. I, for my part, wholeheartedly support this measure as one of the most important measures of social legislation which we have yet had. It seeks to try and bring down the cost of living as far as the masses are concerned by keeping down rent which is one of the chief ingredients in the cost of living, and by looking properly after those who are today being provided with houses by private enterprise. Now, the points which have been made so far have really not gone into the main merits of the Bill. The hon. member for Vereeniging (Lt.-Col. Rood) has spoken of the need for housing; so have other members. They have not really touched on the Bill itself. There was nothing incompatible between the Bill and the need for a national housing scheme. I am sure that the Minister and the Government will be very pleased to take up the question of a national housing scheme in South Africa as soon as they are able to do so, but that may take some time, and until the time that such a scheme can be introduced we have to deal with the whole question of rents, and we have to introduce a measure of this kind to check rents from going beyond a reasonable point. There is another point, and that was urged by several members here—that hardship would be inflicted on the poorer landlord. We heard a lot of the old arguments put forward. The hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. S. E. Warren) spoke about the old lady who had invested her savings in a few properties, and so did the hon. member for Pretoria, City (Mr. Davis). I want to say this: I have every sympathy with the old lady who has invested her savings, but I should like to remind hon. members that hard cases make bad laws, and you cannot possibly legislate for individual cases. In regard to other objections raised by hon. members who spoke of the hardships that this Bill would cause to some landlords, I want to remind hon. members that you cannot make omelettes without breaking eggs. I am satisfied that the House and the country are in favour of doing something drastic to keep down the cost of living, and to keep down rents. Reference was made by the hon. member for Graaff-Reinet (Dr. Bremer), and I am very much in agreement with him on this matter, to the regrettable fact that shops are not included in the Bill. I think in that connection the Minister of Labour and Social Welfare agrees with us who would have liked to see shops included in the present Bill, because the present legislation which provides for the National Supply Board to check shop rents, merely on the basis of 1940 rents, is totally inadequate to keep down the rentals for shops. Shop rents, of course, are a very important ingredient in the cost of living. I feel that if it had been possible to include shops in the provisions of this Bill the Minister would have been glad to have done so, but I am afraid that it would have unduly held up the Bill, and in the circumstances the Minister must have felt that he could render a greater service to the country by keeping over the question of shop rents until later. I am sure the Minister is considering the whole matter, and will be prepared early next session to introduce a Bill dealing with shop rents. Now, another objection, and a very serious objection, was raised by the hon. member for Pretoria, City (Mr. Davis), who said that this Bill was going to the roots of the rights of ownership. I think the House should remember that that question of the rights of ownership was dealt with in this House by the Government of the present Prime Minister in 1920. In 1920 the first Rents Act was passed, and under that Act the principle was definitely laid down that the ownership of a house could no longer deal with that house as he liked, that he was subject to control as far as rent was concerned, and as far as the evicting of his tenants was concerned, and that the principle of the sanctity of private property was taken away. That was done by the Government of the Prime Minister in 1920. And all the subsequent legislation in that direction has been to make that position more progressive and more satisfactory. So it is no good at the present stage, and under present conditions, when there is a general clamour for better conditions, for hon. members to come and say: “I am in favour of these beautiful principles of a better social order, but you must not interfere with the sanctity of private property.” That is an outworn shibboleth. It is generally accepted that the State must have the right in the interest of the community to interfere with these things and to check the exploitation of the poorer classes by the more privileged classes. Hon. members also mentioned and complained that sacrifices would have to be made by landlords. When hon. members see the provisions of this Bill by which a landlord under present arrangements will be able to get anything up to 8 per cent. per annum on the value of his house and 6 per cent. on the value of his land, I fail to see where the sacrifice comes in. When so many of our young people are making such great sacrifices it ill-becomes the House to be perturbed about the landlord, whose profit is reduced from 10 per cent. to 8 per cent., and for my part I believe that the large majority of the landlords of this country, examining the position as it is today, and the needs which exist, will gladly accept the provisions of this Bill—much more gladly than some hon. members of this House.

You are talking Socialism.

One other point has been made. We have been told from different quarters that this Bill is going to stop building, that people will not want to invest their money in building houses because their return is going to be limited to 8 per cent. And that therefore there will be a greater shortage of houses than before. That is an argument which has continually been raised, but has never come true. It is an argument which has been used against the Minister of Finance in connection with the Excess Profits Tax. The Minister has been told that capital will be withheld from fresh developments. Well, a very useful way of dealing with that position, if it were true, would, as already suggested by me, be by putting a punitive tax on idle capital. My answer to these arguments is that it will hasten the day when the Government of this country will realise that under our present economic arrangements private capital is only concerned in the making of profits, and is not concerned in the general interests. And if that is realised the Government will take up a very definite attitude, it will take up the policy of national housing, and then a measure such as this will no longer be necessary. Today a Bill of this kind is necessary and in the interest of the country. It is in the interest of our soldiers, who have gone up North to fight, and who want to be sure that while they are away their dependants will be protected against high rents, and when they come back that they will be able to live in comfort in houses for which they do not have to pay a rent which they cannot afford to pay. All these are the objects which the Minister has in view, and I therefore give the measure my whole-hearted support.

There can be no question that some better and more effective provision must be placed on the Statute Book for the purpose of giving decent houses to decent people. There is no question that this is an attempt to remedy a social ill. The social ill is the inadequate housing of the middle class section of our people, the poorer section, the unskilled wage earner. What is this evil for which this Bill is supposed to provide an adequate remedy? You cannot talk to municipal health officers, you cannot take up any municipal health officer’s report without seeing repeatedly references to overcrowding, to the numbers of people who are ill housed in our towns, to slum conditions and so on. The first reaction is always that people cannot afford to pay the rents required, and that is perfectly true. Personally I cannot imagine how the blatant principle is denied when one expects people who get 25s. per week to live in houses built by people who get 25s. per day. It is fundamentally economically impossible that a man who gets £1 per week should live in a house built by a man who gets £1 per day and if trade unions insist, and rightly so, that the wages of the workers should be safeguarded, one must also insist on seeing that the people who are less privileged shall have an opportunity of living in those houses. If I were to ask to define for the benefit of the Minister the meaning of reasonable rent I should use the phrase which was used by the hon. member for Berea (Mr. Hooper). He suggested that a philanthropist once said that no man should live in a house which cost him more than one-sixth of his income. I say definitely that to lay down what shall be a reasonable rent must be considered on the basis of a man’s income, and one must have regard to the fact that no man should be expected to pay more than one-sixth of his income for the house in which he lives. The Minister of Railways has introduced a socalled rent rebate scheme. One of the most reactionary members of this House is the hon. member for Gezina (Mr. Pirow), but what did he do under the guidance of the officers of his department? No one will tell me that the hon. member for Gezina was the brains who conceived the rents rebate scheme. That scheme lays it down that no man shall pay more than one-sixth of his wage for the housing he has, and if he does the railway department is prepared to subsidise him. If railway users are expected to subsidise the homes in which railway workmen are living, it is only logical that the community in general should be called upon to do the same thing on behalf of the less privileged section of the community. If we are going to tackle this question we must lay down as a fundamental principle that householders and tenants shall have adequate housing. There are to be no more of these slum conditions, there must be no question of parents living with five or six children in one room. They do so to ensure that they will have something to protect themselves if evil days come upon them. We build subeconomic houses; what do we do? The hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie) said that no man living in a sub-economic house was permitted to live there if his emoluments were more than a certain amount laid down, and that amount is by no means such that it would ensure his having five-sixths of his income available to meet the ordinary demands of his household. You have a minimum wage. No person is permitted under the utility schemes to go into these houses unless he is assured that he has an income sufficient to pay for that house. There are hundreds and thousands who are in greater need of housing in this city of Cape Town and in South Africa generally than can be accommodated in the sub-economic housing scheme, and the sooner we live up to our so-called principles that every man shall have sufficient for his own maintenance, and for the upbringing of his family, the sooner shall we be true to the trust that is reposed in us. We must see to it that no man is called upon to spend fifty or sixty, and I know of even cases of 70 per cent. of his weekly earnings in providing himself and his family with a roof to cover them. It is wrong to think, for one single moment, that people earning 25s. a week can live in houses built by those who earn 25s. a day. I don’t attack the standard of living of those who are fortunate enough to get 25s. a day, but I do make a claim for that section of the community who are not getting more than 25s. a week. How was it that we got the Rent Act of 1920? The hon. member for Berea (Mr. Hooper) suggested that it was because it was a post-war enactment, something designed and provided to enable returned soldiers to have decent accommodation, because houses could not be built during the war. The hon. member who takes a great interest in going into the constitutional question might with real intent consider what the constitution of this House was in 1920, and how it was necessary for the government then in being to rely upon the Labour Party for the promulgation of certain of these enactments. The price paid in 1920 by the then government for the support of labour was the first Rent Act. I found that by studying the constitution of the House at that particular time. I am not a member of the Labour Party, God forbid that I should be a member of the Labour Party, but I do say that without the Labour Party there would be a very great lag in a deal of the social legislation which is coming before us today. Were I to try and influence the members of the Labour Party, I would say that their one hope of living up to the ideal for which they are supposed to stand, is to make themselves responsible not for the care of trades union officials, not for the care of trades union men, but for the care of the man who is unskilled. Let the Labour Party insist on representing who has got a little or nothing, rather than the man who has 25s. a day. The Labour Party has a big future before it if, and only if, it will advocate the cause of the unskilled men in this country, and I want to say in regard to this particular Bill, you can define reasonable rent how you like and as long as you like, but so long as it is defined in relation to the amount of interest it will return on an investment, so long will we be disregarding the fundamental basis which is going to remedy or which is going to attack this very great social evil. We have got to make reasonable rents in relation to the ability of the individual to pay, and not to consider whether or not it is sufficient and adequate or profitable as an investment for a man. One criticism which I think I should offer is in regard to the Minister’s suggestion that lawyers should be excluded from representing people before the board. I hold no brief for lawyers, but I will say this, that as many instances as can be suggested where the lawyer has assisted he cause of the capital invested in houses, just as many instances can be brought forward where the lawyer has been of very material benefit and advantage to the tenant who is being rack-rented. Without your lawyer there would be very little opportunity for the tenant to get those advantages which the present Act is supposed to concede to him. I know what I am speaking about when I say that the Minister will be doing an injustice not so much to the landlord, but definitely to the poor tenant if he denies to the latter the right of skilled and efficient representation before not only the Rent Boards, but also the Control Board which will subsequently have to determine whether or not the Rent Boards have been right or wrong.

I have listened with interest to various members debating this Bill. Practically everyone has agreed that the principles of the Bill are just and right, and what criticism has been levelled has been levelled at the difficulties of carrying out what we all know to be just and right, namely, reasonable rentals for the tenant and reasonable rentals for the owners of property. At the present moment there is no getting away from it that in our large cities rents are far too high. In Pretoria the average civil servant pays something like 25 per cent. to 33⅓ per cent. of his salary in rent. The poorer man earning a salary of £25 to £30 a month finds it very difficult to get reasonable housing facilities at a rent which he is able to afford. The question has cropped up here, and I hope the Minister will give his consideration to it, the question of shop rents. These excessive rents that are charged in many places are certainly causing an increase in the cost of living to the poor man. There is one point I would like to draw the Minister’s attention to, and that is the profiteering that is going on with natives in areas where there is not sufficient accommodation. I have found it in Natal. These are people that are renting houses at a markedly low rental, and then they sub-let rooms often housing three or four people living in one room at a rental of say 7s. 6d. a month each. That is 30s. for one room. There may be three or four rooms in such a house which could be hired at £2 or £3 a month. These profits are excessive, and are really taken away from the men who cannot afford to pay such a price for the little accommodation they get. And remember, these men have wives and children who are not with them, and the money they earn has to keep the families as well. These people are definitely being robbed. Of course, they are called lodgers, and in that way the people responsible seem to be able to avoid control. It has been suggested that industries should provide the necessary accommodation for their employees. I cannot agree with that. The largest employer of labour is our Government. Does it provide housing accommodation for all its employees? I certainly think the Minister should try and adopt some measures for overcoming the one difficulty that I can foresee, and that is that this Bill will stop speculative building and therefore create a shortage of houses. That is one of the problems which will have to be faced, and I trust the Minister will give his attention to that particular problem.

I don’t wish to detain the House very long, but I want to give my whole-hearted support to this Bill, and to ask the Minister not to entertain any idea of sending it to a Select Committee. There is nothing in this Bill which would justify such a procedure, because its main objects are to consolidate the existing laws and to continue a war measure which has been found to be very effective in dealing with the question of rack-renting. If there is one thing for which the Minister should be commended, it is that, having found in a war measure something that is valuable, he is making a Statutory provision of it today. That is to say, what was wise as a war measure is now assured in regard to the future. It seemed to me, as I listened to the discussion — and I think I heard the whole of the debate with the exception of one speech — that great efforts were made to discover some flaw in the Bill. Those efforts have proved to be entirely unavailing, and I know that they will not disturb the Minister. In so far as the landlord is concerned, his position is improved under the Bill. So far as the maximum net return of 8 per cent. on the value of the dwelling is concerned, that I think we may safely assume will in practice be applied where buildings are modern and up-to-date, and have all the necessary conveniences. So that the landlord whose interests it is desirable to protect are fully protected in this Bill. In reference to the speech of the hon. member for Cape Town, Central (Mr. Bowen), who has always shown his interest for the underdog, I wish to say it is that very section of the community that cannot afford to engage the services of a legal man, were provision for such representation made in the Bill. It would be the man with money who would be in the best position in regard to representation. In this connection I am perfectly prepared to accept the judgment of the Control Board with a personnel such as stated by the Minister. There is nothing else that I would add, but I do want to say that, while there may be a difference of opinion in regard to details, I am satisfied that the second reading of this measure will be passed unanimously by the House.

I am sorry to see the Minister of Labour has not found it possible to introduce a clause dealing with shops. When the last Bill was before the House, he gave us a definite promise that he would deal with shops in the very near future. I ask the Minister where that provision is, and what has happened to it; are we likely to get it this year, next year, some time, or never? Generally, when the Minister of Labour gives us an undertaking we can rely upon him. He knows just as well as I do all the arguments that can be advanced for a Bill dealing with rentracketeers so far as shops are concerned. That is a measure which is long overdue in this country. It is very disappointing to find now, after his promise, that the Minister is not prepared to proceed. The majority of members of the House appear to be under the impression that this Bill is going to provide a lot of new houses for the poorer sections of our community. I make bold to say that there will be very few houses built in the future; instead of bringing about a building boom it is going to have just the reverse effect. One does not mind that, because if private enterprise will not build houses then other methods will have to be adopted to bring those houses into being, whether through the medium of a public utility company, by the Government or by some of the municipalities. These houses will certainly come into being, and I don’t think anyone will be able to prevent that happening. Don’t let us think for a moment that the Minister, when he introduced this Bill, thought we were going to see a great building boom and everybody getting cheap houses; nothing of the kind. I am sorry the Minister has not dealt with rents in this Bill in another way. I feel sure the time is long overdue when we should make some serious attempt to house certain sections of our community, and I believe if the Minister had made a start in this Bill for providing subsidies for all in receipt of an old age pension, he would have been doing a real good job of work, and conferring on the public something to my mind very long overdue. Mr. Speaker, that could have been done. I see no reason at all why our old age pensioners should not receive a subsidy on their rents. We have done it with our railway workers, very many thousands of them are in receipt of rent rebates, and we ought to have made a start now with our old age pensioners. I know of dozens of old people who are drawing a miserable pittance of £3 16s. 6d. a month, and they are actually paying £2 and £2 10s. for rent. This Bill may help them. I sincerely hope that it will, but it will not have the effect that every member of this House would like to see, and that is old age pensioners provided with decent roofs over this heads, and increased pensions form the Government. I hope something will be done on these lines, because we shall have to do it sooner or later. It is absolutely impossible to expect our old people to be living on a matter of 25s. or 30s. a month, because that is what they are doing. We talk about a New Order coming into being, social security and all that sort of talk. It seems to me just a lot of drivel, no sincerity about it all. This is an opportunity when the Minister might have have made some little advance in our social system, and I am sorry to see he has not taken advantage of it. I support the Bill whole-heartedly, it is a step in the right direction, and the benefits that will be derived from it, to my mind are worth all the little inconveniences that people would be put to in connection with it. One thing is certain, it will mean the end of rentracketeers. I certainly support the Bill.

The last speaker is one of those individuals who always try to keep you in doubt up to the end. I do not know how other hon. members read the speech, but while I listened to him I was in fear and trembling that the hon. member was going to throw down the gauntlet and say “This Bill is not worth 2d. and I am going to vote against it.” I was in a state of nervous prostration, and then my heart rebounded to the ceiling when the hon. gentleman, after passing the strictures that he did, told me with the utmost emphasis that he was going to whole heartedly support the Bill. Well, sir, I got his powerful influence behind me, and I am grateful to the hon. member. My hon. friend has said that we, the intelligent members of the House, seem to think that one of the results of this Bill is going to be the establishment of a lot of new houses. Where on earth did he get that impression? Nobody ever dreamt about it, least of all myself.

I did not accuse you of doing it.

In any case, nobody ever dreamt that the Bill was going to provide houses, nor was it intended to provide houses; the object of this Bill, when it becomes law, is to prevent rack-renting landlords from charging too much rent for the houses that are already built or may be built. My hon. and gloomy friend over there took advantage of the debate on this Bill to preach propaganda against the Durban Town Council. He was very concerned about the housing of the poor, and yet, sir, he and others are the most powerful opponents of the Durban Savings Bank Bill.

Order. The hon. Minister should not refer to that.

Oh, very well, sir. I am not so clever as the hon. member, because he did it without saying it. Nevertheless, sir, the fact is there. I was very much impressed by the speech of the hon. member for Cape Town, Central (Mr. Bowen), but his criticism, so far as the Bill itself was concerned, was baseless. He gave us a most eloquent address upon the necessity for housing the very poor. Has he ever found me wanting in my efforts and determination to see not only to the housing —that is only one incident in their unfortunate lives—in my efforts to uplift all these unfortunate poor? I want to assert now my complete conviction that the way to deal with these questions is not in a Bill of this description, but by a general uplift of wages all round, and I feel sure that I shall have the support of my hon. friend, the member for Cape Town (Central) in that. There is one thing, of course, that rather touched me on the raw, when he called upon the deity to forbid him ever joining the Labour Party. Well, sir, if there is anybody who is likely to permit the hon. gentleman to join the Labour Party, it is the gentleman who rules over Pluto’s gloomy reign.

Which Labour Party? The present or the future Labour Party?

Not that abortion that my hon. friend has got his eye upon.

I’ve got my eye on you.

Well, I must concede the touche to my hon. friend. One point made by the hon. gentleman on my right shows you how half-baked experience of economics leads one entirely astray. My hon. friend said, apropos or nothing, how can we expect unfortunate people receiving 25s. a week to live in a house built by men getting 25s. a day—the assumption being that a house is much better when built by a man earning 25s. a day. I note with satisfaction in passing that the hon. member was careful to say that he had no objection to the builder getting 25s. a day, but I want to tell him that wherever it has been tried out, and this is where I join issue with him, the highly paid, highly skilled artisan builds a house ultimately much more cheaply than the individual who is paid much less. And I entirely agree with my hon. friend that there should be no question of subsidising. There should be no question of sub-economic housing. Sub-economic housing is only a subsidy to the poor employer—poor in his outlook, poor in his moral conception of his outlook. Well, that is by the way. The Bill seems to have received a reception which is somewhat difficult to understand. Every one who has got up has said that he is in favour of the principle of the Bill, but in every individual case some fault has been found with some clause. Remarkable enough, fortunately enough, they have not all seized on the same clause to find fault with, and I am forced to the conclusion that they have all sat down and studied the Bill with the object of finding some defects in it on which they could preach an adverse sermon—they have all been looking for some text on which to preach an adverse sermon. There has been no connected line of thought between my adverse critics, and I am forced to the other conclusion that every one in his soul believes that this is a good Bill and a right Bill which should be passed unanimously in all its details. The hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. S. E. Warren), with the usual lawyer’s meticulous examination, says: “Let us send this to a Select Committee.” With what object?

To kill it.

That arises from it. But the same sort of approach that has been given to every Bill I have introduced in this House has been shown here again—it has been badly drafted. And my hon. friend says first and foremost I must send the Bill to a Select Committee. For what—in order to improve the drafting and the language.

That is only one thing.

Yes, that is one thing. He wants a Select Committee—is the Select Committee from his experience likely to be able to improve on the language, and drafting having in view the fact that the law advisers and the Parliamentary draughtsman have already dealt with those clauses, because every clause and every section has gone under the harrow, has been actually drafted by the law advisers, and then been vetoed by the parliamentary draughtsman. But what this criticism does is this: it shows that it is a most dangerous thing to have lawyers investigating the drafting of a Bill.

You are in your best form tonight.

I am glad to receive that testimony from my legal friend, that scintillating light of the Bar. He is welcome to that free testimony, but is it not a fact?

It certainly is not.

It does not matter what situation arises in our ordinary day life. If you want a legal opinion you send to Mr. So-and-so and he gives you a long opinion—and incidentally a highly charged legal opinion, and then your opponent sends it to some other legal luminary and he gives another opinion and then you get a third opinion and none of them agree. And the unfortunate potential litigants wonder where they are. And that is one of the reasons why I am not going to have, of course with the assistance of the House, legal people as such on any of these Boards. An appeal has been made apropos of this legal question that I shall give to the poor unfortunate 25s. per week tenant the right to go to the courts—to contest the situation against whom?—Against the landlord, who in all probability is immensely wealthy or reasonably so—and that is what hon. members call protecting the tenant. Good heavens! It sounds very well in spoken language, it looks very pretty if properly embellished on parchment.

That is what Democracy is proud of.

It is proud that you can give a man the right to go to court, but he cannot afford to go there. No, I prefer to leave this final judgment in the hands and in the minds and brains of ordinary common sense people and it will not cost the tenant one sixpence. Now I want to say this to the two main opponents to the Bill. I would hate to think that they are interested otherwise than as legislators. But it is very strange to listen to the arguments they adduced. I am referring to the hon. member for Pretoria City (Mr. Davis) and the hon. member for Vereeniging (Lt.-Col. Rood). I should like to know without being too blunt what is the guiding motivation behind the remarks of these two honourable members?

The hon. the Minister must not ascribe motives or suggest motives …

I said I would hate to …

The hon. Minister must not suggest any motives other than those proposed.

Well, I withdraw it at once. But the fact remains that the way they argued was much more strongly in favour of the unfortunate landlord than the tenant, and I want to remind those hon. members that this is a tenant’s protection Bill and not a landlord’s protection Bill, and to those hon. members who talked about the net 8 per cent. I want to say that I hope most fervently that every member of this House will join me in opposing any suggestion that more than that should be allowed. The hon. member for Vereeniging took advantage of the occasion to suggest an alternative namely a State general housing scheme—as a supplementary measure, in the words of the hon. member for Troyville (Mr. Kentridge). One accepts that with both hands, but if it is to be a substitution then I reject it at once and I would remind the hon. member, as I remind every hon. member who has the same outlook, that this is a measure to protect the interests of the tenants who perforce must run a house. The law says they must be in a dwelling and that being so it is the business of the State to see that no rapacious landlord shall have the opportunity of drawing more money out of the tenants than he is supposed to get. We have this present position. And I want to say this to the hon. member for Cape Town, Central (Mr. Bowen), who spoke about slum conditions. His is the best reply to these people who say: “Do not interfere with private enterprise.” “Private enterprise is the thing which makes the wheels go round.” The real root cause of slumdom is private enterprise. That is the sole cause of slumdom, and no other. When they talk about private enterprise as applied to house rents, to the conditions of the world, to the conditions in South Africa, and more especially our big towns—I say that the slum conditions there are solely due to private enterprise. The profit mongering which has been rampant throughout the ages is responsible for these conditions. I know the outlook of the hon. member for Vereeniging. I know what he is after. He has the big finance outlook. It is unfortunate but it is true, and what he wants evidently was sticking out a mile—for the State to build houses in sufficiently close contiguity to his private enterprise that is going on in Vereeniging, so that the workman shall be anchored to his job. I repudiate that suggestion with all the power that is in my being. I have had to live and work on the job, and my efforts will always be in the direction of encouraging those who work to live as far away from their work as they can, not live on the job, and incidentally may I say again, the hon. member again wanted to try and stand up for the building society which he evidently has at heart. Well, I cannot ask the House to send this Bill to a Select Committee either for drafting purposes or for any other purposes. What will be the net result of that? If we send it to a Select Committee we cannot hope to get it properly licked into shape this session. Next session we shall have the general election. Is that what you want? Mind you, I am convinced that it won’t make much difference, except a slight delay.

Except that you won’t be here.

I do not think the electorate of this country has gone entirely daft, and all signs point to the fact that if not the same personnel, certainly the same combination will be returned in charge of this country after the next elections. So I do not look upon the delay with any trepidation from that point of view. But I want to make sure that what has proved so completely efficacious as an emergency measure under the Law Emergency Act shall take its place on the Statute Book of this country, and I therefore now ask this House to pass, unanimously if possible, the second reading of this Bill.

I move—

I am sorry to inflict myself on the House again.

Not as sorry as we are.

You see, the unfortunate part of it is this. I have to stick at my post, and my hon. friend can vamoose. There is no obligation on him to stay. This is a very little measure which should not take long, and surely should not call forth very much discussion. The House well knows that our wage legislation goes back almost into antiquity. And after over twenty years’ experience we have come to the conclusion that the Wage Act as at present existing instituting and carrying as it does a Wage Board for the purpose of enquiring into, and fixing wages, is very cumbersome and very slow, and, in addition, it has been brought home to us as a result of the very rapidly changing conditions, how very necessary it is for us to devise some means to expedite not only the enquiries, but the results of these enquiries and their findings. For that purpose this Bill has been introduced. As you know, Mr. Speaker, when a Wage Board proceeds to make an investigation, it first of all gets an instruction from the Minister, and then it informs the industry, both sides, that is, the employers and the employees, that it is about to hold the enquiry. The Wage Board has to give three months’ notice of that, and then they proceed to investigate. They go through the books; they take evidence from all and sundry, then they have a meeting or two, probably three, and agree on how widely distributed the industry may be, and the extent of the area into which they are enquiring, and many more meetings are held. Meetings are held from time to time, and there is more delay. Then they have to put up a recommendation which is of an interim character. The Minister receives that. At the same time, they have to publish, or, at the instance of the Minister, they publish a statement to the effect that they are going to hold another meeting for the purpose of listening to objections—objections to the interim recommendations. That takes some time. Having done that, according to the objections that are brought to bear, and the effect of these objections, it may be that the Wage Board makes important alterations in the original recommendation. If they do make these important alterations they have to publish them again for further objections. If they make minor alterations to the recommendations, then in their discretion they may or may not publish for further objections. Then they make final recommendations for a determination. Now we have had to go into all these matters. We have had to go into all these enquiries. All these things lead to delay, sometimes for over a year, sometimes eighteen months, and we have on record delays of a couple of years. In the meantime, conditions entirely change, and by the time the recommendation is made for a determination they have to begin all over again—they have to go over the same old ground again, and it is irksome to employers and employees alike. They want to know where they stand, and in conquence they have had representations time after time from all sections of the industrial community, asking for some legislation to be introduced which will have the effect of making for greater expedition. In response to that, and also in response to my intuitive desire, we have evolved this new Bill. We are getting down to things and cutting down the periods of notice. The actual initial investigation is undertaken—by that I mean an initial enquiry into a particular industry which has never been enquired into before—the time of that will be cut down considerably, and we are taking power, or we hope to do it with the consent of this House, wherever necessary to review already arrived-at determinations without having to go through all the rigmarole of such a close enquiry as before. The idea of the supplementary alterations to determinations is that both sides will be called together—you will have a sort of glorified industrial council of the employers and of those who represent the employees. They will be called together, and with all the information at their disposal they will be persuaded if possible to come to an agreement and an improvement. That can take the form of a new determination without any unnecessary longer delay. The other important feature of the Bill is this, that we ask the House to give the Wage Board power to make cost of living allowances from time to time as circumstances require. I do not think I need enlarge upon that. I do not want to waste my words or your time in elaborating the position. The thing is before you. I did not think it necessary to issue an explanatory memorandum, the Bill being so simple, simple even enough for members of Parliament, and I am just beginning to wonder with reference to this question of memoranda, whether they are any use because I find on the last Bill that almost as much criticism was directed against the memorandum as against the Bill itself, so I am giving members two sources of criticism. That is desirable, of course, but if hon. members will promise me that they will refrain from criticising the memoranda, then I shall continue to issue them. That is all I wish to say.

The Minister complained in his reply to the second reading of the Bill just accepted by the House that practically every Bill he has introduced has been criticised for lack of good draftmanship and wording. It appeared almost as if the Minister became despairing of ever being able to introduce a Bill which would meet with the approval of members of the House. I am afraid that after I have spoken on this Bill the Minister will also say that he has never yet introduced a Bill into this House the contents of which had commended itself to the approval of the members of the House. Up to now it has always been a qualified approval. Of course, the Minister has been to blame for that. I have no intention, however, of attacking the Minister tonight, I am merely going to discuss the Bill. I might say I think it is largely due to the fact — and I say it in the best spirit — that the Minister is the champion political acrobat in the House. I do not think the Minister has introduced one Bill which was not originally violently opposed by himself when he was a member of the Opposition. I need only refer to the Workmen’s Compensation Act. When the original Bill was introduced the Minister and his Party fought it tooth and nail. But when it was reintroduced since the Minister joined the Cabinet, the Minister and his Party supported it. The same position occurred in regard to the Factories Act, and the Unemployment Act, and now again this Wage Act. I want to discuss this matter fully tonight, and I want to show what should actually be done in regard to the Wage Act. It is also necessary to obtain the correct background. In doing so we must go back to the time when the original Bill was introduced, namely in 1937. One would have thought that at that time the Minister of Labour would have given it his wholehearted support but on the contrary, that Bill was opposed by the Minister of Labour and by his colleagues behind him. They had however, very substantial reasons for their opposition, reasons of such a nature that one would have expected to see them embodied in this Amending Bill. This Bill, however, only deals with a slight speeding up of the work of the Wage Board and cost of living allowances. It does not go very far. In 1937 the hon. member for Krugersdorp (Mr. M. J. van den Berg) moved an amendment on the second reading of the original Bill. That amendment read—

That was their solution. That was what they preferred to the Wage Act. I may say that it is very noteworthy that in that amendment they confined themselves to European unskilled workers alone. That only European unskilled workers should receive wages which would enable them to maintain a decent standard of living. That amendment was designed with two purposes. Firstly, it was evidently designed in an effort to kill the Bill. They did not want the Wage Act. Secondly, they had certain valid objections to a number of the provisions of the original Bill. In the course of the debate the Minister of Labour, who was then the hon. member for Benoni, said, inter alia—

I want hon. members to understand that the reasons why I am referring at length to the attitude of the Minister of Labour is because I want to show that the serious shortcomings in the original Bill to which he so strenuously objected has not now been rectified in this amending Bill. I want to show to the House that the Minister was right in his complaint that the Wage Act would not be effective. I will also show what the real causes are for the ineffectiveness of the Wage Act. The Minister further said at that time—

Now I want to sum up the Minister’s objections. Firstly he objected that the Bill would be ineffective in its operation; secondly, that it would set section against section; thirdly, that it would set individual against individual. Fourthly, that it would accomplish nothing in uplifting the citizens of South Africa, and lastly that it excluded Government departments from its scope. Those were the main objections of the Minister when the original Bill was introduced in 1937. I agree that these are serious objections and that they retarded the efficient working of the Act.

Did you disagree with him in 1937?

I was not here, unfortunately. Now I want to show what the Minister has done to rectify these objections. I have sketched the Labour Party’s attitude in regard to the introduction of the original Bill. During the past two-and-a-half years I have consistently criticised the Wage Act. I have shown time and again that inadequate wages were being awarded to workers in the industries the Wage Board has investigated. Those criticisms have come not only from this side of the House, but also from outside the House. The Trade Union Congress has passed resolutions in regard to the working of the Act. Even Labour Party branches or rather those that were left went so far as to pass resolutions demanding radical reforms of the Wage Act. The Yeoville branch, in March, 1940, passed a strong resolution asking for an amendment of the Act. Last session, replying to demands from this side of the House that the Act should be amended, the Minister said—that was after I had quoted a number of determinations under which the wages were absolutely scandalous—the Minister said—

which, of course, is entirely untrue. That was the promise the Minister made last session. He gave an undertaking that he would introduce an amending Bill which would make it possible for the Wage Board to grant that very standard that we on this side of the House were agitating for. I have shown how strongly the Minister opposed the introduction of the original Bill. I have given him reasons and his explanation of the fact that inadequate wages were awarded, and lastly I have shown the House what promises the Minister made last session in regard to the amendment of the Act. In the light of that I want the House to examine the amending Bill now before it. In this Bill there are only two clauses of real importance, Clauses 2 and 4. Clause 2, I may say, deserves the same criticism as all the other Bills which the Minister has introduced into this House. It is one of the most involved clauses that I have ever read. I admit that I am only a layman, but I have read this clause, especially sub-sections (1) and (2) not once but a dozen times. I had to get the assistance of a legal friend to make head or tail of it. It is evidently designed to give wide and rather vague powers to the Wage Board, which we hope it will eventually make use of. After a large amount of study, I came to the conclusion that it would enable the Wage Board to grant cost of living allowances. The other clause is Clause 4, and that should be taken in two sections. I think sub-sections (1) and (2) enables the Minister to speed up the rectification or minor omissions. The balance of that section will enable the Wage Board to make amendments in standing awards without necessarily having a new investigation of that particular industry. These are the only two clauses of importance in this amending Bill. I want to ask the Minister why he has not included amendments which would rectify all those matters to which he so strongly objected in 1937, and about which we on this side of the House have complained for the last two-and-a-half years, and in regard to which he has consistently agreed with us. My complaint is that there is nothing in this amending Bill which will make the working of the principal Act more effective. There is nothing here which will enable the Wage Board to award wages which will enable a decent standard of living to be maintained. I want to deal with one or two of the real weaknesses of the Wage Act and which I contend are the direct cause of these inadequate wages being awarded. Section 6 of the principal Act provides that after due investigation the Board must award wages to certain workers which will enable them to support themselves in accordance with civilised standards of living. That is one of the main provisions in the Wage Act. After due investigation they must award wages which will enable the workers to support themselves in accordance with civilised standards of life. That is the main duty of the board, but in discharging that duty they must take a very important provision into consideration, and that is the provision contained in Section 8. This is the clause known as “the ability of the industry to pay” clause. This is one of the greatest weaknesses of the Bill. First, the main duty of the board is to award wages which will enable employees to maintain a standard in accordance with civilised standards of life, but in awarding those wages they are compelled to take into consideration the ability of the industry to pay. That is a provision that has never been defined, and is the one provision in the Act which I contend, and I think the Minister agrees with me, has resulted in low wages being awarded especially for unskilled work. This provision has never been defined, and after the Wage Board has made an award, no reasons have ever been given by the board why they considered the industry was not in a position to pay higher wages. The board has received representations from the employers, we do not know what those representations were; the employers have probably stated that they are not in a position to pay more than a certain wage, and that if higher wages are awarded, the industry would not pay. The result is that inordinately low wages have consistently been awarded. That should have been rectified in this amending Bill. It must be the desire of the Minister, in view of his attitude in the past, to make the Wage Act more effective. Unfortunately nothing las been done. Another thing that should have been defined in this civilised standard of living. What is actually meant by that? There should have been a definition in regard to that. These are two of the main weaknesses of the Act, which have resulted in these consistently low wage awards. I have shown by way of example and by way of quotation, the wages that have been awarded by the Wage Board during the past two years, and I think that in every determination wages have been awarded which do not enable these people to maintain themselves in accordance with civilised standards of life. I think another weakness in this Bill which has resulted in low wages being awarded, is the provision that there may be no discrimination or differentiation on the basis of race or colour. That is a provision which we find in quite a number of sections of this Act. I want to say, especially to hon. members on those benches, that I don’t approach this matter with any racial bias or from any desire to oppress the nonEuropean. On the contrary, we are trustees of the non-European, and that our policy is that it is our duty to see that the nonEuropean can also maintain a decent standard of life. I want to discuss this matter dispassionately and approach it from the standpoint that it will be in the best interests of both the European and the nonEuropean to have this provision removed from the Act, this provision laying down that there shall be no discrimination or differentiation on the basis of race or colour. I contend that the result of that provision has been this; firstly it has resulted in inordinately low wages for the unskilled labourer, and secondly, it has resulted in the elimination of the non-European from skilled and mainly semi-skilled work in industry. Why do I say that? I think the intention of the framers of the principal Act was this. They started by advocating equal wages for equal work, with the object of driving the non-European out of skilled work. They hoped it would work in this way. If an employer is compelled to pay the same wages to the non-European as to the European, then the employer will prefer to employ the European, and I think in practice that is what has happened. The nonEuropean has been driven more and more out of skilled and semi-skilled work. What has been the result? It has not only been detrimental to the non-European, but even more detrimental to the European, You have this position. The non-European must exist, and he has therefore been compelled to resort to unfair competition against the European. He has been prepared to accept lower wages than the standard laid down. That is one of the reasons why we have had so many evasions of the Wage Act, many of which have never been before the courts, and about which the Wage Board has probably never heard. You have had unfair competition. I can quote dozens of instances of non-European builders, carpenters, and painters employed by contractors, not because they are better workers, but because they are prepared to accept lower wages.

Do you approve of their being skilled workers?

Yes, I will come to that presently. Now, I want to deal with the unskilled worker. What is the position? When the Board investigates any industry and awards unskilled wages, it is perfectly obvious that they always have at the back of their minds the fact that those wages will be received by both Europeans and nonEuropeans. That has influenced the Wage Board, and resulted in the awarding of such low wages for unskilled work. Both classes have consequently suffered. We have had many complaints about the low wages paid to unskilled labourers. Now, I come back to the interjection of my hon. friend. He says: “Do we want to drive the non-European out of skilled work?” No, but I maintain that there should be discrimination on the basis of race and colour in awarding wages, but that that should be in conjunction with a quota system. By that means the European would be assured of employment, and will not be driven out by the competition of the non-European, while the non-European will be assured of employment and sufficient wages to enable him also to maintain a decent standard of life. That is to my mind the only solution of the problem. I don’t for a moment blame the members of the Wage Board for granting these low wages. I think that they have done their work to the best of their ability, but they have been compelled to work under very difficult circumstances. They have had to keep within the letter of the law, which, to say the least of it, has proved very ineffective, and has not allowed them much latitude. I am at the moment only concerned about making this Wage Act more effective. There are other important matters that have been omitted from this amending Bill. One of the main objections of the Minister of Labour in 1937 to the original Bill was the exclusion of Government departments, the exclusion of the Railways and Civil Service from the terms of the Wage Act. He stated in 1937 that the wages being paid by the South African Railways were scandalous. Now that he has the opportunity of including the Railways within the terms of this Act, does he do that? Another main objection to the Wage Act as it stands at present is that as a result of its functions there has never been any uniformity with regard to wages of working conditions. Take, for example, the garment workers. They are awarded certain wages in Johannesburg, then there is an investigation of the industry in Cape Town, and the Board awards totally different wages, and completely different working conditions, although it is the same industry in a different area. We have had the same experience in the engineering trade. I received only this afternoon a circular from the National Union of Distributive Workers, where they make precisely the same complaint, namely, that there is no uniformity whatever. One industry with different wages in every area. That is one of the main weaknesses of the principal Act which I contend should have been rectified. Then, again, in the matter of delay. This amending Bill will alleviate that position slightly, but I don’t think it will make any vast difference. You will still have precisely the same delays. According to the figures I have received from the Minister, the number of wage determinations that have been published in 1941 was 10, 24 investigations are proceeding, 9 references have been authorised, and 29 other investigations are under consideration. That is an average of 10 published in a year. How many years is it going to take before the whole of these 50 determinations are published? It will probably take five years. The employees in certain industries will have to wait five years before they get a determination. Something more should have been done to speed up matters. Now I come to a very serious matter. That is in regard to the penalties provided under the Act. I contend that those penalties are inadequate, and that is borne out by the figures that I have obtained. I have here the report of the Department of Labour for 1939, which shows that there were 302 prosecutions during that year for underpayment, and evading other provisions of the Act. Out of these 302 prosecutions there were 281 convictions. That is a fair indication of what the position is—302 prosecutions in the course of one year. I understand that the penalty providing for the cancellation of the registration certificate has only been applied in two or three instances during the last five or six years. The penalties that are opposed are no deterrant whatsoever. The Minister should have provided much sterner punishments to prevent these evasions.

Surely cancellation is a pretty heavy penalty.

Yes, but it is never applied. It has, I believe, only been applied on two or three occasions during the last five or six years. Provision should have been made for a more severe minimum penalty. I feel that the Minister has, as usual, again missed a golden opportunity for considerably improving an ineffective Act.

Don’t spoil a forcible speech.

He has missed a golden opportunity to introduce a Bill that would really make this Wage Act effective, and put the Wage Board in a position to award decent wages for all employees in all undertakings, Government as well as private. The Minister had an opportunity of rectifying those serious objections to and omissions in the Wage Act about which he complained so bitterly in 1937. In conclusion, I want to say that my party’s policy is that wage regulation and wage fixation should be approached from an entirely different angle. This Wage Act is merely patchwork, and it has proved ineffective. This amending Bill is another patch on the old Wage Act, which will still be little more effective than in the past. The whole question must be approached from an entirely different angle. This is not the time nor the opportunity to describe in detail the policy of my party. I want, however, to briefly touch upon a few of the main underlying principles. Firstly we contend that wage control and wage fixation should be entirely in the hands of the State and that the power should be exercised by way of a permanent board with sub-divisions consisting of experts. All wage control and wage fixation should be exercised through the medium of this permanent board. Secondly, and this is the most important principle — a principle that will probably shock the hon. Minister’s Socialist heart—self-government in industry must be eliminated. Self-government in industry has resulted in nothing else than continual bickerings between employer and employed, in strikes and disputes. To give one example. During 1941 there were 34 strikes which involved 5,404 employees and resulted in the loss of approximately £12,000 in wages. Selfgovernment in industry and collective bargaining are things of the past. It has been an essential period in the economic evolutionary process of a hundred years, but it has served its purpose and the time has arrived that in the interests of the State, in the interests of employers and employees, self-government in industry and collective bargaining should be eliminated from our economic life. It is, of course, essential that in conjunction with this the State should be responsible for the employment of all its citizens. In addition to that, of course, there should be a limitation of profits. In regard to the non-Europeans, the unhealthy economic competition which is gradually arising and which will become more and more intense should be entirely eliminated. My party maintains that this can only be done by fixing a definite quota for Europeans and non-Europeans in unskilled, semi-skilled and skilled occupations in industry. We contend that only along those lines will the non-European in industry problem ever be solved. I think the Minister will agree with me that the people of this country want radical economic changes. They are tired of the old economic order, and they want something new, not necessarily the new order of my friends over here, the New Order group about which they are very vague, and about which they understand very little. The people of South Africa want something entirely new, something radical, and it is for the government of the future to give the people a new economic order. That is the only government that in future will ever command the support of the people of this country. I want to assure the people of South Africa tonight that when my party soon takes over the government of this country we intend giving the people that new economic order. We intend introducing radical reforms. We will give them that new way of life, so often spoken about by the Rt. Hon. the Prime Minister, but which will only remain words as long as he governs this country.

I think I am expressing the feeling of the House when I say that there is no one present who has not listened with the greatest interest and appreciation to the speech of the hon. member for Fordsburg (Mr. B. J. Schoeman). The hon. member has on previous occasions proved his capacity to speak. Tonight he has given us again clear and forcible evidence that he can both think and speak, and we are grateful to him for the tone he has given to the debate. In saying that I believe I am voicing the feelings of the hon. Minister also, who, judging by his interjections, showed that he as much as any of us appreciates the way in which the hon. member for Fordsburg handled the thorny problems covered by this simple amending Bill. The hon. member’s speech, however, places me in a difficult position. I, too, proposed to take the opportunity offered by the Bill to review some aspects of the work of the Wage Board, and to make some suggestions for its improvement; but I did not anticipate having to follow a speech such as that just made by the hon. member for Fordsburg. That speech has broken so much new ground that it must inevitably put out of focus any suggestions and criticisms made on the basis of the status quo. In other words, I have the difficult task of trying now to put my points into perspective against an unexpected and novel background. I shall do my best, and in the course of the presentation of my case, shall do my best to show where I agree and disagree with the hon. member for Fordsburg. For there is much on which I agree with him, as there are inevitably points at which I disagree. I disagree at the beginning about the merits of this Bill. I think it is a useful addition to the existing machinery of the Wage Board, and, as such, I am prepared to support it. It will help to speed up the work of the Board, and that is in itself a merit. Now I don’t want to go on from that point, as the hon. member for Fordsburg has done, to use the occasion provided by this Bill to consider some of the problems that the Wage Board has been imparted with, approaching the matter from the standpoint of the unskilled worker. I feel that, within the limits of our existing labour field, the Wage Board has done very good work under very great difficulties. That does not mean that we are satisfied with what has been done for the unskilled worker whom we represent; we are not, and there are obvious reasons why we should not be satisfied. There is still a very long way to go before the position of the unskilled worker will approximate to what we want. But that does not alter the fact that the position has been considerably improved from what it was. I believe that there are reasons for which the Board themselves are not responsible why it has been impossible for them to do much better than they have done up to the present time. So I wish to offer my meed of gratitude to the Board for the conscientiousness, courtesy and consideration with which they have carried on their difficult task, and to say that I believe +his small amendment Bill will remove some of the many difficulties they have been up against in the work they have been doing. Now I want to review some of these difficulties with a view to a possible modification of our policy in the future, and in making my remarks I am encouraged by what the hon. member for Fordsburg has said. I think that the major difficulties in the way of the Wage Board doing what it was supposed to do, which was to establish a reasonable standard of living in industry in this country—I think that the two major difficulties are that the Wage Board has been operating in an entirely new field, in which they have had practically no guidance, and in which no one has had much experience; the Wage Board operates in a field where trade unionism is not an effective factor. The Wage Board operates in new industries mainly dealing with mass production in which the training background and organisation are different from those operative in old established industries in which the machinery of the trade unions operate. Now, in those industries there is a new field to be covered for which our own experience offers no guidance and the Wage Board has had to find its way through that field on the strength of its own experience. That is one of the great difficulties. The other difficulty is that the Board has been operating in this new industrial field which has been growing rapidly, which in organisation has been assuming patterns familiar in some degree in homogenous countries, but where the approach to the problem which this field presents has been complicated by the heterogenous labouring population and the traditional attitude of South Africans to certain sections of that labour market. They have been trying to regulate industries with a labour pattern derived from non-industrial days, a wage pattern derived from preindustrial conditions and bolstered now, when they are outworn, by prejudices and self-interest; and out of this material they have had a moral obligation imposed upon them to provide conditions suitable to an industrial society with very little help and much discouragement from the country at large. They have had almost superhuman difficulties to contend with, and in the circumstances they have done amazingly well. But now I want to suggest that the time has come for the Government and the country to lay down a new background to its wage regulating machinery and to give a new lead to the people on whom this obligation has been put, of building a social pattern for South Africa. I feel it is essential that we should consider exactly what purpose we have in view, what we visualise in establishing and encouraging industries in South Africa. Whether they are to build up self sufficient strength for ultimate war purposes such as we are involved in today. Do we simply want industries as means to self sufficiency in a time of war, or do we want industries which will provide us with a decent living for all our people? The two things are different and they make different demands on our intentions and organisations. The Minister will probably add “Do we intend to encourage industry for the benefit of a few, while the rest can sink or swim as they like? These are not academic questions; they are practical issues. We must decide what we intend to do with our industries. I myself have no doubt as to what the answer should be. We have had one lead after another but we have had a new lead in this report of the Agricultural and Industrial Requirements Commission, in which it is shown again that we can go on for a short time building up comfortable existences for a small number of people, but that we cannot build up a future for the whole community unless we use the whole community much more effectively. The members of this Commission repeat that you cannot go on building up industries in this country that are now uneconomic, and hope to establish a secure foundation for your society. Or let me say you cannot go on building up industries which cannot now pay a living wage, and expect them to become economic industries. You have to decide whether you are going to allow industries to come into existence and to continue to exist if they cannot pay a living wage to their employees. That is the practical issue which depends to a great extent on the Minister of Labour, but even more on the Minister of Commerce and Industries. We have to take a decision in this matter, and on this decision rests the decision as to what our Wage Board is to do. At the present time the Wage Board is actually trying to deal with this problem, as the hon. member for Fordsburg said, under conflicting instructions set out by this Wage Act. I agree with him entirely in what he had to say on that. I do not think that the Wage Board can operate efficiently in terms of the present Wage Act unless the Government interprets its own instructions more explicitly than it has so far done. The hon. member read out one instruction which was to the effect that the Board shall take into consideration the ability of the employers in the trade or section of the trade to carry on their business successfully should any determination of the Board be put into effect. He did not read the next section, which says that it shall also take into consideration the cost of living in any area in which the industry or section of the industry is being carried on. I happen to know that the Wage Board finds it extremely difficult to co-ordinate these two is the more important. So far faced with the question which is the more important, the cost of living in the area or the payability of the industry, and I contend that if the Wage Board is to be effective, we shall have to decide which of these two is the mort important. So far as I am concerned, of course, there is no question. I hold that we must decide—and I think the Minister agrees—that the basic principle of our economic life must be a social principle, and that that social principle must be that any man employed must get out of his employment the means to live, and to live decently, which means, of course, that we shall have to scrap this instruction about the payability of industry and get round the ability of industry to pay in some other way. We may have to subsidise certain industries until they can pay or wipe them out altogether. But I think we owe it to the Wage Board to give them a definite lead in this matter. Now, to return to my first point, the organisation and grading of industry, or rather of industrial occupation, with which the Wage Board is faced. Here I shall come to the question raised by the hon. member for Fordsburg. The Board is grading occupations which have never been graded before, and I feel it should have some direction there. Let me take an instance. It has just published recently a proposed award in the cordage and matting industry. It has laid down a whole series of grades, to which it attaches provisions in regard to periods of training and wages. It has published its propositions in that regard, for that particular industry. Now, the grades proposed correspond to some extent to apprenticeship, but they do not carry any guarantees. A man starts as an unqualified worker. The period is laid down, after which he becomes qualified, but there is no guarantee that he will not be thrown out half-way, and there is no guarantee that the whole industry will not be run by semi-qualified people at the rates of pay applicable to semi-qualified people under this proposed determination. Now, I do not think that the question of training periods should be imposed on the Wage Board alone. I think all these matters should be decided for them, or at least that they should be assisted in their decision in that regard, and I feel that a very considerable and large job needs to be done outside the Wage Board in this matter, to assist them. And now the hon. member for Fordsburg raised the question that all these grades in industry should have two sections—a European section and a nonEuropean section. That, I understand, was the implication of this proposal. Let me say at once that I regard that as a proposition well worthy of consideration. If I thought that we had a chance of getting guaranteed ratios of European and non-European employees in every grade of our new industries, I would welcome with open arms the proposition, and I feel that it very definitely should be considered by the Minister.

And different rates of pay, too?

Yes, even on different rates of pay, provided the rates of pay reflect the degree of skill and guarantee employment to non-Europeans. The main doubt about the hon. member’s proposition arises out of his reply to the question as to the basis he would use for his ratio. He was asked if he would have a ratio on the basis of population, to which he replied no, but on the basis of skilled workers available, but he did not say what provision he would make for the training of non-Europeans. Now, the hon. member knows as well as I do that there is no colour bar in the Apprenticeship Act, and that still no non-European can become apprenticed—first of all, because he cannot attain the minimum educational qualification laid down; and, secondly, because there is a social bar against him. That is why the coloured people are in a very much inferior position in industry here in Cape Town than they used to be. But if the hon. member will guarantee us that he will provide training for non-Europeans as well as Europeans, by all means let us consider his scheme. Anything that will make the grades fluid racially will be all to the good. All that is happening at present, and here I challenge the hon. member’s interpretation—is that the native is tied down to the unskilled level. There is no ladder for him between the labouring class and the graded class of employment, even in the mass production industries, and I feel that the hon. member is entirely wrong when he talks about the non-European having entered into competition with the skilled man. He has never done so. He has been left continually on the bottom rung of the ladder. So you cannot say that he has entered into competition with the European, but if you say that the European, the unskilled European, has entered into competition with the unskilled native labour, then I might agree with you. We would be justified by the facts in saying that the European has entered into competition with the native on the unskilled level. I would welcome any suggestion whereby we could get some of our non-Europeans into the graded levels of industry. This report to which I have referred says that they are eminently suited for mass production work. Now the last point I want to make is this. I want finally just to say a word on the wage pattern. I do feel that the Wage Board have laid down wages which are scandalously low. I don’t say they could help themselves. They have been working on a traditional wage basis. They have found jobs labelled as native jobs, carrying native wages, and they have had to begin from that level. But these wages are far too low for any decent or sensible country. We were talking the other day of a Social Security Code. You can never have any Social Security Code until you lay down a basic wage for the people at the bottom of the social system. And that is something which the Minister must get the Government to adopt if his wage regulation is to be at all efficient and effective. The Government must lay down that nobody shall be paid less than the basic amount needed for decent living. But here is another feature to which I want to draw attention. At present the Wage Board is laying down different rates of wages for different areas. You get higher wage rates laid for one part of the country than for another, and the spread is enormous. In this recommendation to which I have referred there is a spread of 33⅓ per cent. They are going to pay 30s. in Cape Town for a job for which they are going to pay £1 in the smaller towns of the Eastern Province and Natal. That is an enormous gap, and I do not see how it can be justified. It seems unreasonable; and it is damaging to the cause of better wage levels. Everywhere we hear the objection raised by employers in the higher level areas that they have to pay so much more in wages than any other parts of the country pay. And there does not seem to be any reason for it, except that some areas have always paid much less than others. For instance, Durban has always paid much less than Cape Town and Port Elizabeth. Well, let us admit that fact but do not let us perpetuate a difference which has no just foundation. If the pre-existing position must be taken into consideration and differential wage rates accordingly laid down, let it be insisted that that is merely a temporary position designed to give the lower wage areas time to accommodate themselves to the level in the higher wage areas. Let us give these lower wage areas time to get into step, but let it be a limited and defined time after which employees in all areas shall have to pay the higher wage rate. I do suggest that this is the only reasonable course to pursue. There should not be differentiation between one area and another, except perhaps small concessions to the smaller centres, although I doubt the wisdom or necessity of even that. Living is not really cheaper in the smaller centres. Costs tend to balance between those centres and the larger centres. And in any case, I do not consider that any concessions should be made so long as the wage under consideration is not a living wage. And finally, under all recent Wage Determinations provision is made whereby juveniles may be employed at two-thirds the adult wage rate. But nothing is said about a ratio of juveniles to adults. In any case I do not believe that juveniles should be used as labourers; and certainly they should not be allowed to water down the ordinary adult wage standard. In all these matters I have raised, I feel it is imperative that a new lead should be given to the Wage Board. Give the Board a definite social direction, and let it feel that it has the backing of the country in helping to establish a decent social system that will guarantee a decent living wage to everyone in the country. I agree with the hon. member for Fordsburg. The country is sick and tired of all our old policies and piecemeal improvements that lead nowhere. I beg the Minister to consider the suggestions by the hon. member for Fordsburg in the spirit in which I believe they were made, and, on new lines, let us hope we may be able to build a new and better South Africa.

May I at once congratulate the only two speakers on this Bill on the very excellent speeches they have made. They have evidently dipped deep into the whole position because the speeches they have made have been entirely constructive. I specially want to congratulate the hon. member for Fordsburg and I hope he will forgive me when I say that I want to congratulate him on his unusual attitude— he has been very useful indeed. Of course, one cannot go into the whole rigmarole tonight, but I do feel very deeply, the same as both hon. members who have spoken on this question. Hon. members know my outlook. I do not agree with my hon. friends in this regard that it is a desirable thing to have a quota system. It bears examination. We would be wrong if we did not examine it and I propose to do so, but I do say at first blush that a quota system does not seem to me to be the right wav to get over the difficulty. I have always held and I still hold that what we have to do is what the hon. member who has just sat down has said—that we should establish a national minimum wage first and base our wages on that, upon which every individual can live a decent, comfortable and happy life. That is what I want. Then we car do any grading for special skill above that. That is the thing for Parliament to do. And I would be very pleased to introduce such a Bill if I thought I could get the House or the majority of the House to support me. My hon. friend feels perfectly certain, just as I do, that the object cannot yet be achieved.

Why not try?

I shall try, but I know it is no use. We have to educate public opinion to such an extent that they must demand it, it is a matter of education. Hon. members over there will agree with me that we have to get public opinion behind us in that outlook. I do not pretend that we are solving the difficulty. But this Bill has been introduced because of the position that has developed, and I feel that we must have some means of expediting matters. We are naturally also educating the Wage Board. I cannot instruct them, as hon. members know, and it would be undesirable for the Minister to do so, but I have pointed out to them that what they should aim at gradually, but as rapidly as possible, is a 10s. per day minimum for all unskilled workers. I see the blank look on hon. members’ faces. It shows what hope I would have of getting a minimum wage passed at this stage. Now, I just want to say this: it has always been my policy to pay for work done, irrespective of the colour or race of the individual. I hope my hon. friend will not ask me to say more on this question. I appreciate the kindly criticisms that have been made. I hope we shall be able to get together privately and see if we can evolve a scheme which we can inflict on the country with some hope of success.

I want to suggest that progress be reported. Members on this side of the House did not think that this Order would be reached and they are not prepared for it. We allowed the Government to take the previous Bill through all its stages, and I think we can ask now that the House should adjourn.

Just let us dispose of Clause 3.

I move—

I move—

1. (4) If an applicant for the insurance of a motor vehicle under this Act makes a false statement in respect of any material particular in his application, which he knows to be false, he shall be guilty of an offence and liable to a fine not exceeding fifty pounds.
2. (5) If a registered company fails to fulfil any obligation imposed upon it by this section, it shall be guilty of an offence and liable to a fine not exceeding fifty pounds.