Mr. Chairman, I wish to move an amendment to this clause. I must apologize for not being able to give the hon. the Deputy Minister and the House longer notice of this amendment, but I did not know that we would take the Committee Stage of this Bill today; I had thought that we would be going on with the Votes. I wish therefore to move—

The reason for my introducing this amendment is to try to reduce, to some extent, the ambit of this Bill so as to make the prohibition on gatherings much more limited in extent, and to bring this Bill somewhat in line with the British House of Parliament Act of 1839. During the Second Reading debate the hon. the Deputy Minister and the spokesman of the official Opposition, the hon. member for Durban North, argued that there was not anything very extraordinary about the measure which was being introduced because in fact in Britain there was such a law. I am now trying to reduce the effect of the Bill somewhat in order to bring it more or less into line with the British Act. As regards the other arguments that were used, for instance when reference was made to the dangers that the Langa march of 1960 had presented to Parliament, I pointed out that in fact the Langa procession stopped at the magistrate’s court near Caledon Square, which is outside the area proposed by this Bill. All those arguments, such as the argument about allowing the inalienable right of an African or other messenger boy to get in or out of Parliament—this was the argument used by the hon. member for Durban North, if one can call it an argument—and the discussion of “street democracy”, of course do not make any sense at all. I am now moving this amendment hoping, as I have said, to limit this Bill in such a way that it may even be acceptable to those hon. members who use the argument that this Bill is so similar to the provisions of the British Act of 1839.

Mr. Chairman, I am not prepared to accept this amendment. The amendment moved by the hon. member for Houghton refers to 50 people. It can happen very easily that far fewer people with more energy can cause a great deal more trouble. What the hon. member does, is to limit the aims of such a gathering. To my mind I made it quite clear during my Second Reading speech that what we want to limit here, is movement in the streets through Cape Town in the vicinity of the Parliament of South Africa. We want to maintain the dignity of our Parliament. This does not only apply to people, as was indicated by the hon. member in her amendment, who act with a specific purpose in mind; people who, for instance, want to submit petitions, and so forth, to Parliament or the State President. We want to put a stop to rowdiness in the streets around Parliament, which is the symbol of our authority of State. As I have said before, people who demonstrate in the streets close to a parliament aim to try and create anarchy, incite innocent people in the streets, the general public, and to work them up into a state where some kind of confrontation or action can take place. The whole purpose is to be able to make out a case where one did not have a case before; to place the police in a position where people may get hurt so that a hue and cry can be raised on behalf of the demonstrator while nothing would have been said on his behalf in the whole of South Africa before. In those circumstances, Sir, I am not prepared to accept this amendment.

Sir, the hon. the Deputy Minister is now giving a very different reason for the introduction of this clause from the one which he gave when he introduced the Second Reading. [Interjection.] I listened very attentively to the hon. the Deputy Minister’s speech, and he certainly did not mention at that stage that this was intended to keep all demonstrations off the streets and so on. He mentioned nothing at all of that kind. The hon. the Deputy Minister was talking about access to Parliament and he pointed out how difficult the position was when there were demonstrations around Parliament. What was specifically at the back of his mind was the protection of Parliament, and that was not only at the back of the mind of the spokesman of the official Opposition but it was very much to the front of his mind when he supported this measure. Sir, this has nothing whatever to do with access to Parliament; and certainly gathering of 50 persons, standing with placards in peaceful, non-violent demonstration, have in no way in the past obstructed access to Parliament and have created no disorder in the streets at all. As I pointed out at the Second Reading, the only disorder that we ever had around Parliament was the police baton charge last year on the steps of the Cathedral, and that was a non-violent, peaceful protest, as was borne out by the courts of law when subsequently people were charged with holding a demonstration and only one person was found guilty on that count, and that was for addressing a meeting without permission, using a megaphone. The hon. the Deputy Minister’s arguments today are rather different from the ones that he used on Friday, and we are now getting to the real reason for the introduction of this clause, which is what he admitted, I must say, when he replied to the Second Reading debate and said that this was really aimed only at student demonstrators.

I want to point out that my amendment also tried in some way to limit the absurdly wide definition of “gathering”, as we have it in clause 1 of this Bill. Sir, “demonstration” is defined in the Oxford Dictionary as “an outward exhibition, an exhibition of opinion on political or other questions”. If, for example, a pedestrian should knock somebody down and make a demonstration, that would fall within the meaning of the word “demonstration”, which in itself is not defined in this clause; only the word “gathering” is defined as meaning “more than 50 persons”, which, as I say, is the position in terms of the British Act, which hon. members here were so keen to put forward as an example of what was done in other democratic countries.

The hon. the Deputy Minister says that he has in mind demonstrations which might in some way disturb the peace. I would say that in that case he ought in some way to define this in the law. At present there is a very vague and general definition, and I must say that the definition of “gathering” is even wider than that of “demonstration”, because any assembly of any number of persons is prohibited, irrespective of its purpose. If a meeting of people is to constitute a “gathering”, presumably there has to be a common purpose, and as I understand our law it must be a meeting of more than two persons. But, Sir, under this Bill a “gathering”, with a common purpose, will fall within the definition. All gatherings are forbidden, and in the list of exceptions that we have in clause 2 there is no mention of any private gatherings of people. What we have excepted are divine services, funeral processions, official functions, and so on. The definition of “gathering” is therefore extremely vague, and I believe that the amendment which I have moved will somehow get rid of this vagueness and the wide implications of the Bill by prohibiting only a specific gathering, that is to say, a gathering of more than 50 persons for the specific purpose of petitioning Parliament or of coming to Parliament for any particular reason, and this is exactly what the British Act does as well. It prohibits a gathering of more than 50 persons—it does not say a gathering of more than one person—and it only prevents such gatherings if they are for the purpose of presenting petitions, etc., to Parliament. That is the object of my amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I rise only to correct the impression which the hon. member for Houghton has given that her amendment will bring this Bill more into line with the British practice at Westminster. That, of course, is not so.

It is so.

The hon. member for Houghton has referred only to the British Act which was passed early in the 19th century.

In 1839.

Sir, the situation in Great Britain is dealt with not only by that Act; it is dealt with in addition by a ruling by the Speaker in the British House of Commons. There are two authorities, governing the situation there—one a legislative authority and the other the authority of the House of Commons. Obviously the sessional order from the House of Commons had to be brought in because the legislation passed early in the 19th century in itself was not sufficient, and the amendment of the hon. member for Houghton is merely designed, as I understand it, to bring this legislation into line with the provisions which allowed gatherings of 50 persons or fewer, but which prohibited gatherings of more than 50 persons. The sessional order which they have makes it mandatory for the Metropolitan Commissioner of Police to disperse all gatherings, whether they consist of 50 persons or fewer, and quite obviously, Sir, that is necessary for two reasons: firstly, to enable members of Parliament and also those who have business at Parliament to go about their business, to go to and from the House, and, secondly, to allow Parliament to carry on its business in a calm atmosphere, because without that atmosphere no legislative assembly can properly carry out its functions. As I say, Sir, I rise merely to make the point that the amendment which the hon. member puts forward does not have the effect of equating this Bill with the position which pertains at Westminster.

Mr. Chairman, I did not say that my amendment was going to equate the position here with the position in Britain. I said it would equate the position here with the 1839 Act, which was referred to by the hon. member, and bring the position here more into line with the position in Britain. That is what I said. But, Sir, I am quite prepared to agree with the hon. member that my amendment does not take cognizance of the Speaker’s sessional order, nor does this Bill. It takes no cognizance whatever of the Speaker’s sessional order. I stated in my Second Reading speech that there was nothing whatever in law or anything else to prevent our Speaker from giving exactly the same instruction, if he wished to do so, to the police to stop any disturbances.

Would you support it if he gave it?

Sir, here is the order which is issued by the British Speaker—

Not out of session, as this Bill does, which prohibits all meetings throughout the year, whether Parliament is sitting or whether Parliament is not sitting—

which is in Parliament itself—

Sir, I would have no objection whatever if our Speaker wished to issue an injunction that during a session of Parliament, members shall not be prevented from coming in and out of Parliament; that steps may be taken to prevent any disorder, which would disrupt the proceedings of Parliament, and to stop any disorder in the Lobby of this House, which is the nearest approach that I can think of to Westminster Hall. Sir, what on earth the hon. member for Zululand, who has now disappeared into the blue, should have had to say about this in connection with the amendment that I am moving I simply cannot conceive. I said in my Second Reading speech that the Speaker could issue any such injunction. That is an absolutely different matter from prohibiting all out-door meetings within a radius of one mile of Parliament, or more than a mile, I imagine—in the whole of the central area of Cape Town—and on the city campus of the University of Cape Town, in session and out of session, on days when Parliament is sitting and on days when Parliament is not sitting. That is a completely different situation and one to which I take the greatest exception. Sir, before I complete my third and last comment on this clause, I would like to ask the hon. the Deputy Minister by what right he says that he is going to instruct the police that they need not carry out the law in respect of a certain person. The hon. the Deputy Minister, in his reply to the Second Reading debate—when I raised the absurdity of a gathering meaning one or more persons and pointed out that this could even apply to little old Miss Lee, who has been seen very frequently parading around the streets of Cape Town in the vicinity of Parliament, persumably frightening the life out of the hon. member for Durban North, since he has felt so nervous all these years—said that this law was not designed for Miss Lee, and he laughed when he said so. I know, of course, that it was not designed for Miss Lee, but in fact it applies to her. He said he would instruct the police not to see this thing which she was doing; to leave Miss Lee alone and not to arrest her. Is the hon. the Deputy Minister not defeating the ends of justice? I ask him that, because here is a law which he is placing on the Statute Book and he is telling us in advance that he is going to single certain individuals out and he will see to it that the police take no notice of them. I wonder whether, if I stand outside Parliament with a placard, he will extend the same courtesy to me. [Interjections. Anyway, that is not the point. It is the principle that is at stake here and I believe that no Deputy Minister has the right to come to Parliament and put laws on the Statute Book, which he realizes are absurd, and then by making certain exceptions he hopes to relieve the Government of the embarrassment of having little old Miss Lee carted off to gaol.

I just want to reply to the last accusation levelled by the hon. member for Houghton. The only reason why Miss Gladys Lee’s name was dragged into this debate, is because the hon. member wanted to make a sentimental point here in regard to Miss Lee, by suggesting that we are only introducing this legislation to have this old woman of 75 or 80 years arrested. This is a typical far-leftist standpoint and statement and manoeuvre. I then told her quite clearly that I have nothing against this poor old soul who parades around with her placards. I then said that if she is really concerned about Miss Lee, I would ask the police simply to ignore old Miss Lee if she gets the idea into her head to parade with a placard again. Now the hon. member again comes along with a far-leftist manoeuvre and asks now what right I have to violate the legislation? Sir, Miss Lee can now take note of the fact that, thanks to the hon. member for Houghton, I withdraw my words. Now I will ask the police also to arrest Miss Lee if she stands there again, and then they must inform her that it is because of the hon. member for Houghton that this is being done. [Interjections.]

I rise in the first place to observe that the hon. member for Zululand is back in his seat. He had to leave urgently for a short moment to receive an urgent ’phone call, but he is here. Sir, I should like to put this matter in its perspective. The hon. member for Houghton, as one would have expected, has raised this matter in order to make the most capital she can out of a situation in respect of which only one member of this House could possibly not be in agreement and that is she and her supporters outside. When the hon. member says, as she does, that here is a law he—pointing at the hon. the Deputy Minister of Police—is putting on the Statute Book—let me say that this is a law which this House has asked to be placed on the Statute Book, and not only this House but the Other Place also. Parliament as a whole has asked for this law to be placed on the Statute Book. It comes neither from the hon. the Deputy Minister nor from the Opposition, it comes from the Standing Rules and Orders Committee of this House and the equivalent body in the Other Place. When the hon. member cavils at what is in this Bill and cavils about the nature of the demonstrations that may be held, I must say that there is no absolute restriction on the right of protest. There still is the right of protest. It remains. However, you may not have demonstrations in the open air within the prescribed area unless you have permission. The point I wanted to make was that of the open air spaces that there are and that are not public places within the area which is described in the schedule to the Bill, there are two that I know of which might form a place where one might have such meetings of protests. They are the campus at Hiddingh Hall at the top of the Avenue and the Cathedral steps. The Cathedral steps are not a public place but a private place, thus was the whole point of what happened before. There has to be permission from the Dean of the Cathedral, the Very Rev. E. L. King, in order to have a meeting on the steps of the Cathedral. If you have a meeting there, on a private place, in the nature of things you could not possibly have more than 70 odd people without them spilling into the street. So when before you had a meeting there, it attracted a lot of spectators in one of the most congested corners of one of the main arterial outlets of Cape Town. Can the hon. member tell us whether there was any other object in having a meeting on the Cathedral steps other than that it would in fact achieve the very effect it did, namely that you would have a lot of spectators coming around, that you would have the streets congested, that you would have a scene, to put it at its lowest, and that you would have the necessary publicity.

The worst scene we had was last year.

The hon. member has talked about the House of Commons and my hon. friend from Zululand has indicated how much further that sessional order goes. The sessional order goes so far as to say that there should be no annoyance therein or thereabouts, which goes much further. The hon. member for Houghton must answer a question. She talks about the various English Acts that there are, but does she agree with the Rand Daily Mail—she obviously does, but will she say so—where it says—

[Inaudible.]

Does she agree with another Johannesburg paper which says—

Then she talks in protesting terms about “street democracy”. The situation postulated by these two newspapers is precisely the situation that we in our Law have since 1911 sought to prevent, a situation which any Parliament would seek to prevent and one which every Parliament in the world has sought to prevent and has indeed taken extraordinary action to prevent. The situation is, in fact, not that one says that people should not have any protest meeting. They may have their protest meetings in all the ways in which they have been held, but now you must have permission for a meeting in the open air on the St. George’s Cathedral steps. You must have the permission of the chief magistrate. The necessity for this was illustrated on the Monday after that black Friday, that unfortunate Friday when there was a meeting on the steps of St. George’s Cathedral and the events which then occurred. Then the students—not the students, but the supporters of the hon. member—wanted to have another, similar meeting on the Monday. The most irresponsible act of indiscretion, the most irresponsible decision that was ever taken, was taken by the Very Rev. E. L. King, the Dean of Cape Town, who is responsible for the Cathedral, when he allowed them to have another meeting on those steps. The chief magistrate of Cape Town, in terms of the General Law Further Amendment Act, which we have passed and which deals with processions, may not refuse an application to hold a procession in the open air in public places in Cape Town unless he is satisfied that the maintenance of law and order will be adversely affected if permission is granted. Surely we have seen that the judgment of a person like the chief magistrate of Cape Town is necessary to determine whether or not a gathering should take place if law and order and the maintenance thereof may be affected, by the very fact that until that was passed the decision rested with people like the Very Rev. E. L. King. The position is that you may still have your protest if it will not conflict with law and order. Is there anything unreasonable about that? Is there anything unreasonable in protecting the environs of Parliament? If my note is correct, the hon. member for Houghton said that the only disturbance we had ever had was the police baton charge on the cathedral steps. That hon. member has been longer in this House than I have been. I was not here in 1960, but was there not another occasion when the whole of the structure, all the buildings of Parliament, were threatened in 1960?

No, it is not true

If it is not true, I wonder what all these Bantu were doing around the House at that time. However, that was another occasion.

I want to ask the hon. member whether practically she could say that such an event could be prevented, security-wise, if in fact you only have a prohibition on events, or similar events which might lead up to such events, within spitting distance of the precincts of Parliament. Perhaps the hon. member would care to reply to some of those questions.

In a state of emergency.

Question put: That the words proposed to be omitted stand part of the clause, and a division demanded.

Fewer than four members (viz. Mrs. H. Suzman) having supported the demand for a division, Question declared affirmed, and amendment dropped.

Clause put and a division demanded.

Fewer than four members (viz. Mrs. H. Suzman) having supported the demand for a division, clause declared agreed to.

Clause 2:

Mr. Chairman, I move as an amendment—

Part of this amendment would have been consequential on my first amendment if it had been accepted. The purpose of this amendment is to try and limit this measure as it is going to stand if it is passed unamended. We are now not going to be allowed to have any demonstrations or gatherings of more than one person in an area defined in the schedule, an area which is a very wide area indeed. The area goes well beyond the immediate precincts of Parliament, and I wish to narrow this down to be applicable only on those days on which Parliament is actually sitting. The arguments that hon. members have used about members of Parliament being disturbed in their deliberations and of being prevented from having access to the Houses of Parliament must surely fall away if we limit the prohibition of these meetings to those days when Parliament sits. Then hon. members can come in free and untrammelled, undisturbed by any ladies with placards, or undisturbed by any demonstrating students, undisturbed by anything or anybody. But on the days when Parliament is not sitting, when it does not matter whether or not members are disturbed because they will not be here, the ordinary right of public protest as we have enjoyed it all these years, will obtain. I want to know, if all these arguments about the necessity for having this law are so imperative today, why were they not imperative in the period 1960 to 1973 when, according to the hon. member for Durban North, we had such a difficult time. I would like to remind the hon. member that in 1960 an emergency was declared, which lasted for three months. After that, once the declared emergency had lapsed, until the present time, 1973, it appears that we have all been able to come and go quite peacefully in and out of Parliament undisturbed by the demonstrations which have been taking place. So, I would like to move this amendment in order to limit the application of clause 1, which has already been passed, so that no gatherings or demonstrations within the area defined by the schedule, an area which is very much wider than the precincts of Parliament, shall be allowed only on those days when Parliament is sitting.

Mr. Chairman, I am not prepared to accept this amendment. If one were to accept it, it would mean that demonstrations would in fact be allowed to take place in this area. It would mean that the prohibition would be limited to those days when the House of Assembly is in session. The Session Committees concerned obviously asked us to extend the period over the whole year. In those circumstances I am not prepared to accept the hon. member’s amendment.

Mr. Chairman, a number of points arise both from this clause and from what the hon. member for Houghton has said. Firstly, the hon. member seems to approach this question of protests and demonstrations from the point of view that all demonstrations and protests would be against either the Government or the official Opposition, but not necessarily against the point of view which she supports.

I would allow that too.

I would like to pose this situation to the hon. member: What would her attitude be if there were a demonstration of persons outside this House directed against the Progressive Party …

That would absolutely be all right.

… and directed against the Progressive Party so successfully that the hon. member could not attend at this House in order to fulfil her function here?

Come off it!

The hon. member says “Come off it”. That is not good enough. If she is against the principle of this Bill, she must accept that that position might well arise. We do not accept that point of view. We take the view that the hon. member for Houghton, like anyone else, is entitled to free access to this House to put her point of view. This legislation is designed to allow the hon. member free access here in the same way as it applies to any other member of this House. That is only the one point, the question of access.

The other point is the point made by the hon. member for Durban North, a point which is tended to be ridiculed by the hon. member for Houghton and others. However, it was merely an example to show that a messenger boy has as much right to go about his business and to have free movement in the streets as have the protesters who are obstructing the way. The messenger boy is, of course, merely an illusion for the man in the street. The man in the street—and there are far more of them than there are protesters or demonstrators —also has a right in this matter. He has the right to go about his business. The trouble these days is that the demonstration is only successful in the eyes of those demonstrating if it hinders and impedes the right of the ordinary man to go about his business. Otherwise it is not a successful demonstration. This, I believe, is the point made by the hon. member for Durban North. People have the right to demonstrate and express their views, but provided they do not obstruct unduly the reciprocal right of the ordinary person, of whom there are far more than there are demonstrators, to go about his business unobstructed as well. As there are within this limited area many places under cover and within the city of Cape Town, many places in the open air where this can be done without obstruction to other citizens, we believe that the Bill is not unreasonable.

A final point is, of course, that, as I have said earlier, Parliament, in order to properly fulfil its functions, requires a calm atmosphere in which to do it, unimpeded by the noise and shouting of demonstrators. A court of law is, in many ways, a similar institution. For those reasons this side of the House gave this particular clause which really embodies the principle of the Bill, its support at the Second Reading.

Mr. Chairman, I am surprised to hear the hon. member for Zululand coming with such absurd arguments. I am used to them from the hon. member for Durban North, but, I must say, for the hon. member for Zululand to come with these ridiculous arguments, really surrises me. Could I ask him when a messenger boy has ever been obstructed from going to and from Parliament and carrying out his lawful business? I have a messenger who comes backwards and forwards every day and he has never complained. Has the hon. member had any such experience?

He asks me whether I would object if there were a meeting outside of persons against me which prohibited me from entering Parliament. Let me tell him, first of all, that there are many people in South Africa who are against the point of view I hold. In all the years that I have been here I have never been obstructed and demonstrations could have taken place; nor has the hon. member for Zululand been obstructed by people who do not happen to agree with his point of view. Has he ever had the slightest difficulty in getting in or out of Parliament? Surely he will agree that there are ordinary by-laws, municipal by-laws, under which one could summon the police to remove persons who were obstructing the free passage in public thoroughfares? I pointed out during the Second Reading that exactly that happened last year when there were about 50 students demonstrating in Parliament Street. Presumably they were breaking a municipal by-law because, without this tremendously important Bill on the Statute Book, there was a police van there in no time at all. The students were bundled into the police van—in fact, they were not obstructing anyone; they were standing on the pavement—but, in case they might cause an obstruction, they were bundled into the police van. They were taken off to Caledon Square, or wherever it was, where they were charged under a municipal by-law, after which they paid admissions of guilt for breaking that by-law. It think it is absolute nonsense for the hon. member for Zululand to try to persuade this Committee that unless this clause is put on the Statute Book, members of Parliament and messenger boys are going to be obstructed in going to and from Parliament, and this House will not be able to debate in a calm atmosphere. May I ask what we have been doing all these years? Indeed, we have had many highly contentious debates in this Parliament. Over the last 13 years that I have been a member, measure after measure was introduced by the hon. the Prime Minister when he was Minister of Justice. When there were demonstrations and protests, nobody had any difficulty in entering or leaving Parliament, and nobody had any difficulty in putting his or her point of view in this House in as calm an atmosphere as we can have in Parliament. So, I do not know what the hon. member is talking about.

The hon. member for Durban North says that the chief magistrate can always give his permission, unless he is convinced that there might be a serious abrogation of law and order. Well, one has to prove the old mala fides argument, which every lawyer, I would imagine, knows is virtually impossible. If, in the chief magistrate’s opinion, the meeting is likely to cause a break in law and order, then, of course, he will forbid the meeting. As I say, there have been very few permits granted since the Processions Act has been on the Statute Book, and I am convinced that exactly the same will happen in this case. I am interested to see that the hon. member is now defending magistrates so fervently. I can remember an occasion when he was furious with the hon. Minister of Justice when the hon. the Minister was considering allowing magistrates on the Bench.

Order! The hon. member must come back to the clause. We are only dealing with the prohibition of certain gatherings and demonstrations in a defined area.

Sir, I am discussing clause 2(2)(e), which provides that any gathering or demonstration for which the chief magistrate of Cape Town has granted permission in writing, such a gathering or demonstration may be held. It was argued by the hon. member for Durban North that chief magistrates would not, in fact, withhold permission for the holding of such meetings unless, in their opinion, there was a serious danger that law and order would be disturbed. But I am trying to show that the hon. member’s faith in magistrates seems to vary, depending on which measure he happens to be debating. A little while ago, he was telling the hon. Minister of Justice that regional magistrates should not be allowed on the Bench. Now he is telling us that the chief magistrate would seldom be likely to err when, in his opinion, there is going to be a break in law and order.

But who needs to demonstrate when they have you here, Helen?

Well, I wonder, but it just so happens that the other people would like to show their feelings as well. I know the poor old member for Durban Point is having a bad time these days inside and outside this House, but he must not let these things upset him. He must take it calmly, Sir. His bad times will probably pass.

Amendments put and a division demanded.

Fewer than four members (viz. Mrs. H. Suzman) having supported the demand for a division, amendments declared negatived.

Clause put and a division demanded.

Fewer than four members (viz. Mrs. H. Suzman) having supported the demand for a division, clause declared agreed to.

Clause 3:

Mr. Chairman I move as an amendment—

The reason for my moving these amendments is, for instance, that the second amendment abolishes the restriction on reporting the gathering or demonstration. The Bill goes very far beyond protecting M.P.s in forbidding advertising “or in any other manner makes known the proposed gathering or demonstration”. The term “proposed” may, I know, be legally argued in this context; but that depends entirely on the court’s interpretation. In other words, must the gathering have taken place, or not before the provisions become operative? But that is a legal quibble. I want to ensure that, if a gathering does take place, it can be reported. Otherwise, I believe that this is restricting the freedom of the Press still further. As it is, the freedom of the Press is restricted in South Africa, in that it may not report, for instance, on prison conditions. There are various defence matters and official secrets, etc. on which the Press may also not report. Now we are going still further. If a gathering or demonstration takes place, then, according to clause 3(b), if a newspaper reports on the gathering which, in terms of the Bill could be illegal, it is committing an offence. I believe that is another serious restriction on the reporting of news. It is censorship, in fact, of the very worst kind. I wonder whether the official Opposition is going to agree to this form of censorship. This provision will apply to a demonstration which takes place outside Parliament or even on the Parade ground. Let me point out that the prohibited area includes the Parade ground which, until now, was a prohibited area for two year periods; the prohibition had to be renewed every two years. Now this is a permanent prohibition. If there is an outdoor gathering in the city campus of the University of Cape Town and it is held without the permission of the chief magistrate, and any newspaper reports on that gathering, it is in terms of this clause committing an offence for which there are serious penalties. Therefore I wish to move this amendment in order at least to try to preserve the freedom of the Press to report on those demonstrations which may take place.

Mr. Chairman, for the same reasons I advanced earlier on, I am not prepared to accept this amendment. It appears as though the hon. member for Houghton is only opposed to agitation. Where a gathering is mentioned, she does not suggest that it be deleted. According to her amendment the clause will, inter alia, still read as follows—

This is an offence; this she allows to happen; it is only when it comes to the agitation that she is so concerned. Apparently we are allowed to prohibit the gathering itself. In any case, Mr. Chairman, I am not prepared to accept the amendment.

Question put: That the words proposed to be omitted stand part of the Clause, and a division demanded.

Fewer than four members (viz. Mrs. H. Suzman) having supported the demand for a division, Question declared affirmed and amendments dropped.

Clause put and a division demanded.

Fewer than four members (viz. Mrs. H. Suzman) having supported the demand for a division, clause declared agreed to.

Schedule:

Mr. Chairman, I want to amend the Schedule. The Schedule at present takes in a vast area of central Cape Town, which includes the Parade ground, the city campus of the Uiversity of Cape Town and the Cathedral steps. It includes, in fact, an enormous area in the centre of Cape Town. I wish to move the following amendment. I am afraid it is going to be very difficult for hon. members to follow, but I shall try to define, after I have moved the amendment, what area I mean. I move—

I have a little map here which I have shown to the hon. the Deputy Minister. In short, if I may just tell the House, it in fact includes the exact precincts of Parliament, bounded by Plein Street on the one side and Government Avenue on the other, the street just above the Groote Kerk on the north side and the Art Gallery on the south side. I think that will give hon. members an idea of the area in which the Houses of Parliament stand. It includes Government House and the Archives and Stal Plein. It is the whole area which encompasses Parliament and its immediate environs, and surely this is what hon. members want; they want to be able to get in and out of Parliament; they do not want any noisy demonstrations nearby to disturb their meditations; and they want to know that the buildings of Parliament will be safe from demonstrations consisting of one or more people.

Question put: That the words proposed to be omitted, stand part of the Clause, and a division demanded.

Fewer than four members (viz. Mrs. H. Suzman) having supported the demand for a division, Question declared affirmed and amendment dropped.

Schedule put and a division demanded.

Fewer than four members (viz. Mrs. H. Suzman) having supported the demand for a division, Schedule declared agreed to.

House Resumed: Bill reported without amendment.

During the Second Reading of the Bill I dealt with various objections I had to the introduction of an amendment to section 17(g) of the original Act, an amendment which did not in my view maintain the principle which I regard as very important for the maintenance of good relations between public servants and the public of South Africa, and for the protection of the Public Service itself. I will not repeat these arguments. I merely wish to draw this to the attention of the hon. the Deputy Minister …

May we have the attention of the Deputy Minister?

Order! The hon. member may proceed.

I wish to draw the attention of the hon. the Deputy Minister to the fact that the amendment which appears in clause 3 of the amending Bill and amends section 17(g) of the original Act does not in my view provide an adequate definition of what a public servant should or should not do. The amendment refers to somebody who makes use of his position in the Public Service to promote or to prejudice the interests of any political party. Now, so far as that goes it is perfectly clear, but I believe that it is a provision which it would be very hard to apply. It will be very hard to define, hard to identify and hard to apply. If we were confident that the further amendments to be introduced by my hon. friend in clause 4 of the amending Bill would be accepted, our task would to some extent be facilitated because it does define rather more specifically and more precisely what it is that a public servant should or should not do in the furtherance of the interests of any political party or to the prejudice of the Public Service. I should like to draw to the attention of the hon. the Deputy Minister the possibility of a number of incidents arising, incidents which would in fact be prejudicial to the Public Service but which are not defined in either of these amending clauses. Suppose, for example, that a public servant in participating in political activity were to indulge in extravagant heckling. Now, this is something which is not prohibited but if a public servant were seen to be heckling he might be held not to have made a speech, not to have addressed a meeting, but nevertheless to have made, shall we say, no more than rude noises. If he does this and attracts attention to himself it would obviously be prejudicial to the Public Service that he should be seen to be doing such things. He might for example be employed as a chucker-out. If he is employed at a political meeting to chuck out other hecklers, then the fact that a public servant, who enjoys some status in the community, is seen to be lifting people on his shoulders and throwing them through the window, would be most undesirable and could create a very unhappy impression. There is the question of demonstrations. Demonstrations could take various forms. If, for example, a public servant were to take a leading part in a demonstration he would not be infringing any of the provisions which we will deal with under clause 4, but nevertheless he would without question be behaving himself in a manner which would be prejudicial to the status and the prestige of the Public Service. One can also imagine many other situations arising which do not fall under the prohibition in clause 4. Therefore in order to supplement clause 3, in order to achieve the purpose which I am sure we must all, on both sides of the House, have in mind, which is not only to restrict the activities of public servants in the use of their status as public servants in furthering or opposing certain political parties, but also to protect the Public Service against improper behaviour by public servants in the exercise of his function, I wish to move as an amendment—

I do not think the hon. member has read this particular clause with the necessary care. This concerns a person who uses his position in the Public Service to promote or prejudice the interests of any political party. In other words, the tenor of the clause is positive. The official may not make use of his position to do certain things. In other words, it is positive. It therefore goes without saying that if he may not even do the positive, then he will decidedly not be able to do anything negative. It therefore appears to me that if he is not allowed to perform a positive act whereby his position will be prejudiced, he is, on the other hand, unable to use his position to do anything negative as well.

Mr. Chairman, I understand the problem which has been raised by the hon. member for Rissik, but I do not think it is the correct approach. The provision in the Bill before us is that a public servant may not use his position to further political interests. It is a very circumscribed statement. A person, who is the Secretary for the Interior, for instance, may not use his position to further the political interests of a party, but he may well act in some manner, while he is Secretary for the Interior—an indication of which was given by the hon. member for Von Brandis—and do something in public or at a public meeting which adversely affects the interests or the status of the Public Service. After all, he is a man who is known, because of his status, as the Secretary for the Interior. I think the two things are different. They are complementary, but the one does not include the other. This provision about using his position as a public servant to further the interests of a political party applies to certain provincial regulations at the present time. An important man can stand up to say that his views are this or that on a political issue. He is known as a gentleman of standing and holding a high position, but he is not using his position to further the interests of a political party. However, it may not be in the interests of the Public Service, that he should, while holding that position, participate in politics.

I think the hon. the Minister was present in the House during the whole of the Second Reading debate which was handled by the hon. the Deputy Minister. The problem with which we are faced in this legislation and which arises from this clause and the subsequent clause is that there is no uniform code of ethics in relation to political activity throughout the Civil Service in its wider sense; that is, those people who are in State employ in various departments and who act for the State in relation to the public. That is the problem which we have. In this Bill we are now dealing with one small section of State employees; that is, those who fall under the definition of “Public Service”. The hon. the Leader of the House is present and he will know that this Bill excludes the employees of the Railways. It is for that reason why one is trying to find something here which is not going to curtail unnecessarily the right of a public servant as a citizen to exercise his political rights, but at the same time it should be restricted in a manner which we believe is necessary for the sake of the status of the Public Service. That is why we have moved this amendment, the object of which is to provide that a public servant should not act in a manner which is detrimental to the Public Service. One can imagine a large number of persons employed in the Railways who are not in contact with the public. Their work is of a specialized nature within the administration of the Railways and their activity in politics does not affect the public because they do not come into contact with the public in the performance of their ordinary duties. However, vast numbers of the persons employed in the Public Service and for whom we are now legislating, are persons who directly contact the public.

But so do the railwaymen. Many of them have direct contact with the public.

Yes, but I am talking about those members who are not in direct contact with the public to the extent of the public servants for whom we are legislating in this Bill. All that we are trying to find is some code which can be applied right throughout the Public Service. I do not want to anticipate our discussion of the next clause, but I am sure that if the hon. the Minister of the Interior, the hon. the Minister of Transport and the hon. the Minister of Posts and Telegraphs could get some of their officials together, they would be able to work out a code which I believe is in the interests of the Public Service as a whole in South Africa. I think the amendment moved by the hon. member for Von Brandis is a reasonable one, in that it constitutes the counterpart of what is in the proposed clause. At the same time it does not do something which is detrimental to the Public Service for which the hon. the Minister of the Interior is responsible. I am sure that the hon. the Minister does not want any public servant to act in a manner which could be detrimental to the Public Service.

Mr. Chairman, I really do think the hon. members for Green Point and Von Brandis have gone too far. The hon. member for Von Brandis has used words such as “chucker-out” and “hecklers” and so on. It is really not in the make-up of our public servants, as we have come to know them throughout the years, to play such roles, in any event, not those servants who support the National Party. That is not how we know them. I do not know what the public servants are like in those hon. members’ constituencies. When we study clause 3, we see that it is primarily concerned with putting the interests of the Public Service first. The hon. member for Rissik referred to an official who used his position in the Public Service to promote or to prejudice the interests of a political party. I cannot see what a “chucker-out” and a “heckler” have to do with that.

You do not understand English!

I do not need that hon. member’s advice on English; he is anything but a translator. Basically this provision is concerned with the interests of the Public Service. I think that if the hon. member gives careful consideration to the matter, he will see that that amendment with which he has come forward in fact disturbs the essence of this clause. I am therefore unable to support it.

Mr. Chairman, I am unable to accept the amendment. There are two reasons for this in practice. The first is that it will be a difficult task to determine when such a person is prejudicing or not prejudicing the Public Service as such and who is to exercise the deciding authority in that connection. The second reason is that I think in all honesty that the Public Service Act already has a blanket provision which covers the situation in general and which is just as effective as that one could possibly be. I refer to the existing section 17(b) of the Public Service Act. According to that it is very clear that an official will be guilty of misconduct if he—

If, for instance, a man were to act as a “chucker-out”, to use the term which has been mentioned, then I think he would be contravening this provision of the existing section 17(b). As I interpret this, he would be committing an act which was in fact prejudicial to the administration, discipline and efficiency of a department or an institution. If that were to be the case, I think that it could be interpreted in this way. I think what the hon. member wants to cover is already covered by section 17 (b) and that is the reason why I feel that we should not confuse the matter any further by means of an amendment to section 17(g). Section 17(g) deals specifically with the one aspect, namely the abuse or the use of his position in the Public Service to promote or prejudice the case of a political party. I think that section 17(b), as it stands at present, constitutes the blanket provision which has the effect which that hon. member seeks to achieve by means of the amendment moved by him. Then, too, I want to say to the hon. member for Green Point that it is impossible to achieve uniformity in this regard because we are dealing with …

It has been achieved in other countries.

Yes, but other countries do not have provincial administrations as we have, which have their own way of doing things. We have provincial administrations, each of which has its own provisions. Then we have the railways which has traditionally been functioning for years on another basis. So, too, there is the Post Office which recently became an autonomous body. As the hon. member himself will know, services such as the Defence Force, the Police, the Department of Prisons and the Bureau for State Security are excluded from this provision.

I made mention of that at the Second Reading.

In other words, everyone is considered on merit according to the circles in which he moves. The same argument which applies to the Railways, applies to public servants as well. There may be a difference percentage-wise in respect of the number of officials coming into direct contact with the public in the Railways on the one hand and in the Public Service on the other. The principle is nevertheless the same, whether there is 10% in the one group and 30% in the other. It makes no difference. The fact of the matter is that certain people are in direct contact with the public in both the Railways and the Public Service. The principle is therefore the same under both set of circumstances. In the light of the circumstances and in the light of the facts I fear that I am unable to accept the amendment. I therefore want to request that the clause remains unaltered.

Mr. Chairman, the hon. the Minister stated two things. One is that he can deal with those particular problems or that they can be dealt with under the existing regulations and the generalized applications thereof, and not necessarily dealing with political activity. What I want to say to him is that in the Second Reading it has been pointed out that these regulations have not been enforced for direct political “inmenging” in the past. The excuse of the departmental head and the Minister concerned was that disciplinary action was permissive and not a compulsory one. In other words, it may or may not be applied, steps may or may not be taken. The second point is that if he wants to carry out logically what he has just said, namely that there should not be uniformity throughout the Public Service and that the police, the Post Office and others he mentioned should have different regulations, can the hon. the Minister then tell me any reason why the Department of Justice is not in the same position as the police and why it is not going to be dealt with in the same way? The Department of Justice is falling under the general provisions of this legislation. That is why I think these matters do. I am disappointed that the hon. the Minister indicated that it was impossible to get uniformity, I believe that it is necessary to have clarity in this regard. We can certainly release a vast number of people in various grades of the Public Service to participate more actively in politics. It has been done in other countries, where they have met and agreed that certain grades could participate more actively. I want to say that I believe, and accept, that the overwhelming majority of our senior public servants exercise this political right with the utmost discretion. Unfortunately one has to legislate for the black sheep in the family as well as the white sheep. As far as the Public Service is concerned, we have no objection to the overwhelming majority taking part in these matters, because as they rise in the Service, they use their discretion, and they use it because of their own initiative. There is no compulsion in that regard. I believe it is necessary to limit the activities of those who do not use their discretion in the way that it should be used.

Mr. Chairman, the hon. the Minister has used two arguments in reply to my amendment, neither of which, I believe, is entirely valid. The first is that my amendment would be difficult to enforce. I put it to him that the amendment under clause 3 of the amending Bill would be even more difficult to enforce. This amendment asks that two things be proved: Firstly, that there should be prejudice or advantage to a political party and, secondly, that if there is such prejudice or advantage, it must have been caused by the public servant in using his public Service position for that purpose. In other words, not only must the deed be proved, but also the motive. This is a very hard thing to prove, and one wonders who is in fact going to take the trouble to prove it against him. In the case of my amendment there is a much simpler issue to be proved. It has not this double requirement, i.e. that he has to do the deed to advantage or prejudice a political party and be shown to have used his position in the Public Service to achieve that. In the case of my amendment it is merely required that it be shown that he has done something in a political context which has been harmful to the Public Service. It means, simply, that he has behaved himself in a way, whilst conducting political activities, which redounded to the discredit of the Public Service. This is a much easier thing to prove. It is one which is much more easily motivated because the Public Service itself, if it feels itself harmed, would in fact wish to take action against that person. I believe that it is in fact the counterpart to the hon. the Minister’s own amendment in clause 3. I believe it rounds off and completes the picture; it gives greater protection to the Public Service and to the public. That is our only purpose in suggesting this amendment.

As far as the second point is concerned, the hon. the Minister has suggested that the amendment which I have proposed covers a position which was already covered by section 17(b) of the existing Public Service Act. It is difficult to agree with this because section 17(b) obviously contemplates circumstances other than political ones. It was section 17(g) in the original Act which specifically dealt with the political circumstances. Section 17(b) is a matter of general discipline within the Service. It is theoretically possible to apply section 17(b) to a political act of some kind, but section 17(g) in the original Act deals specifically with the political concept of a public servant’s activities. If one now looks at section 17(g), as amended, one sees that it deals even more elaborately or at greater length with the political activities of the public servant. It is hardly likely that section 17(b) would be taken as covering political activities. I think section 17(g) as it stands would in fact be regarded as the section which deals specifically and comprehensively with what the public servant may or may not do in a political context. I think this imposes the permissive aspects of it and the limitations of it. I believe that 17(g) must be looked at as the one clause which contemplates the political activities of the public servant. I believe therefore that section 17(g) should be adequate for that purpose. I do not believe, that as it stands now, with or without further amendments in clause 4, which we will discuss presently, that it is adequate for its purpose. I attempted to illustrate, for the information of the hon. member for Pretoria District, that the examples I quoted were obviously not allegations of the sort of thing which public servants might do. They were merely illustrations of the fact that the amendments, as they stand, are inadequate to cover every political contingency which may arise in the political life of a public servant.

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member was correct in only one small aspect of his argument, namely that paragraph (g) of the old Act only determines the position of the public servant in respect of his association with a political party. What the hon. member is envisaging in his amendment, is to determine the conduct or actions of such a person in respect of his political associations as well. If the hon. member were to take another look at section 17 of the Act he would see in the definition of “misconduct” that that would amount to an officer being guilty of misconduct and that he might be dealt with in terms of the provisions of section 18 were he to do certain things. These things are set out in paragraphs (a) to (r). These comprise a number of contraventions of which an official may be guilty. One of the sins mentioned, is that of belonging to a political organization or taking an active part in political matters. Now this particular aspect is simply being changed. Bad conduct is not something which is wrong in one aspect only. It applies everywhere. All the other provisions in respect of bad conduct or the kind of conduct on the part of an officer which does not meet the ideals we set for the Public Service, could come into question. In other words, this does not apply to politics alone. Under no circumstances may an officer be guilty of poor conduct. If the hon. member were to read all those provisions he would note that the Public Service is in fact protected against poor and unfair conduct on the part of an officer. This, therefore, does not imply that when he is guilty of poor conduct in a church council, action will not be taken against him. If, for example he belongs to another association and he acts wrongly there, it is not necessary that there should be a specific provision for that contingency. I think that just like the rest of us, the hon. member does not want an officer to act poorly or wrongly. However, this is sufficiently covered under the definition of “misconduct”. For that reason it is unnecessary to insert any additional provisions.

Mr. Chairman, I just want to direct the hon. member’s attention to section 17(i) of the Public Service Act, which contemplates precisely the same thing, and covers it very clearly. Paragraph (i) reads—

All the examples mentioned by the hon. member could be classified under this provision, if it were to come to that. There is no doubt about this. Therefore my argument remains that I think that the prohibition as such is contained in these provisions. The new paragraph (g) is not really being substituted for section 17(g). Clause 4 of the Bill, in which the political rights of an official or employee are being defined, is really being substituted for section 17(g). The total prohibition is now being lifted, with certain conditions. There is really only one object behind the substitution of section 17(g) and that is to prevent abuse in this respect. But all the other sections covering the whole terrain of misconduct remain unaltered.

It is true that certain departments have more difficult problems to handle than other departments as far as the question of politics is concerned, and from the nature of the case their officials are in a more delicate position than others. It is not a question of unwillingness on my part. This is a practical problem. One cannot lump them all together and prescribe that this must be the position for all officials in the service of the State or the provinces. For that reason we have various Acts, and for that reason specific people are being excluded in this Bill. For that reason the Railways, the Post Office and the provinces, respectively, are covered by other legislation. The powers of the provinces in regard to this matter were allocated to them years ago. By means of this Bill, officials who have been entrusted to the care of the Public Service, are now being accommodated.

Amendment negatived.

Clause agreed to.

Clause 4:

Mr. Chairman, as the principal Act stands at the moment, members of the Public Service are debarred completely from membership of any political organization. That, Sir, you will appreciate, goes much further than membership of a political party because there are political organizations which do not function as political parties.

This Bill intends to provide that members of the Public Service should be permitted to exercise certain political rights. I want to say that in the Second Reading debate we welcomed the fact that it introduces some certainty into what has been an uncertain position, as a result of the fact that no person has contravened the existing provisions of the Act over the last few years. As the hon. the Minister stated in reply to a question by the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District, there had been no prosecutions or disciplinary actions because of the contravention of the existing provisions over the last ten years. Yet the hon. the Minister will agree with me that there are public servants who have contravened the provision prohibiting membership of a political party or organization over the last ten years. So, we welcome the introduction here of some certainty. There are the specific do’s and don’ts, as far as participation in politics is concerned.

Now, Sir, what is this provision aimed at? As I understand this Bill before us, it is aimed, firstly, at going as far as possible to provide a public servant with the opportunity of expressing his personal political affiliations, becoming associated with those persons who think like him in relation to political matters, and of making some contribution to the thoughts of the political party to which he is affiliated or with which he is in accord.

We now come to the first point whereby, in terms of this clause, public servants are allowed to become members of a lawful political party. Having become a member —and I think the hon. the Minister will agree with me—he there has the opportunity of assisting in the day to day running of that party. He is particularly also given the opportunity, through his party organization, of assisting to formulate policy and to change policy. He may, for instance, try to bring about a change from “verkramp” to “verlig” or from “verlig” to “verkramp”, according to his feelings in that party.

How far do we go after that? Because the second basic principle of this clause is that what he is going to do must be done privately and not publicly. Paragraphs (b) and (c) make it quite clear that he may attend a public meeting but that he must sit there quietly and attentively and listen; he must not take any active part in the public meeting. Furthermore, he may not draw up or send out pamphlets, and so on. Where is the dividing line between the opportunities he has for his personal expression of political affiliation as a citizen, and the prohibition upon his acting publicly in that regard? The amendments I have placed on the Order Paper attempt to clarify this position.

The suggestion contained in my first amendment is that a public servant should be able to join a political party and that he should be able to serve on a branch and/or constituency committee. There he can have his say and actively participate in party affairs. In other words, paragraph (a) will read that an officer or an employee may “be a member and serve on the branch and/or constituency committee of a lawful political party”. That is how the proposed section 24A(a) will read.

As far as paragraph (b) is concerned, we accept it as it is printed. This paragraph states that a public servant may “attend a public political meeting but may not preside or speak at such a meeting”.

Paragraph (c) states that a public servant may not “draw up or publish or cause to be published any writing or deliver a public speech to promote or prejudice the interests of any political party”.

What I suggest should now be added, relates to what he should do and may not do, having once become a member of a branch or constituency committee. The first leg of my amendment states that a public servant “may not hold office in the management of any political party”. The hon. the Minister will realize that once a member becomes an office-bearer in a constituency, in a constituency organization of a political party or even in a branch of that organization, his political activities are no longer his personal concern; they then become the concern of the branch or of the constituency. It then becomes a public manifestation of his political activities. I believe that that is undesirable and that it cuts across what was intended by the Bill which is now before us.

The next prohibition which I believe should be incorporated is that a public servant may not “canvass for members or funds or for support of any candidate in the interests of any political party”. That would eliminate him from direct participation in making contact with the public as a member of a political party. In so far as elections are concerned, it would exclude the public servant, for instance, from getting involved in the municipal elections in Johannesburg, but not from the municipal elections of Pretoria, where such elections are not held on party political lines. Hon. members know that elections in Johannesburg are held on party political lines. There he could not then go and canvass for councillors. He could, however, certainly do so in Cape Town or Pretoria, where the elections are not held on party political lines.

The further paragraph I have suggested should be included in order to provide clarity, so that there can be no question about this. This paragraph, paragraph (f), states that an officer or employee may not “use, or permit the use of, the premises of any State department for political purposes”. In other words, in terms of this provision one will not be able to have a cosy little branch known as the “Department of the Interior branch” or the “Department of Agricultural Economics and Marketing branch” where persons can make use of State department premises or offices for the purposes of political meetings.

I believe that these are reasonable amendments, and we on this side would like to see them introduced into this Bill not for the sake of limitation, but more for the sake of clarity, because a basic principle in the new section proposed here is the separation of the opportunities for private political expression on the part of a public servant on the one hand, and the public expression of political affiliation by such a servant on the other. I trust that the hon. the Minister will accept this amendment for those reasons, and therefore I move—

1. (d) not hold office in the management of any political party;
2. (e) not canvass for members or funds or for support of any candidate in the interests of any political party;
3. (f) not use, or permit the use of, the premises of any State department for political purposes.

Sir, I want to support briefly the arguments of the hon. member for Green Point. In terms of clause 4 as it stands, a public servant is allowed to do certain things. This is the positive side of the amendment contained in this Bill. The first is that he may be a member and serve on the management of a political party; secondly, he may attend political meetings, etc. He is prohibited from doing two things only. The one is that he may not serve as chairman, and the second is that he may not publish, viz. in (b) and (c), he is prohibited from publishing by making speeches or drawing up writings, etc. Sir, an immediate deduction to be made from these prohibiting—since he is allowed to do certain things and since only these two prohibitors exist, namely that he may not preside at a meeting nor publish—is that he may do anything else which is legal in the execution of his political activities, because there are only these two things which are prohibited. We would have preferred the hon. the Minister to have accepted our first amendment, because then there would have been a general statement which could perhaps have been embodied in a code which could have been drawn up by the heads of departments and which would be intelligible to everyone and which could be applied to all circumstances as they developed. What we have here now is a certain clause which allows certain things to be done and which prohibits only two things in the whole political life of the public servant. Of course, it may be deduced that everything which is not prohibited is in fact allowed, and these include a large number of other activities, some examples of which I mentioned a short time ago. The hon. member for Green Point tried to add a few other prohibitions to those two prohibitions, and the inclusion of those prohibitions would definitely be an improvement. To my way of thinking there are also other possibilities which arise —other activities which may, also have to be prohibited in the future. Sir, we still prefer a code; we still prefer a general statement as we would have had if our amendment to clause 3 had been accepted and which would have allowed of such a code being put into operation by, for example, the committee of heads of departments; but the clause as it stands is inadequate and the endeavour of the hon. member for Green Point seeks to eliminate the shortcomings in the clause. I doubt whether they could ever be eliminated adequately simply by stipulating these points, because there are many activities which it is simply impossible to mention in one clause. We would have preferred to have had a code but since it is improbable that our concept of a code will be accepted, I support these additional prohibitions as proposed by the hon. member for Green Point.

Hon. members of the Opposition are trying to define further the powers which are being granted here. We differ immediately here in respect of the first matter. In other words, the Government is prepared—and this is how it has been accepted—to allow an official to become a member of a political party and of the management of such a party. Now the Opposition wants to exclude the possibility of such an official serving on the management.

No, it must just not be possible for him to be an officebearer.

Sir, how does one serve on a management if one is not an office-bearer, I do not know how the Opposition’s managements work but if one serves on the management of a branch of a party, naturally one is a member of the management; one is not chairman or secretary, but one is a member of the management and one has certain duties in this capacity and one comes in contact with the public. The hon. member does not want the public servant to hold any office.

He must not be chairman or secretary.

He may not be chairman or secretary, but he may be a member of the management of the branch. Is this the distinction which the hon. member is drawing.

Yes.

But then he is still an office bearer.

Sir, he remains an officer-bearer, in my opinion, because from time to time instructions are given to those members to execute certain things in practice, to collect funds, to canvass, or something of this nature. What difference does it make whether the man who does these things does so in his capacity as member of the management or in his capacity as chairman? As chairman he would perhaps come into contact with the public less frequently. The ordinary member is the very person who goes from house to house. I think that if we were to accept this amendment we would actually be aggravating the position. But in practice there is only this difference; we on this side of the House are in fact prepared to allow the official to serve on the party management and perform all the duties he would in the normal course of events be given to perform as a member of the management of a party. The Opposition differs from us and therefore their amendment states that he may not hold office in the management of the party. This automatically applies to the next one, (e), too, namely that he may not canvass for members or funds or for support of any candidate of any White political party. If he may serve on the management, then automatically he must do this, as far as I can see, and therefore I am also unable to accept (e). In the case of (f), I once again want to submit for the consideration of the hon. member that in my opinion (f) is already covered in two of the existing provisions. I want to agree that (f) should definitely not be used. We do not want to use the premises of the state departments for any political activities. I agree, but I want to maintain that (f) is fully covered, in the first place, by the provision I have just mentioned, 17(b), which refers to the committing or permitting of, or the conniving at, any act which is prejudicial to the administration, discipline or efficiency of a department, office or institution. The fact that one uses one’s office for an official party meeting or something of this nature, is, after all, a contravention of that. But the second reason is even clearer. I refer to section 17(o) which provides that it constitutes misconduct to misappropriate or improperly use any property of the Government under such circumstances that his act does not constitute a criminal offence. If a person were to use an official Government office for a political meeting, I would make the logical deduction from that that he was using it improperly. The office has not been provided for that purpose. Such a person would, for example, make use of the State’s electricity and that would constitute improper use of the property of the State. I therefore want to take up the sincere standpoint that in my opinion this is fully covered in (o) and in the blanket clause (b). I want to put it like this only in principle. What the hon. member for Green Point is now trying to say is that we are granting certain powers but withholding others, so that certain things may not be done. That which we deemed necessary to withhold, we withheld. For the rest we believe in the blanket provisions such as the previous one, 17(b) and 17(o) and 17 (h). All these blanket provisions must clarify the matter further. We cannot stipulate the exceptions one by one because one would never be able to do so. One would always forget one or two and we therefore have the blanket concept which we are now inserting into 17(g), viz. “using his position in the Public Service” to promote or prejudice a party. To me this seems to be a blanket clause which, politically speaking, solves the whole matter and in the light of this I do not think that the amendment can constitute an improvement.

I am very sorry about the Minister’s approach but his view of the amendment is a very superficial one. If the hon. the Minister would only read what is in front of him on the Order Paper, he would see that we have no objection to an official of the Public Service being a member of a branch committee or constituency committee. That is clear. But we also go further and say that he must not hold an office in the management of a political party. There is a big difference between membership of the management and of the committee. We say that he must not act as chairman of a branch of a constituency or as treasurer or as secretary. We say that it is clear that in terms of the Bill before us, he cannot act as chairman at a public meeting. Now what may happen? Take the hon. the Minister’s own constituency. There is a public meeting, and, in terms of the Act as it stands, the chairman of his own constituency committee is unable to preside at that meeting. Why then should he be able to act as chairman to do the ordinary work of the constituency? Then he must get someone else to do it. That is our problem. What the Minister said is not logical.

†The hon. the Minister has not done justice to the amendment in considering it. Does he really want us to accept that it is in the interest of the Public Service of South Africa, the relations between the public Service cannot only become the chairman of a branch in my constituency, but that he can canvass for members? If he is allowed to canvass, it means that he can canvass in his own office and he can canvass among his underlings in his office. He can also canvass among his own underlings and in his own department for subscriptions for membership of the Nationalist Party or the United Party. Does the hon. the Minister really think that that is desirable? The point is furthermore that he can canvass those people in his office to go to vote for somebody on election day. That is most undesirable. If the hon. the Minister will go not only to the officials in the top grades, but to those in the second and third grades, I guarantee that if he gets 1% of those officials who will stand by that proposition he will be lucky. They do not want it. It embarrasses them. It embarrasses their relationship with their own staff and it embarrasses their relationship with the public.

The hon. the Minister explained to me that the proposed subsection (f) of our amendment is not necessary, but if he does not accept subsections (d) and (e) then it will be going out from this Chamber that there is nothing prohibiting officials from acting as office-bearers of any political party, from collecting funds, from canvassing inside and outside their own departments. If his senior officer comes with an instruction to sign a membership card of the Nationalist Party and he says that he is not prepared to sign it, what will happen to him? What happens to discipline; what happens to relationships within the Public Service? I believe it is a wrong step.

If you want to restrict, as is the spirit of the Bill, the public servant’s political activities to his private life, we have no objection and we should like to see that the public servant is given the opportunity to express all the political views he likes, whether in the committee of a branch or that of the constituency. However, when it comes to the public servant’s official capacity, there should be no manifestation of what his political views are.

I do think that the hon. the Minister is doing an injustice to a vast number of our public servants, because what did they ask in 1970? What did the Public Servants’ Association ask? They only asked that they be permitted to become members of political parties. As the law stands at the moment, they cannot even become members. The hon. the Minister is aware of this position. They cannot become members without transgressing the Public Service Regulations and if they do, disciplinary action can be taken. All they said was that they should like to become members of political parties. I agree that they should be able to express their political views within the confines of the various committees of political parties in order to contribute to the political thinking of South Africa. However, if these other actions are permitted, if they are permitted to hold office, not only as an ordinary member of the management of a constituency or a branch, but also as office-bearers, for example, chairman or treasurer or secretary, then I believe that the Minister must expect to encounter many difficulties. I believe, too, that he can expect a lot of resistance from the ranks of the public servants themselves.

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member has apparently failed from the very beginning to understand clause 4, as printed. Apparently he did not quite understand at the Second Reading what we meant by section 24A(a) as proposed by clause 4. In the Afrikaans text this reads as follows—

I shall tell the hon. member in my terminology what we mean. I want to give the English version, too, so that there may be no confusion:

This surely means that it is a reference to a public servant who is in the position of being a member of the management. A member of the management has certain duties. To me this simply means that we are hereby granting full political rights to the public servant. That is what they asked for. No public servant is being obliged to do this. No constraint is being exerted upon a public servant to be a member of a political party. The person who does not feel like being a member of a party, need not be one, and the person who wants to join a party, will now have the right to do so and need no longer do so in secret or on the sly, thereby running the risk of being confronted at any time with the fact that he has infringed the Public Service Act. We just want to give the opportunity to be able to do so, to those who want to or can do so. Those who do not want to do so, need not; there is a free choice. We are now giving the public servant, who is just as much a taxpayer and a member of the population as is anyone else, the rights enjoyed by the ordinary John Voter and John Citizen. Why should we restrain the public servants from doing this if it is their right? We are giving them the right to do so. I may add that the amendment proposed by the hon. member, that a public servant be prohibited from serving on a management, apparently implies that we on this side of the House and the hon. members on the other side of the House, understand two different things.

It is the office in the management. They must not be office-bearers in the managements.

The hon. member and I do not see eye to eye as regards our terminology. Apparently the organization of that hon. member’s party differs from that of mine. My party’s organization is that one becomes a member of the party.

Correct.

That group of members meet in order to elect a management.

Correct.

The management does not only consist of office bearers, of chairmen or secretaries, but apart from the chairman and the secretary, there are a treasurer and 15 members of the management.

He may be that.

The hon. member says that he may be one of those 15 members of the management.

He may not be a chairman or a …

He may not be a chairman or a secretary. On what grounds may he not be that?

He comes into contact with the public.

As an ordinary member of the management, he also comes into contact with the public, and he must also canvass from house to house. As an ordinary member of the management he must also collect funds. Their tasks are identical; I am unable to see the difference between the two. Now we are very clearly prohibiting this person, and this we do not want, from acting as chairman at a public meeting. Should he now, as a result of that one act which he may perform, perhaps once in five years, be prohibited from becoming chairman of a branch for the rest of that period of five years?

It is not a party meeting, but a public meeting.

Yes, it is, what is more, a public meeting. He is prohibited from being chairman of such a meeting. However, I say very clearly that the vice-chairman will take the chair on that one occasion if he should be a public servant. Why should the chairman be prohibited from serving as chairman for the whole term if he is the obvious leader in his community and if everyone accepts him as leader? If he is elected as chairman, he may not accept the chairmanship because he may only be an ordinary member, whilst in essence he takes the full responsibility and has the qualities of a leader. I want to state clearly that I am not prepared to give the public servants half a right. We are giving the public servants political rights at their request. All that we are doing, is to prohibit what could cause the State embarrassment. We are prohibiting him, to be specific, from acting as chairman or as a speaker in public, or from abusing his position by promoting or prejudicing a a party.

But, surely, that is also half a political right.

What is half a political right?

If a person may not do that. Then, surely, it is no argument.

We say now, and the public servants themselves are saying so, that there are certain things which they do not want to do. I am not forcing anyone to do them. Those who do not want to, need not do so, and I have no objection to that; that is their full right. To those who want to do so, I, as the responsible Minister, cannot give half a right. I want to give them the rights to which they are entitled, and I do not begrudge them those rights in the slightest. I am sorry, but I am not prepared to accept the hon. member’s amendment.

Mr. Chairman, the hon. the Minister commenced his reply by saying that no public servant would be compelled to take part in politics. I accept that, and I am glad to hear him say it, because this is our attitude as well. However, what has been the effect of these prohibitions, in the Act up to now? These prohibitions have provided a degree of protection for the public servant who has not wished to take an active part in politics. When any person has said to him: “Why do you not come in?”, or “To which political party do you belong?”, or “Which way do you think, politically?” he has had the protection of saying: “Look, I am a public servant, and I have nothing to do with politics.” That has been the situation up to now. This has been the protection that has been afforded to him. At the request of the Public Service Association—and I have a copy of their resolution of 1970 here— the Government has now introduced this legislation to grant them certain political rights. I believe that we are going beyond what the Public Service Association asked for in 1970, as has been pointed out by my hon. friend for Green Point. We are going beyond that; we are taking all that protection away from the public servant. He can no longer claim the protection of the Act, if we accept the amendments to the Act which are now proposed by the hon. the Minister. We take away all the protection he may ever have had. We are now allowing his senior officials to go to the man and say: “Here, sign a membership card,” and the official cannot say: “Look, I do not take part in politics.”

Why not?

Because the regulations no longer prohibit it. He is not going to have the protection of the Act any more. He is going to be compelled to declare himself to his senior official because immediately he says to the senior official, “No, I will not sign the membership card you are putting in front of me,” his senior straight away thinks: “He will not sign it because he is against me and my party.”

Oh, please!

Of course that is the implication of what is happening here! We are taking that protection away from him.

There is yet another aspect of this. The Act as it has been in the past and as we are trying to amend it now, prohibits the currying of favour by a public servant, particularly by the senior officials of the various departments, with their Ministers or their seniors by officiating within the political party which is supported by the senior official and also by the Minister. What better way for a civil servant to advance within a department than to play an active part in working for his Minister? I believe one must protect the civil servant from this sort of thing. You must protect him against those people who will use what we are now putting on the Statute Book to act against him.

Let us have a look at Die Staatsamptenaar of April, 1970, in which an editorial was written on the whole question of political rights. Reference is made there to the resolution requesting the authorities that public servants should at least be permitted membership of all recognized political parties.

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

It goes on—this was just an introduction …

Order! The hon. member must come back to the clause. He is now making a Second Reading speech.

I accept your ruling, Sir.

The hon. member must come back to the discussion of clause 4 concerning the proposed new section 24A and the amendment proposed.

With submission, Sir, I am dealing with the proposed new section 24A.

The hon. member is discussing a resolution of the Public Servants Association. The hon. member must abide by my ruling.

I want to quote from this editorial—

If we recognize the political rights of the civil servant, which we all do, that he should have the full right to cast his vote and to participate privately in politics for himself, this is fine. However, immediately you get to the stage where that civil servant can hold an official position in a political party—he might even be the chairman of a province or the chairman of a national congress of a political party—can he still continue to serve his masters, to serve the Government in an impartial way? This, I think, is the point which my friend, the hon. member for Green Point, was trying to make, namely, allow the man political activity, allow him to be a member of a party by all means, but do not let him get himself into a position where his official position in the party is such that it can impair his judgment within the Service. At the time when I was in the Public Service it was a thing over which we were all extremely proud, namely the fact that we had to serve the Government of the day. Certain civil servants, particularly those of the Department of Bantu Administration and Development and the Department of Foreign Affairs have to carry out the policy of a particular political party. Those, I believe, should be apolitical; you cannot do that. It is an extreme view and I accept that it is an extreme view. Therefore we should limit the activity of those particular officials in politics. Let them be members of a political party. Let them have opinions. We do not want to prohibit the civil servants from having political opinions. But I do believe that there should be a limit to the activities which are permitted to them.

We had the example seven or ten days ago. The hon. the Deputy Minister of Finance is unfortunately not here. He said that a teacher should be entitled to propagate for the party of his choice so long as he did not carry his beliefs into the classroom. Now, if you are going to apply this to all civil servants, namely that a civil servant should be entitled to propagate for the party of his choice, how then does an official in the Department of Bantu Administration who supports the Progressive Association or United Party carry out the policy of this Government as a good State servant? This is the question which the hon. the Minister must ask himself. Does he agree with this statement by the hon. the Deputy Minister of Finance, namely that a civil servant should be allowed to propagate for a party? I think this is in conflict with what the hon. the Minister means. I believe that the hon. the Minister is making this too wide. He is taking the defence away from the civil servant. He is leaving the civil servant open to abuse. In this way we are going to detract from the goodwill which the civil servant has in the eyes of the public.

Mr. Chairman, I am sorry, but I must reply to this argument. The hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District really has a poor opinion of the public servant if he maintains that the public servant wants to hide behind the Act in an attempt to justify in this way his evasion of political activities. Prevously, when he was asked to join a political party, he could say, “The Act protects me; I may not,” and he can still say so. He can still say that he does not want to join. There is nothing to stop him.

Yes, but then he would be declaring himself.

Why would he be declaring himself?

He would be declaring himself, because if he does not join, it could be deduced that he is against you.

Who says so? There is no question of that. One need only say that it is against one’s principles to discuss one’s politics openly with anyone. Hundreds of people say so, and they are not necessarily public servants. Any member of the public can say that he is not prepared to take an active part in politics. He need not say openly where he stands. His business, interests or whatever may cause him not to be able to do this. Nothing on earth can force a public servant to do this if he does not want to. I do not think that the public servants will have a favourable opinion of this hon. member who now wants to create the impression that they have been hiding behind the Public Service Act all these years. According to him they do not really want to take part in politics; however, they do not have the courage to say so themselves, and that is why they are hiding behind the Public Service Act. They can supposedly say that the Act does not make provision for them, and therefore they are hiding behind it. That is the impression the hon. member is trying to create. It is not a question of protection. He says that the Act protected them. The Act now gives him that right. Now he still has his personal right, as an individual, to say, “In spite of the fact that the Act provides that I may take part in politics, it is my personal conviction that I do not want to take part openly in politics; I am sorry.” Everyone will respect him for that. That is his personal right. This is done by many other people who are not in the Public Service. What is the difference? After all, this is his right. We are giving the Public Service the full opportunity.

Then the hon. member said that the highest ideal of the public servant was to serve the Government of the day. I am in full agreement with him. It is his highest ideal to serve the Government of the day. But whether he may exercise political rights or not, the fact remains that the public servant still has a personal opinion. Whether or not he has political franchise or the right to be a member of a political party, he still has a political opinion. Now, at this moment, before this Bill is enacted, he has a political opinion His opinion may differ from that of the Goverment of the day. He may vote against the Government at every election. This has always been his right all along. In what respect will the fact that he is now a member of a political party, suddenly make it impossible for him to do his duty and serve the Government of the day? The fact that he is a member of a party as such, only means that he may now do openly what he has always had to do in secret; that is all. Whether he wants to do so confidentially, or wants to remain silent about it or kick up a fuss about it, is his affair; the fact remains that in the light of the present provision, i.e. that they may not become a member of any political party, the public servants have asked “at least” to be allowed to become members of a political party. That does not mean that that is all they want. I had discussions with the Public Servants’ Association, and I discussed the whole matter with them fully. I want to say that what I am doing here corresponds with their wishes as expressed to me That is why I am doing it in this way, and that is why I want to give the public servants their full right. As far as I am concerned, there is no need for protecting people against themselves, and still less will it affect their ability to perform their duties properly.

Mr. Chairman, the point which the hon. the Minister does not seem to understand is that we are trying to say that there are degrees of participation in politics.

Order! That argument has been raised by two members and by the hon. member himself.

Mr. Chairman, it is obvious that you do not want to hear me and I will consequently resume my seat.

Question put: That the word “management”, in line 5, stand part of the clause.

Upon which the Committee divided:

Tellers: S. F. Kotzé, P. C. Roux, G. P. van den Berg and H. J. van Wyk.

Tellers: H. J. Bronkhorst and J. O. N. Thompson.

Question affirmed and amendments dropped.

Clause agreed to.

House Resumed:

Bill reported without amendment.

Mr. Speaker, when the House adjourned on Friday, I had indicated that I wished to address certain remarks to the hon. the Minister in connection with the Standing Advisory Committee to be appointed in terms of clause 18 of the Bill. It would appear that this committee is to be established by the hon. the Minister and that it will investigate certain matters of its own volition; it will decide itself to investigate certain matters. It will also investigate matters referred to it by the hon. the Minister. There is no reference in the Bill to the fact that this committee will be utilized to examine contemplated legislation. I wonder whether the hon. the Minister could indicate to us whether he regards that as one of the functions of this Standing Advisory Committee. Will it give advice in regard to contemplated amendments to legislation affecting companies and company law?

Then, Sir, there is another matter I wish to refer to. I should like to know what is to be done with the report of this particular committee. So far as the Bill is concerned, it states merely that the Standing Advisory Committee “may from time to time make recommendations to the Minister”. I want to suggest to the hon. the Minister that he might include in this Bill—we can debate this more fully at a later stage—the provisions which are in a measure which we passed earlier this session, relating to the establishment of the Law Revision Commission. In that measure there is a provision that that commission must present a report annually on the investigations, etc., it has undertaken, and that such a report will be tabled in this House. I think it would indicate to the House what work has been undertaken by the committee, and I trust that at a later stage, when I introduce this amendment in the Committee Stage, we may have a more detailed discussion about this matter.

Before I leave clause 18 and the functioning of this advisory committee, there are three matters in this connection I should like to raise with the hon. the Minister. The first is the question of the constitution of this committee. The clause refers to certain persons who will be appointed, one of whom shall be a judge or a senior advocate, and then it goes on to mention “such ex officio and other members” as the Minister may from time to time determine. I wonder whether the Minister could give us some indication as to where he is going to find these ex officio members. Does he mean members ex officio solely from the department, or would they, for instance, include such persons as ex officio the chairman of Assocom, the chairman of the Stock Exchange or a person from some organization of that sort? Will he consider such persons as ex officio members, or are these to be purely departmental officials?

As the hon. member for Parktown has said, we welcome the standing committee, but there is one subsection of clause 18 which I think needs clarification, and that is where the power is given to this committee to call to its assistance “suoh person or persons as it may deem necessary to assist it”. In other words, it is given the power to call witnesses to come and consult with it, and no doubt to be interrogated. Is it the intention that this should be on a purely voluntary basis? In other words, will they merely invite people to assist them?

Is that subclause (5)?

Yes. Will this take place merely by way of invitation? In other words, will there be no question of compulsion or anything of that nature? I would assume that that is so, but perhaps the hon. the Minister can deal with this point and indicate what he has in mind.

I find, and have found over the years, considerable difficulty in dealing with a phrase which is so often incorporated in our laws, and that is the phrase “directly or indirectly”. In this Bill it appears over and over again. It appears in various definitions. It appeas in relation to the control of a company, where the control of so many shares, of a certain percentage of the shareholding “directly or indirectly”, is of importance. It appears in connection with loans which are forbidden under the Act, “directly or indirectly”. It appears throughout, in various clauses in this Bill. Sir, I am going to suggest that when we deal with this matter in the Committee Stage we should try to eliminate some of the occasions on which the word “indirectly” is used. I suggest that in some of these clauses, where the term “directly or indirectly” is used, we should specify what we mean by “indirectly” in the particular connotation in which it is used in that particular clause of the Bill. I do not want to weary the House, or you, Sir, at this stage by going through each of them, but I think this is a drafting phenomenon which unfortunately is repeated over and over in this particular Bill.

Now I come to what I believe is one of the most complicated aspects of the Bill which I think could be greatly simplified. I refer to clauses 32, 33, 34 and 36 dealing with the formation, objects and powers of a company. Sir, if you look at clause 32 you will find that a company must be formed for a lawful purpose; in other words, it must have a purpose which is lawful. When we go to clause 33, we find that the company must have a “main object”. When we look at one of the subclauses of clause 33, we find that the company must have a “main business”. I am afraid that by the time one is finished trying to find out what this all means, one is left in a somewhat confused mental state as to what is the “main business”, the “main object” and the “purpose” of a company in the context of this particular clause. For instance, if one forms a company to grow tea, is one’s main object to grow tea, or is one’s main object to enter into the field of agricultural activities? What is the main object, the main purpose? I would say that if you ask most people in the world what their main object or their main purpose is in forming companies, they will say that it is to make profits. I think we should try to define in some way what We mean by “main purpose” and “main object”. Sir, I want to suggest that this procedure could be very much simplified. I hope the hon. the Minister will have time to discuss this more fully. Clause 33(1) provides—

Then it goes on to say in subclause (2)—

It seems to me, having regard to the saying clause, clause 36, which deals with acts which are ultra vires, that it would be sufficient if clause 33 merely said that subject to any limitations imposed by this Act and subject to the provisions of section 34, a company formed in pursuance of section 32, i.e. for a lawful purpose, shall be deemed to have unlimited capacity, including the powers set out under Schedule 2, unless there are certain restrictions placed upon it in its own memorandum; in other words, we should simply state that it must be established for a lawful purpose, and no restrictions should be placed upon it in exercising the powers set out under Schedule 2.

Sir, at this stage I do not want to go into the details of the amendments that we propose to place on the Order Paper, but what I am trying to do is to simplify the position. In clause 52, for example, we should merely state that the memorandum of a company shall state the name of the company; that it has limited capacity to trade or to carry on business in terms of section 33, or that it has unlimited capacity, save for the exclusion of certain things which can then be set out in detail. In other words, in the case of a company with unlimited capacity, the memorandum should simply state that it will not be restricted in its activities in any way and that it will be able to exercise all the powers which are set out in Schedule 2. That will avoid this “main business” and “main purpose” which are referred to in the Bill at present.

There are one or two other matters I want to deal with. The first is a problem in the administration of companies which I believe will arise from the provisions dealing with special resolutions. Now a special resolution according to the Bill, must be lodged and registered with the Registrar of Companies and will only take effect as from the date of registration. In other words, if a special resolution were to be adopted on the 1st of the month and it were to be finally registered in the companies office on the 23rd of the month, it would be effective from the 23rd. I believe that can lead to complications and difficulties in company management and I can see no reason myself why a special resolution, when it has been registered, should not then become effective retrospectively from the date on which it was passed. I can see no problem in that. There may be some obstacle of which I am not aware, but it seems to be a matter which could well be considered and which would facilitate company administration. If a special resolution is taken, its taking effect will then be suspended until such time as it has been registered.

Talking about special resolutions, I come to the question of loans to directors, which are dealt with in the provisions of section 86bis et seq. of the previous Act. It seems to me that although a great deal has been done in this Bill to tighten up the position, there is still one loophole. The limitation on loans to directors and other officers in this Bill still does not cover the position which has arisen often in the past where money is lent to a private company which is in fact controlled by one or more of the directors of the lending company. I believe that that flaw still exists in this Bill. There still can be a loan from a public company to a private company, on resolution by the directors, where the directors themselves, either all or some of them, may have the full control of the subsidiary company. In that regard I believe that when we deal with clause 37 of the Bill, it will be necessary to add another form of company to which loans cannot be made. Clause 37(1) reads as follows—

And then I want to suggest that the following words be added, namely “or which is a company controlled by any director or directors of the lending company”. At the moment, as I read and understand the position, there is a loophole in those provisions and a way around can be found by unscrupulous borrowers. This also has reference to clause 226 of this Bill, which deals with the more direct aspect of loans to directors. I believe there also it is necessary to close that gap and have the same sort of provision which I have suggested for clause 37.

There are general provisions in this Bill which one finds are of value and which I am sure will be most efficacious. One really finds oneself deeply indebted to the work of this commission and the various other persons who contributed to the drawing up of this Bill which is before us. It has gone through the threshing-machine, or through various threshing-machines, before it has come out in the form in which it is today. One hesitates to make suggestions in regard to matters which have been so ably and carefully considered by the various people and bodies concerned. But perhaps those of us in the lesser walks who come across these matters in daily practice, come across things of which the erudite persons in higher positions who deal with company matters and companies legislation may not be aware. Clause 260, for instance, contains a very sound provision about an inspector’s rights to call for information and to cause an examination to be made, but I think there is a danger. A person who can be subpoenaed in terms of the Bill to appear before an inspector for interrogation, may find himself in some difficulty if he is not legally advised. I suggest that any person who is summoned to appear before an inspector should be entitled to be accompanied by an attorney with or without counsel. One appreciates that the inspector’s interrogation follows virtually the same system, although in a different way, with which we are dealing under the Criminal Procedure Bill, where provision is made for a preliminary interrogation to take place, and it seems that there is no reason why legal representation should not be allowed to a person who is called to attend such an interrogation.

There are two other matters with which I should like to deal in the time left to me. First of all I come to the question of foreign companies requiring or intending to register in South Africa. I refer to clause 335. The hon. the Minister will notice that this clause provides that any foreign company making application for registration under the chapter of the Bill which deals with foreign companies must satisfy the State President as to various points. It must satisfy the State President in regard to the conduct of the business, the nationality of the majority of the directors, and so on. Is it constitutionally correct that we should involve the State President in exercising what merely amounts to an administrative judgment in determining whether or not he is satisfied on certain facts? It would seem to me that in clause 335(2) the words “State President” should be substituted by “Minister”. If there were to be some argument or public discussion as to whether or not the company was entitled to registration, it would be difficult to involve the State President in such discussion and not the Minister concerned. I can assure the hon. the Minister that we on this side of the House might feel inhibited in making our views known if we were to disagree with any decision of the State President, but we would certainly be able to express our views to the hon. the Minister in that regard if necessary. In any case I do not think it is the correct form in legislation to involve the State President in, as I have said, what seems to me to be an administrative discretion.

There is another word which is being used and to which the hon. member for Parktown referred in connection with the liability of directors in the event of the liquidation or judicial management of companies. I refer to cases where businesses were conducted “recklessly”. I scratched my head over the weekend to find some other means of expressing this. It does seem to me that one can find legal precedent and a refinement of that expression if one were to say, not that he has conducted his business “recklessly” but that the business was conducted in a “grossly neglible manner”. I think there are sufficient court decisions and analyses of that expression, an expression which should have a different connotation and a more definite meaning than the word “recklessly” which is being used in the Bill. I offer that merely as a suggestion to the hon. the Minister.

Then I want to say, finally, that the more one goes into this Bill and the more one studies it, the more one comes to the following conclusion. As I have said on Friday and I want to say again, one of the early functions of the advisory committee will be to clarify the position of private companies in relation to all the operations of this legislation. Private companies are being frowned upon and the hon. the Minister’s colleague, the hon. the Minister of Finance, has socked them up to R50 for licences in an endeavour to dissuade the public from registering these private companies. While it is part of our law, I think it must be looked at not as a procedure to be burdened by unnecessary commissions, but something that can be adopted. It forms so much part of our commercial life in this country that it could well be looked at to see to what extent some of these provisions could be relaxed and perhaps also how they can be directed mainly to the lessening of the involvement of the Registrar of Companies’ office in the activities of private companies. As the hon. the Minister knows, for the payment of 25c any person is at present entitled to go to a private company’s registered office and look at the register. I wonder whether one cannot contemplate another form of getting information without all this burden being placed on the central companies office in Pretoria, e.g. the supply of all the information and the submission of returns which presently have to be rendered by these companies. I believe that that is something that can be considered further.

I want to say again that one appreciates the tremendous volume of work that has gone into this bill which is before us. It is obviously a Bill that can be dealt with more in detail in the Committee Stage and there we can collaborate on the number of amendments which are not touched on this afternoon. I believe however that it is a step forward and a very important step forward in company legislation in South Africa. It will take some time to get used to the new definitions and expressions which are used, but as the hon. member for Parktown has said, this is a Bill which we on this side of the House most certainly support.

Mr. Speaker, I want to begin by expressing my sincere appreciation for the discussion which has taken place in regard to this Bill. Hon. members will appreciate it when I say that a person requires a great deal of courage simply to open this piece of legislation. It requires courage to begin to study this piece of legislation. It is a very lengthy piece of legislation, of a very complicated and very technical nature. I think we had the proof here that a great deal of study has been devoted to this Bill on both sides of this House. In the first place, the hon. member for Parktown introduced this debate and spoke for almost an hour on the Bill. He went into it in great detail, and I have a feeling that we shall deal with it later during the Committee Stage. It nevertheless affords one an opportunity of discussing the particulars in advance, and then, after thinking matters over a little in that connection, taking a decision in regard to them during the Committee Stage.

When I was an articled clerk my principal frequently told me that one should know the basic concepts of the Act, but, he said, what was equally important, and perhaps even more important, was that one should know where to find them. One should know whether it was part of common law, or whether it was statute law, etc. A lawyer in particular must know which book to open when he wants the necessary information on a matter. For that reason I think it is in fact the right approach first to understand the basic concepts of this Bill before us. When we come to the analysis of words, whether it is this word or that word and what its meaning is, as will probably happen many times in the courts after this, one does still have to know where to find the clause. From thence one can then proceed to make the analysis.

Do you want to give some work to the lawyers?

I am afraid they are going to have extra work. It is unavoidable. The world cannot really get along without lawyers; after all, they have to create order out of the chaos of other people.

First they create the chaos.

I should like to begin with the hon. member for Parktown. He raised various problems here. It is obvious that I will not reply to all of them, but I do want, for the sake of the discussion, to reply to a few of the points. The hon. member referred to a holding company. He mentioned that for the purposes of a holding company provision is now being made for a shareholding of 30%. It seems to me that what the commission had in mind with the creation of a holding company was that that definition should be created for the purposes of disclosure. I think it is in the interests of the shareholder that he should know from time to time what the major and important investments of his company are. For that reason it is provided here that, if it is more than 30%, it has to be disclosed. The percentage could have been anything. I cannot do better than to refer to what the commission itself said with regard to this matter in their report on page 113. They said—

I think the hon. member also discussed the possibility of whether it should be shares with voting rights or whether it should merely be preference shares to which no voting rights are attached. If the approach is the disclosure of the interest, the question of whether these are shares with voting rights are attached. If the approach is the disclosure of the interest, the question of whether these are shares with voting rights or shares without voting rights is not of such great importance. I continue—

Then the report continues—

As I have said, this is as I see the philosophy behind it, and I cannot really improve on the elucidation of the commission itself.

The hon. member for Parktown, the hon. member for Vryburg, and others, referred to the standing advisory committee for which provision is being made in clause 18. Various opinions were expressed on who should be members of this standing advisory committee. The hon. member for Green Point referred to the members who would serve on it in an official capacity, and at this stage I should like to give an indication of how I think the committee should be constituted—I am not saying “will be”, for I do not want to commit myself to that at this stage. I should like hon. members to realize this. The Bill itself provides that the chairman of the committee shall be a judge or a senior advocate. Then there shall be, or it is desirable that there shall be, representatives on this committee of the following bodies: the Committee of the Johannesburg Stock Exchange; the Council of the Bar of South Africa; the Association of Law Societies of the Republic of South Africa; the National Council of Chartered Accountants; the Afrikaanse Handelsinstituut; the Association of Chambers of Commerce; the Federation of Steel and Engineering Industries; the Association of Trust Companies; the Chamber of Mines and the Shareholders’ Association of South Africa; and, in an official capacity, the Chief Master, the Registrar of Financial Institutions, the Attorney-General or a person from the office of the Attorney-General appointed by the Secretary for Justice, and finally, an officer of the Commercial Branch nominated by the Commissioner of Police. In general outlines a committee of this nature ought to meet the requirements we advocate.

The hon. member for Sunnyside asked whether consideration should be given to the possibility of the Standing Committee on Income Tax having representation on this committee. At present I am not convinced that there is any connection between the two, or that this would necessarily serve a useful purpose. However, I do not want to commit myself to the constitution I have just suggested. We shall consider it at a later stage, before it is finally instituted.

The hon. member asked why we remain so committed to the minimum of seven members for a public company. I then told him it was because the figure seven is so frequently used in the Bible. Perhaps there is another good reason as well. The old purified National Party began with a membership of seven, and subsequently achieved very great success. It is, after all, traditional, and whether it is six, seven or eight does not really make any difference. We shall probably adhere to the seven.

The hon. member discussed the combination of professions. At the moment it is being provided that if there is a partnership of more than 20 persons, they have to be converted into a company except in regard to a composition of professions. The entire matter is still under consideration at present. The hon. member for Jeppes also referred to this matter. I do not think it is necessary for us to discuss this any further at this stage.

The hon. member referred to clause 38, i.e. the clause which prohibits the lending of money to persons by a company to purchase shares in the same company. The clause provides further, in subsection (1), that this is the case except where the lending of money is the main business of the company. The hon. member felt that we should perhaps say “except where the lending of money, inter alia”, is the business of the company. I am afraid that if we were to do this, we would emasculate this clause to such an extent that very little of it would remain. I just want to read out to the hon. member, for the purposes of our discussion, what the commission said in regard to this matter. It appears in the supplementary report on page 31. I quote—

Here the old Act is being referred to—

One can spend a long time debating this matter. Here it has been stated very briefly and concisely. Personally I think, however, that I have to agree with the standpoint of the commission. If this is not done, one is going to deprive the clause of all its value.

The hon. member referred to clause 39 and then asked what the position would be in the case of take-over. Clause 39 provides that a subsidiary may not have shares in the holding or in the controlling company. He objected and said that provision ought to be made for a period which has to elapse before this takes place. I then gave some thought to this matter and asked myself a question. Since the Bill now provides that the subsidiary may not possess such shares, what is going to happen if a take-over occurs such as the one referred to here? It goes without saying that the take-over cannot occur immediately, and I think it would be fair to conclude—I have no doubt that the court will arrive at the same conclusion—that the subsidiary will get rid of those shares in the holding company within a reasonable time. But I think this is one of the matters to which the standing advisory committee could give consideration in future.

The hon. member referred to a defensive name, and asked what it really was. As I see it, it is a name for a company which one wants to reserve for oneself. Clause 43(2) on page 32, provides that such a name may be registered in the office of the Registrar of Companies on payment of an annual registration fee. Then the name remains reserved in this way, as it were, as the name of a company which one need not register, at a later stage.

In regard to clause 76 the hon. member said that insurance companies should also be exempted from the provision which reads that the premium account should be added to the share account for the purpose of determining the capital account. I think this is something which could be considered. At the moment I cannot really think of any good reason why this should not be the case. It is something we could discuss, and which the standing committee as well could probably investigate.

The hon. member then referred to an “offer for sale”. He asked “What constitutes an offer of sale?”. To my mind an offer of sale is such a simple expression that I doubt whether it is really necessary to give a definition of it. It simply means that one offers a person something at a certain price. That is more or less the meaning in this clause. But what I do want to tell the hon. member is that basically it is precisely the same as the provision in the existing section 80bis. In other words, there is not really any change. It appears that in the past, apart from the other provisions which do in fact give an indication of what it is, it was there all the time. As far as I know no problems have really cropped up in this regard. Nevertheless, it is also something which we could discuss at a later stage.

I come now to clause 186. As regards the notice of meetings, the hon. member thought that the period of 21 days, for which the legislation makes provision, should be extended. This is a debatable point. But I want to point out to the hon. member again that the period has always been 21 days and the hon. the Minister of Posts and Telegraphs will agree with me that our postal service has improved during the past few years, has it not? Consequently, if we could get along with a period of 21 days in the past, it will probably be an adequate period now as well. It is an argument to say that these people may perhaps go on holiday for a month, and that one should perhaps make it a longer period. I am quite open to conviction on that score, but that has been the provision up to now.

The hon. member for Green Point referred here a moment ago to “recklessly” in clause 424, to which I also wanted to refer. I would say “recklessly” is far stronger than “negligently”; not only must there be an element of deliberate carelessness, but something more than carelessness. I think that we could discuss during the Committee Stage whether we should not moderate this word a little, but in any case I think that we should let it stand over for the Committee Stage.

Sir, the hon. member also referred to Schedule IV. He asked to which companies Schedule IV would be applicable. Schedule IV is, together with the rest of the legislation, being put into effect on 1st January, 1974. I consequently think that it is correct to argue that Schedule IV will be applicable to all companies whose financial year ends after 1st January, 1974. But the hon. member should note that provision is also being made in clause 17(1) for the amendment of Schedule IV by proclamation, and in that case of course there are other factors which come into play, but for the purposes of this measure as it is going to be promulgated and put into effect, I should say that Schedule IV will be applicable to all companies whose financial year ends after 1st January, 1974.

Sir, the hon. member for Vryburg discussed the standing advisory committee in particular. I have already replied in full to this. The hon. member for Jeppes also referred to the standing advisory committee. It is an innovation in this legislation which, as it seems to me, is accepted by everyone. The hon. member for Jeppes referred in addition to directors’ position of trust in regard to members of the company. Sir, our common law already provides that directors are placed in a position of trust and that they should not conceal the information they have at their disposal, but should make it available to interested parties in the company, but in clause 229 and the clauses following we have now tried to lay down specific provisions, and I do not think that we have any problems in that connection.

The hon. member also referred to the penalties for which provision is being made in clause 178, and said that the penalties were exceptionally heavy. Perhaps I could quote to him what the commission said in regard to the question of penalties, for here one finds the motivation for the provisions of this clause. The commission states, on page 13 of the main report—

Sir, this is quite unrealistic and ridiculous, and the commission has now proposed heavy penalties. I admit that these are heavy penalties, but I also think that to make certain that these statutory provisions are complied with, as we should like them to be, we should simply reconcile ourselves to the heavy penalties which are being recommended here. The hon. member said that the liability of members should remain limited. But on that score I do not think we understand one another very clearly, or perhaps the hon. member is under a different impression which I do not understand. On that score it is no longer liability of members because we are now providing in this legislation that partially paid-up shares may no longer be issued. A shareholder is liable only for the fully paid-up shares he purchases. In the past it was possible to make a partial payment only, and for that reason it was necessary to provide that he would liable, and that his liability would be limited to the purchase price of his shares, in other words that he should pay only the balance of the purchase price of the shares. Those circumstances can no longer occur, and consequently it would seem to me that it is no longer necessary to make provision in the articles that the liability of members shall be limited. The hon. member also referred to professional partnerships, and so on.

I have furnished the hon. member for Sunnyside with a partial reply in regard to the Standing Committee on Income Tax, which he felt should have representation on this standing advisory committee. The hon. member also referred to the question of copies of documents for lodgment upon the registration of a company. It is now being provided that they should be certified by a notary (public). The hon. member feels that this should not be the case. Sir, this is actually a centuries old system of authentication, i.e. by a notary (public). To tell the truth it is the highest and most valuable form of authentication. It has always been done in this way in the past in the case of a properly certified copy, so that there can be no doubt. It is a most responsible person who does authentication, and consequently I think we should continue with this practice. If there are any snags we should try to eliminate them in another place.

The hon. member also discussed the position when an auditor retires as auditor of a company, and resigns. In clause 280 provision is being made for him to deliver an affidavit stating that he is not aware of any irregularity in the affairs of the company. I went into this matter, and considered it. We attach tremendous value to the auditors of a company. It is of great value and importance that when an auditor withdraws from the activities of a company, there should be a certificate on which we may place great reliance. Over and above all the other considerations which I know are applicable to an auditor, an affidavit implies that one may be charged with perjury if one deliberately makes a false affidavit. Therefore, it appears on the surface to me to be a desirable provision, but we can reconsider this a little further, and perhaps discuss it further during the Committee Stage.

The hon. member for Ermelo touched on a problem here. He said that companies which are sometimes controlled or owned by non-Whites, make use of certain facilities to which they are not entitled. That is a problem which we have. What is in fact being done now in this legislation is that although we could not previously require the banks, where they had nominated companies, to disclose the actual holders of the shares, this can be done now. A bank may now be required—this was not previously the case—to acquire the information in regard to the shareholders in a nominated company. Consequently I do not think there is any problem, owing to the definition in this Bill, in establishing who the shareholders of a company are. But we have other problems, particularly in regard to land tenure, as raised by the hon. member for Ermelo. I think it is more a matter for the Department of Community Development to find means of solving these problems. But I must in all sincerity say that I still see certain deficiencies, particularly in so far as this may be applicable to external companies. In any case we cannot investigate the shareholding of an external company, as the Act stands at present. I think this is something which we will still have to investigate carefully and for which we will also perhaps have to call upon the services of this standing advisory committee.

The hon. member for Green Point also referred to the standing advisory committee, in regard to which I have already replied. The hon. member asked whether they have to help with legislation. Sir, I think this is pre-eminently what we have to achieve with the functions of this standing advisory committee, i.e. that this committee should say to us: Look, there are deficiencies in the Bill; this loophole should be eliminated and those restrictions should be relaxed a little and other matters should be made a little easier. On the basis of their recommendations we will then probably introduce amending legislation in this House. The hon. member also referred to subclause (5). I expect that the standing advisory committee may appoint a subcommittee under subclause 5 to investigate a specially specified section of the matters affecting the Companies Act, and then to return to this standing advisory committee.

Will they be able to appoint outside experts?

I should imagine so. If the committee wants to make use of outside experts, I would expect them to be able to do so.

The hon. member discussed the objects of a company. He referred to clauses 32 and 33. My time is very limited and I cannot go into this in detail, but it ought to be mentioned that clause 32 provides that the object of a company shall be lawful. The objects of a company are then dealt with further in clause 33. I cannot deal with the matter raised by the hon. member better than to refer to page 30 of the main report (R.P. 45—1970) where this matter is dealt with very carefully—

A requirement to the effect that the main object of the company should be stated will not preclude the statement of a number of general types of economic enterprise. The intention is not to restrict the right of incorporators to set up a company with very wide and extensive capacity. But it must be said that the ideal position …

I regard this as being important, and I repeat—

In other words, the idea here is that there is no limitation on the powers of a company as far as third parties are concerned. Therefore we have now disposed of that matter. A company mentions its main object in its memorandum of association, and everything which it may perhaps still engage in, but there is a special relationship between shareholders, directors and the company. That special relationship continues to exist throughout. If the company consequently wishes to decide at a certain stage that over and above all those things for which provision is being made in its memorandum of association, it wants to engage in something entirely different, it must consult its shareholders in this regard. I know there is an idea that something like this should be eliminated, and that the certificate should be left completely open, as the hon. member put it here, but I still think that for the present it would quite probably be the best to allow that relationship between shareholders, directors and the company in respect of the objects to continue.

The hon. member raised other matters of importance. Inter alia, he referred to clause 335 in regard to the provision that the State President shall be satisfied for the purpose of the registration of an external company. The hon. member also mentioned the matter of loans to directors, which is a very interesting subject. I should like to go into this again before this matter is debated further during the Committee Stage.

I think that certain of the minor, specific points could be dealt with effectively during the Committee Stage, and I do not think that for the purpose of this discussion it is necessary to go into them any further.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a Second Time.

Mr. Speaker, I move—

The adjustments to the Post Office Act for which this measure makes provision, cover a variety of subjects. Some amendments are required for introducing new arrangements for which there is a need in practice, whilst others are mainly required for domestic and administrative reasons. I shall deal with the various subjects in the sequence of the clauses of the Bill.

Clauses 1 and 2 relate to the manner in which alterations in rates on foreign postal articles, telegrams, etc., are to be approved. These adjustments are of a purely administrative nature. We regularly and comparatively frequently have to alter our foreign rates, and this does not result from alterations in the rates of the South African Post Office, but purely from alterations in the fees charged by foreign postal administrations. The rate which we are levying hereon, for instance, a letter destined for a foreign country, is made up of a part charged by the South African Post Office for handling the letter, plus a part charged for their work by those foreign postal administrations which must also handle that letter. The part which accrues to the foreign postal administrations and which we charge as part of the postage when the letter is posted here, is paid over to those foreign postal administrations. The South African Post Office is bound by international conventions and agreements to adjust the foreign rates charged by it whenever alterations in the rates of foreign administrations give rise to their share of the fees collected by us being altered. Since such alterations are, practically speaking, beyond our control, clause 2 seeks to authorize the Postmaster-General, in the interests of administrative efficiency, to make those alterations whenever they are required, without having to obtain the formal approval of the State President, or the Minister in every case.

The subject of clause 3 is the issuing of postage stamps, the imposition of fines in respect of insufficiently prepaid postal articles, the methods by which the prepayment of postage on postal articles may be indicated and the transmission, without payment, of reading-matter for the blind. An important object of clause 3 is to leave the existing position in regard to the postage stamps of South-West Africa undisturbed when the Post Office Ordinance of South-West Africa is repealed, as proposed in clause 19. It will therefore, when the Post Office Act of the Republic replaces the existing Post Office Ordinance in South-West Africa, remain a statutory requirement that special postage stamps be issued for use in the Territory. After the proposed statutory amendment the postage stamps of the Republic will also remain invalid in South-West Africa, and vice versa.

The statutory adjustments envisaged by clause 3 in regard to the payment of postage on postal articles are mainly of a domestic nature. They seek to legalize specifically existing arrangements concerning: (a) the collection, by way of the so-called integrity system, of fines on postal articles on which the postage has not been prepaid. In terms of this system the Post Office may deliver such a postal article at once, along with a card on which the addressee may then affix the fine in postage stamps and post it back to the Post Office. This amendment also arranges for the rate of fines, as is done in the case of other postal rates, to be prescribed by regulation; (b) the use of postage franking machines and approved printed wording on postal articles in order to indicate that postage on them has been prepaid; and (c) the established use of accepting reading-matter for the blind for transmission by post without payment of postage.

The next subject is the amendment of the existing arrangements in regard to the registration of newspapers with the Post Office for transmission at the special rate for publishers. Clauses 4 and 5 deal with this matter. The existing section 16 of the Act furnishes the definition of a newspaper which may be registered with the Post Office, and of a permissible supplement to it. As I said during my Budget Speech in the House in March, the reason for the existence of a preferential rate for publishers’ newspapers is the social value of newspapers and periodicals. The rate is only ½c per copy for a mass up to 250 grammes, and lc per copy up to 500 grammes. For ordinary printed matter the rate for a mass of 250 grammes is 5c, and for one of 500 grammes, 6c. On ordinary printed matter of which the mass is up to 50 grammes, the printed-matter rate is 3c. A practice which has become increasingly prevalent in the course of time, is that of transmitting purely advertising matter at the extremely low rate for publishers’ newspapers by having it accepted as supplements to newspapers and periodicals, or by having publications which in fact consist of nothing but advertising matter registered as newspapers. It has become necessary to limit this practice.

On purely advertising matter which does not in actual fact form part of a bona fide newspaper, it ought to be possible to charge the higher rate which is applicable to ordinary printed matter.

The existing definition of a newspaper and a supplement in the Act makes it difficult to combat practices which in fact amount to an abuse of the low publisher’s rate. Furthermore, as the definition has been incorporated in the Act, it cannot be readily adjusted so as to keep pace with the developments in the newspaper and printing trade.

The only object of the registration of a newspaper with the Post Office in terms of the Post Office Act, is to have it recognized for transmission at the special low rate for publishers’ newspapers. However, this rate may be prescribed by regulation, which does to a large extent remove the sense of the definition of a newspaper having to be incorporated in the Act. In order to place the whole matter on a workable basis, clauses 4 and 5 seek to remove the definition of a newspaper which may be registered, and of a supplement thereto, and to provide that such newspapers and supplements may be defined by regulation.

†I now come to the subject of undeliverable mail and its treatment, with which clauses 7, 8 and 9 are concerned.

The Act at present requires that all undeliverable mail, including valueless open articles, should be sent to the Returned Letter Office in Cape Town for destruction or return to the senders. Considerable amounts of fruitless work and transport are involved in dealing in this manner with the millions of items of open mail annually that cannot be delivered and are obviously of little or no value or importance. The amendment proposed in clause 7 is intended to permit of such items being disposed of at the larger post offices.

No change is proposed to the existing requirement that all undeliverable letters should be sent to the Returned Letter Office for treatment. In view, however, of the large amount of labour involved in returning to the senders undeliverable letters opened in the Returned Letter Office, it is proposed that the Post Office should be empowered, except in cases where the letters appear to be valuable or important, to have them destroyed. Clause 8 contains this enabling provision.

The proposed amendment to the Act prescribes that the disposal in this manner of letters of little value or importance, should be governed by regulations that must stipulate a minimum period for which such letters should be kept and the requirements to be met in disposing of them.

Section 32 of the Act, the repeal of which is proposed in clause 9 of the Bill, is a provision enabling the Post Office to destroy or otherwise dispose of postal articles, other than letters or parcels, that are undelivered and appear to be of little value or importance. The section refers to undelivered articles, as distinct from undeliverable ones, and has given rise to problems of interpretation. It is rendered superfluous by the proposed amended section 25 dealt with in clause 7.

The Post Office sayings Bank is the subject of the next four clauses, Nos. 10 to 13. The department is at present busy with preparations for computerizing the Post Office sayings Bank. It is expected that the changeover to the computerized system will commence during the course of the next two months, but it will probably take more than 18 months to transfer all existing accounts to the new system.

It is proposed, mainly upon completion of the computerization of the bank, to introduce various changes aimed at making the facilities of the bank more attractive to the public. The proposed changes are in accordance with recommendations by an interdepartmental committee on State investment media that were accepted last year by the Minister of Finance.

Clauses 10 to 13 deal with those aspects of the proposed changes that require amendments to the Act. They are—

1. (a) the payment of interest on ordinary deposits in the sayings Bank on daily balances instead of on a monthly basis, and the calculation of such interest on a minimum amount of R1 or a multiple of R1 instead of a minimum of R2 or a multiple of R2 as at present;
2. (b) the issuing of a single sayings Bank certificate, in any multiple of R100 and up to the existing legal maximum of R20 000, to cover the amount which an investor wishes to invest in sayings Bank certificates at any one time. At present separate certificates of R200 each must always be issued. I may mention here that sayings Bank certificates are fixed deposits in the Post Office sayings Bank and bear a higher rate of interest than ordinary deposits in the bank;
3. (c) the direct repayment by cheque on demand of sayings Bank certificates that are six months old or older, instead of repayment through the medium of the ordinary sayings Bank account of the depositor;
4. (d) the fixing of a minimum investment period of six months for sayings Bank certificates. To certificates repaid sooner, the interest rate for ordinary deposits in the sayings Bank will be applied;
5. (e) the calculation of interest on a sayings Bank certificate on daily balance instead of on a monthly basis, and from the date of investment instead of the first day of the following month as is done at present if a certificate is issued after the second day of a month; and
6. (f) the payment of interest on sayings Bank certificates at six-monthly intervals reckoned from the dates of issue of the individual certificates, instead of on the fixed dates 1st January and 1st July which apply at present.

One of the proposed changes, namely the calculation of interest on ordinary sayings Bank deposits on a minimum amount of R1 or a multiple of R1 instead of R2 or a multiple of R2, is to apply retrospectively from 1st April this year. Clause 10(2) makes provision for this.

*Mr. Speaker, clause 14 deals with the provision of telephone conduit-pipes in large buildings, and on private premises in areas where both telephone services and electricity supply are provided by way of underground cable. As far as conduit-pipes in buildings are concerned, it has for many years been standing practice at large places for the builders of large buildings to install in the buildings concerned the necessary pipes for telephone services during construction. This does not involve dwelling-houses, but buildings such as blocks of offices and flats. The Post Office is notified through the local authorities of the proposed construction of such buildings, and indicates on the plans for such buildings details of the conduit-pipes required for telephone services. Some builders of large buildings do not meet the requirements of the Post Office in every respect, which often results, subsequently, in problems being experienced in connection with the provision of telephone services and in such buildings being damaged and spoilt. The proposed new section 80A of the Act, which is being inserted by clause 14, seeks to give statutory recognition to the existing arrangements. It will also enable the Post Office, where necessary, to refuse to provide telephone services in such buildings until such time as the requirements have been met, or to recover the extra cost involved in providing telephone services where the requirements have not been met.

In the proposed new section 80B of the Act, which is also dealt with by clause 14, local authorities are authorized to install in townships where electricity for houses and other buildings is provided by way of underground cables, telephone conduit-pipes in the same excavations, i.e. along with the electricity supply lines on private premises. Such townships would then have no unsightly and less effective overhead wires, and both conduit-pipes would then, in an economic manner, be laid in one ditch. It is being proposed that the owners of the properties should bear the cost of the telephone conduit-pipes from the street boundary to the house or other building as part of the cost of the electricity supply lines. This arrangement is considered to be fair because the owners are getting the benefit of a more reliable telephone service, and also of the lack of overhead wires across their property and in their neighbourhood. This way of installing telephone conduit-pipes also enhances the value of the house or other buildings. These proposals are being supported by the United Municipal Executive and the Association of Municipal Electrical Undertakings.

Clause 15 deals with the cost of the deviation of a telegraph line passing over private property when this is done at the request of the occupier of that property. As the Act reads at present, the Post Office may only bear such costs when the deviation is necessary because the line interferes with any building about to be erected on that property. It often happens that an occupier requests a deviation for another reason which justifies accommodation being shown in regard to the cost of the deviation, such as making it possible for him to use the property more effectively. This amendment seeks to authorize the Postmaster-General to approve in such cases of the Post Office bearing the whole or any part of the cost of effecting that deviation.

In clause 16 an amendment to the Act is proposed with a view to combating malpractices in regard to private telephone and telex directories. Such private directories are usually directories for business purposes which are published for profit from the sale of listings and advertisements appearing in it. The activities of some publishers of these directories have been causing problems for years, because their business methods are not always honourable and often mislead the public. In spite of repeated radio and Press statements and articles in the Post Office Bulletin in which the department dissociates itself from these private directories, some publishers are still succeeding in giving telephone subscribers the impression that their directories are official, and complaints are continually being received from telephone subscribers who have been misled into buying listings in these directories.

As a rule the publishers of private directories make use of the expressions “Telephone Directory”, “Telex Directory”, “Yellow Page Directory” or “Yellow Pages” in order to create the impression that their publications have been sanctioned officially. In the proposed statutory amendment it is therefore being made an offence to make in this manner unauthorized use of such an expression in connection with a publication.

The amendment proposed in section 17 seeks, firstly, to authorize the Post Office to deal sympathetically with persons who accidentally and without being negligent damage telegraph lines, cables or apparatus, i.e. as far as the recovery from them of the cost of repairs is concerned.

As the Act reads at present, any person who causes such damage has to pay for it in full, irrespective of whether he was negligent. Many cases are found where it would be fair to show accommodation.

Secondly, the amendment seeks to exempt divisional councils specifically, in cases where their employees have not been negligent, from the obligation of paying for damage to telegraph lines arising from their road works.

This arrangement is necessary in order to place divisional councils in the same position in this regard as are the provincial administrations. Roadworks, which are the responsibility of divisional councils in the Cape Province, are mainly works which in other provinces would have been the responsibility of the provincial administrations.

I referred earlier on to the application in South-West Africa of the Post Office Act of the Republic and the repeal of the Post Office Ordinance of the Territory, which are envisaged by clauses 18 and 19.

The Post Office Ordinance of South-West Africa is identical in every important respect with the Post Office Act of the Republic. In terms of the South-West Africa Affairs Act, 1969, the Post Office Ordinance of the Territory has been administered by the Minister of Posts and Telegraphs since 1st April, 1969. It is desirable for it to be repealed now and to be substituted by the Post Office Act.

I do not think it is necessary for me to elaborate further at this stage on the details of the Bill. I trust that it will receive the support of both sides of this House.

Sir, we recognize that it is necessary for the basic Acts of certain departments to be amended from time to time. The Post Office Act is one of the basic Acts of the Department of Posts, and it becomes necessary from time to time to introduce amendments, and so we recognize the necessity for a Bill such as this. Sir, as you know, a Bill sometimes contains good provisions; it sometimes contains provisions that are not so controversial, and it sometimes contains provisions that are highly controversial. This Bill is no exception to this rule. However, since it is a Bill which can more profitably be discussed in the Committee Stage, we shall elaborate on the particular clauses at that stage. Perhaps I should just make a few remarks on what the hon. the Minister has told us up to now. Firstly, among the clauses we regard as uncontroversial, there are, inter alia, the following:

Sir, in connection with the changes proposed in clauses 10 and 13 in regard to the Post Office sayings bank, I believe that they are also unexceptionable. As a matter of fact, the proposal that deposits in the sayings bank should carry interest from the date on which the money is placed in the sayings bank until the date on which the money is withdrawn, is actually something for which we on this side of the House have been pleading for a long time. In particular my colleague, the hon. member for Parktown, has pointed to the necessity for doing this instead of having the money lying without interest until the end of the month in the sayings bank and only then earnings interest. But I am rather sorry that it had to take computerizing of the sayings bank before this very necessary and obvious change was introduced. I am always dubious when I hear the word “computerizing” mentioned by the hon. the Minister in this regard because we have seen what computers have done to certain other departments and we know what they have done to banks in this country, and I only hope that when computers are introduced and applied to the sayings bank we will find that the computers will at least be able to compete with the human beings who have been doing pretty well up to now in their place. I am not one of the George Orwell people, Mr. Speaker.

*As far as clause 14 is concerned, it is not a very important clause and we agree that the Post Office must be able to request the installation of special pipes, etc., in new buildings. There is just one small question. The hon. the Minister referred to pipes for telephone lines or telephone services all the time, while this Bill refers to “telecommunication services” and then defines “telecommunication services” as “telegraph services”. Is it correct terminology, then, to refer to telephone services if one actually means telegraph services? This is not very clear to me, for I see that according to the definition in the Bill they refer to “telegraph services” in these pipes, while the hon. the Minister mentioned that they were meant for telephone services.

The provisions of clause 15, too, are acceptable, i.e. that the Post Office may decide to bear the cost when a telegraph line, etc., has to be altered as a result of problems experienced by private people.

Clause 16 deals with the prohibition on the unauthorized use of words such as “post office” and other terms.

†I suppose there have been quite a number of cases where people have tried to imitate the Post Office and issue their own directories or lists of telephone numbers and addresses and gained quite a large amount of advertising in the process, advertising which to a certain extent should have accrued to the yellow pages of our ordinary telephone directory. But I am accepting the hon. the Minister’s explanation in this regard.

*I should say the best clause in this Bill is the one which provides that reading matter intended for the blind may in future be transmitted by the Post Office without payment of postage. The hon. the Minister will probably remember that when we were discussing tariffs during the Budget debate this year, I pointed out that in Rhodesia it had been the practice for years to transmit reading matter for the blind by post free of charge. I hope that remark of mine may have contributed to the earlier introduction of this very good arrangement.

As the hon. the Minister probably sees, there is not much that is contentious in this Bill. We regard it as being essentially a Bill for the Committee Stage and we shall support its Second Reading.

However, there is one clause that worries me a little, or rather two clauses, and they are clauses 4 and 5.

†This can be a controversial matter. It deals with the alteration of the method of registering a newspaper at the G.P.O., or by the Postmaster-General as it is known nowadays. This was a right, and a very valued right, of newspapers, monthlies, weeklies, etc., and newspapers were protected by the definition in the original Act itself, which laid down what a newspaper could be. It set out very clearly that a newspaper was any publication consisting wholly or in great part of political or other news or articles relating thereto, or to other current topics, with or without advertisements and with or without engravings, etc. There was a clear definition of what a newspaper was and if it complied with the Act, then that newspaper had the right to be registered and to make use of this special tariff, the low tariffs of postage of half a cent for 250 grammes, instead of five cents for the same weight. Now, this was a great concession to newspapers and they rightly regarded it as one of their very important and basic rights vis-à-vis the Post Office. Now, however, the hon. the Minister is coming with the proposal to do away with this definition and that he be given the power to make regulations on his own, defining what a newspaper is. In other words, instead of enjoying the protection of this Act in the future, it could very well be that newspapers and periodicals will not have that protection, because the hon. the Minister will now be able to make regulations arbitrarily and to decide what a newspaper is and what type of publication will have the protection of the Post Office Act. Let me mention a possibility which may arise. Take the periodical Scope for instance. This periodical fell foul of the Publications Board on several occasions. Afterwards Scope went to the court and its publications were declared legal and they could be distributed. Theoretically the hon. the Minister could, under the regulations which he can promulgate, come with a provision saying that any publication which has on three occasions during the previous year or so been declared to be an undesirable publication shall for a period of twelve months or two years forfeit the right of having this cheap postage by being registered as a newspaper, because the hon. the Minister will in such a case refuse to register that publication as a newspaper. This may sound like seeing bogeys where there are none.

*It may sound like chasing up hares, but these are things that could be done, and I should like to have an assurance from the hon. the Minister about what could happen, and even then I still think that it is not right for us to give these great powers in this connection, in terms of which it will be possible to lay down by regulation when a newspaper is not a newspaper. If it is found that a newspaper is not a newspaper, such a paper will not benefit by the special tariffs.

As I have said, it is a matter we can discuss more profitably in the Committee Stage. We approve of the Second Reading, but we have fairly strong reservations in regard to that clause in particular, while there are a few other matters, too, that we shall raise in the Committee Stage.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Orange Grove said that his side of the House has no objection to the Second Reading of this Bill, although he did have certain doubts which he did not explain further, but reserved for further debate and argument during the Committee Stage. It was very pleasant for us to learn that the hon. member for Orange Grove did not want to oppose the principle of this measure as a whole. It is the Opposition’s custom to make a big fuss about any small matter, but I think the reason why the hon. member for Orange Grove did not see his way clear to adopting that custom, lies in the fact that this Bill, seen from an administrative point of view, is of great value for the efficient working of the Department of Posts and Telegraphs. It was very clear from the Second Reading speech of the hon. the Minister that there are hitches here and there which are a bit bothersome when certain matters must be carried out.

I wholeheartedly welcome this legislation because it gives us a clear description of certain arrangements that are being made with respect to our internal service and in respect of the international service dealing with the fixing of rates for the transmission of postal articles. It is being stated quite clearly here that the Postmaster-General may collect the amounts. He can fix rates in relation to those rates obtaining in the countries to which the postal articles are being sent. I am mentioning this merely to point out that these fees and these rates are subject, in each instance, to the approval of the State President on the recommendation of the hon. the Minister. On the other hand, the legislation makes it quite clear that an appeal can be made to the Minister, so that he has the final say as to whether the actions of the Postmaster-General are to be invalidated or approved. The rates collected in this way must also be published in the Government Gazette. I think hon. members will see that the whole spirit of this Bill is one of acting very fairly and correctly and that the levies being imposed on these postal articles will at all times be open to Parliament’s inspection.

Just in passing, the hon. member for Orange Grove referred to a very praiseworthy provision in this legislation. He referred to the free delivery and transmission of reading matter, etc., to the blind. I just want to add that I welcome this; I think the whole House welcomes it. Yet it is not clear to me whether these postal articles must, in fact, be in braille. If possible only postal articles in braille must qualify for free transmission. If postal articles in ordinary writing, such as letters, etc., are to be delivered, it would be difficult for the Postmaster-General to determine whether this would really be solely for the benefit and convenience of the blind. Since I support this measure so strongly, I want to make it absolutely water-tight so that it cannot or will not be abused. This can be done by making it solely applicable to articles printed in braille.

The hon. member referred to the deletion of section 16 of Act 44 of 1958—we can call it the principal Act. In section 16 of that Act there is a comprehensive description of “newspaper”. The Postmaster-General will, it is true, now have the right to determine in future what postal articles are too indecent or improper for delivery. If one were to read section 16 of the principal Act, one would see that whatever is incorporated in the new legislation will make no difference at all to the description of the principal Act. I just want to quote one short paragraph from this Act. I am referring to section 16(2), which refers to publications—

What were you just quoting from?

I have just quoted section 16 of the principal Act which is now being deleted by clause 4. It is true that in this Bill there is no description of what a newspaper is. Those of us who have all the newspapers open to our inspection today, and who can form a judgment in that connection, will see that no description in the new legislation can in the least influence the position, because in terms of the description in the section I have just quoted, there was sufficient opportunity for the inclusion of photographs, other publications such as advertisements, etc., without it having been possible for the Postmaster-General or the relevant Minister to have had them for inspection. It is a good thing that the Postmaster-General is now being given those powers to judge whether a publication is indecent and improper, whether it be Scope, as the hon. member said, one of the present dailies, or whatever the case may be. I have only one problem as far as that is concerned. For the present I have no problems, because I know what the attitudes to life are of members on this side, of the Minister and of the Postmaster-General. My problem relates to what would happen—and I hope it does not ever happen—if the Postmaster-General were to belong to an ultra-liberalistic element and then had to pass judgment, in terms of the provisions of this legislation, about what is objectionable and what may not be published. I am glad that, under the present circumstances, I can trust the present Postmaster-General and the hon. the Minister fully as far as passing judgment is concerned. But I also trust that this matter can be arranged by way of regulation so that there will, to a certain extent, be guidance for the Postmaster-General with respect to the judgment that must be passed about this kind of matter. I think it would be very beneficial to sound judgment if such a guide could be placed at the disposal of the Postmaster-General. We know that these days it is not only objectionable reading matter that is transmitted by post, but that we are living in a period in which other articles, which I do not need to mention here, are also transmitted by post. I think the Postmaster-General can take action under those circumstances, because he has also obtained the powers to take immediate action when he thinks that an article is objectionable or improper. For that reason I am saying that I fully welcome this provision. I have already said that in this case we trust the sound judgment of the Postmaster-General. For that reason the old section’s description of a newspaper is virtually superfluous under these circumstances. The Postmaster-General must use his discretion, and then there is also still the possibility of appeal to the Minister with respect to these matters.

Mr. Speaker, may I ask the hon. member a question? Would you then, for example, not regard Scope as a newspaper if, say, it were to have been found to be indecent by the Publications Board a few times?

In no way does this concern Scope’s status as a publication or newspaper. It does not necessarily have to be a newspaper; it can be any publication that is transmitted by post. What is involved here is the content of the particular magazine, newspaper or whatever, that has to be transmitted. This is a matter of the content and not the publication as such. I think it would be a very good thing—I want to mention this for what it is worth— for an accepted norm to be made applicable according to which the Postmaster-General could form his judgment. It would be there for the purpose of guidance. I do not know whether he would need it; perhaps he may need it. I do think it would be beneficial if such a norm were laid down concerning what the cross-sectional conservative Afrikaner’s philosophy of life is and what fits in with that. That view can be applied as a norm according to which action must be taken.

Another measure in this Bill which I welcome, is that relating to the delivery of postal articles which have insufficient stamps or no stamps at all. In a previous debate it was made clear here that this obligation of honesty had stood the test for a year and that at least 70% of the persons, to whom these postage-due cards were posted, reacted favourably and sent along the necessary amount with a view to releasing these postal articles. Unfortunately there are still 30% of the people who did not comply. I think that in respect of that 30%, who did not pay the fines, other methods must be found to compel them to do so.

Further I do not want to react to this matter. The rest of the Bill is as good as one could possibly have imagined. It is beneficial to the good administration of the Post Office. We want to express our appreciation to the Postmaster-General and his officials, and to the hon. the Minister in particular, for this legislation which he has brought before the House.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the hon. House for the good reception they have given this measure. I should like to reply to a few of the questions that were asked here. I shall begin with the hon. member for Orange Grove, who raised the question of the calculation of daily interest in respect of the sayings bank, and actually blamed us for having had to wait for the computer before we could implement a good United Party plea here. Actually it is not because we have only now become convinced of that, that we have only now been able to do this; the problem was that the heaps of accounts we have had, simply made it impossible to handle this scheme without available manpower. You know, there are about 1,6 million sayings bank accounts. This is a colossal number of accounts, and it was simply beyond human capability to manage the calculation of daily interest in respect of so many accounts. Now, with the advent of the computer, we are able to do so. That is actually the reason why this could not be done previously.

The hon. member also asked me a question in connection with the description of “telegraph services”. He asked how this term could also include telephones. According to definition the term “telegraph” also includes “telephone”.

The concern which the hon. member expressed in connection with our newspapers, is actually unfounded. We are very sympathetic to our newspapers. We appreciate the value of our newspaper services. If one just thinks of the steps we took with respect to the latest postage rates, to which I referred a while ago, to meet our newspapers half way, I think that it does bear witness to our sympathy. As I said a while ago in my Second Reading speech, only one cent has to be paid in the case of a newspaper weighing up to 500 grammes—those are normally the Sunday newspapers—while the charges for ordinary printed matter of 500 grammes, is 6 cents. Actually the Post Office is losing a tremendous amount on the transmission of newspapers through the post, but that is one of the social services that we furnish, and this surely bears witness to our sympathetic attitude. However, if people abuse one’s kindness, as is the case in respect of several bodies that use these newspapers as an advertising medium for all kinds of pamphlets, brochures, etc., to which the ordinary rates for printed matter are applicable, one does feel that one must be able to handle these people firmly. The best way in which this can be done, is to have these articles described by way of regulation. This proposal, i.e. to have them described by way of regulation, is therefore not aimed at the newspapers, so as to afford them less protection; the intention is simply, in this connection, to be sufficiently strict with those people who abuse one’s kindness.

The hon. member for Harrismith referred to the question of the blind, to which the hon. member for Orange Grove also referred. Those hon. members asked questions in connection with braille, and in reply I want to confirm that material which is addressed in braille will have this assistance. We are aware of the fact that there are investigations being instituted in order to design a new type of writing for the blind, and if a more modern kind of writing than braille can be designed, we shall of course give the same assistance.

The hon. member also raised the problem of what norm should be employed in determining offensiveness, and he referred to the task resting with the Postmaster-General. That is a real problem. In the days when I was Deputy Minister of the Interior and was entrusted with the task of going, all alone, into a cinema to view films subsequent to an appeal, to determine whether they were objectionable and morally subversive, I realized what a difficult task it is. There is not a specific instruction for the Department of the Interior either. I do not know whether my colleague already has such an instruction these days according to which it can be determined whether a publication is taboo or not. One must simply project the sound judgment in any average, decent South African, whether in respect of a film or in respect of reading matter, in order to be able to determine eventually whether a publication is objectionable or not. Fortunately the Post Office has always had a Postmaster-General with that sound judgment. I therefore do not think we need have any doubts about the implementation of that provision.

With these few words I again thank hon. members very much for the good reception this measure has been given.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a Second Time.

Mr. Speaker, I move—

As will be observed from the long title, the proposed legislation is aimed mainly at facilitating the administration of the existing Act by the Department of Police and at deleting obsolete provisions. In brief, the amendments amount to the following:

The amendment of section 4 of the principal Act which is proposed in clause 2 involves a slight change in regard to the appointment of national boards. In terms of the existing provision the national boards consist of five persons, one of whom is appointed and designated as chairman by the Minister, and the other four who are appointed by the Minister from nominations received by him on invitation. If the Minister has not received the nominations invited by him within the period he stated, he may appoint any person whom he considers suitable to be a member of the board. These last four members are usually, but not necessarily, the chairmen of the four provincial boards. The proposed amendment has the effect that the Minister may now appoint two persons, one of whom he shall designate as chairman. With the appointment of the other person it is now being envisaged that the Minister may appoint a member of the South African Police to represent the department by which the Act is administered. Although it is not specifically provided that this shall be the case, this is what it will amount to in practice. The procedure in regard to the appointment of the other members of the board remains unchanged. As I have already indicated, this amendment creates the opportunity to appoint a member of the South African Police as a member of the national board. This is a shortcoming which exists in the present Act, and it is now being set right.

In clause 3 the proviso to subsection (1) of section 5 is extended by inserting a further provision, viz. (f), in terms of which the Minister is granted the power to remove from his office any member of the board if in the opinion of the Minister there exists any sufficient reason, other than those which have already been provided for, which renders such member unsuitable to remain a member of the board. The Minister already has the power to remove a member of the board from his office under certain circumstances, for example, if he is of unsound mind, if his estate is sequestrated, if he is convicted, and so on. However, other causes, too, may arise, such as when a member, although he attends the meetings regularly, shows no interest in the efficient administration of the sport concerned, or makes no contribution to the promotion of its interests. Persons who take so little interest in boxing and wrestling should therefore not serve on a board any longer, and it should be possible to remove them.

Clause 4: This clause amends section 9 of the principal Act in order to remove the doubt that may exist concerning the responsibility of the Minister in regard to making regulations in terms of the Act. As the Act reads at the moment, the board may, with the approval of the Minister, make regulations. This wording is felt to be undesirable. If the amendment is accepted, the provision will read that the Minister may make regulations. Of course, this will only be done after consultation with the board, as is further provided.

Clause 5: This amendment involves a slight change in regard to the appointment of members of provincial boxing and wrestling control boards. Briefly it amounts to the Minister being given the power to appoint as members of provincial boards suitable persons other than those nominated by the boards. Apart from the chairman of a provincial board the Minister is at present obliged to appoint every other member of the board from one of two persons nominated by the board, if nominations are received within the period allowed by the Minister. If nominations are not received within this period, the Minister may appoint anyone he considers to be suitable. So the dilemma is that where a board, for the sake of argument, nominates two unfit persons for appointment, the Minister is bound to appoint one of these two, in spite of their unfitness. The Minister has no option. The proposed legislation is aimed at eliminating this undesirable situation. This does not mean that if the amendment is accepted the Minister will arbitrarily appoint persons other than those nominated by the boards. The appointment will still be made from nominations by the boards, but the provision serves as a safety-valve for cases where the Minister is satisfied that the persons nominated are not fit to serve on the boards. The amendment will also be an incentive to the boards to nominate only absolutely competent persons and persons who have the interests of these sports at heart. Boxing and wrestling are important branches of sport and the boxers and wrestlers, as well as boxing and wrestling supporters, are entitled to have its administration handled by competent and dedicated persons at all times.

Clause 6: A new section 21A is being inserted, in terms of which the participation of women in boxing and wrestling tournaments is expressly prohibited. The new provision speaks for itself. Mr. Speaker, the proposed prohibition on participation by women in boxing and wrestling—this does not apply to hon. members’ wrestling and boxing matches at home—is being introduced at the request of the National Wrestling Control Board. The latter received an application from a promotor to bring lady wrestlers from America to the Republic, to take part in wrestling tournaments here. The National Board refused the application and requested that it should also be expressly prohibited in the Act. According to the board participation by women is indecent. It is the custom to cover the floor of a wrestling ring with a smooth layer of mud. The contestants are dressed in bathing costumes. As a result of their wrestling, sliding, grabbing at each other and falling down on the smooth surface it does not take long before they are half naked, to the great amusement of the spectators, of course. This kind of thing certainly conflicts with the morals and norms of the South African people.

Clause 7: Paragraph (i) is being inserted in section 23 to provide for a penalty provision in respect of the new section 21A and to bring the fines into line with our present monetary system.

Clause 8: Paragraphs (b) and (c) of section 25 are hereby deleted because they have become superfluous. They really refer to South-West Africa.

Clause 9 contains the short title.

We on this side of the House are going to support the Second Reading of this amending Bill. The Bill aims firstly at the tightening of boxing and wrestling control throughout South Africa. It will also put the ultimate control of boxing and wrestling into the hands of the Minister. In terms of this legislation the Minister will appoint members of two boards of control, for boxing and wrestling. When we read the Bill we are very pleased to see that the Minister will be given greater discretion in dismissing unsuitable members from the boards. The Bill also doubles the fines in respect of offences against the Act. The really important part of the Bill, of course—and I am being quite serious—is the prohibition of females from taking part in boxing or wrestling contests in South Africa. We know that we are living in the so-called age of “women’s lib”, but I am quite sure that even the staunchest supporters of “women’s lib” will agree that to allow females to take part in boxing and wrestling is taking “women’s lib” a bit too far. I say this advisedly because I have seen this type of exhibition on television overseas, and I want to say it will be a sorry day indeed for South Africa if this type of exhibition is allowed to take place in our country. I am very pleased indeed to see that the legislation is being tightened up, because, as the hon. the Deputy Minister has already said, applications have in fact been made to promote this type of exhibition in South Africa.

When we come to the Amendment regarding boxing, I want to say that it has been my unfortunate experience to be at boxing matches where on two occasions young South Africans who have taken part have actually died as the result of the boxing matches. I want to say that in these particular cases no blame attached to any particular person, either to the promoters or to the board of control. But what I saw there brought home to me the fact that you can never have tight enough control in a sport like professional boxing. I want to say to the hon. the Deputy Minister that normally we on this side of the House would take the strongest exception to giving any Minister the power to appoint members to control a particular sport, but we accept it in this particular case because professional boxing is such a very rugged and difficult sport. In this particular case you can only have adequate control if you have boards of control and you have on those boards of control the right type of person. I want to say that I agree that in this particular case it is right that the Minister himself should have a big say in the appointment of people who serve on the national board and also on the provincial boards, and also that he should have the right at any stage to dismiss any person whom he believes has not functioned properly as a member of that board. The Bill, as we see it, can only do the sports of boxing and wrestling, which are both very good sports, good, and therefore we on this side of the House welcome this amending Bill and give it our full support.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a Second Time.

We all know that the hon. the Minister is as a Minister really an old hand, but nevertheless as Minister of the Interior he is in fact a new broom, and I sincerely hope that he will act as a new broom when it comes to one aspect of his department, namely the Public Service, and bring about certain changes which we believe are essential and which are in fact long overdue. In the first place, I wish to urge the hon. the Minister to allow the Public Service Commission to delegate more powers to officers in State departments. I am aware of the fact that this is something which has been happening in recent years. During recent years the Public Service Commission has been delegating some of its powers. In fact, I think in its report for 1972 it is mentioned that this procedure of delegation of powers to State departments has brought about greater functional efficiency. I want to ask the hon. the Minister to continue with this because after all the powers which have been delegated up to now are in fact very limited powers. I feel that he can increase those powers without running the risk that these departments will demand their autonomy from the Public Service Commission. The procedure of delegation of powers within the framework of the Public Service Commission is something which can work in respect of certain State departments. However, there are certain departments where this system is of no avail. Here I refer in particular to the education departments. It is quite all right as far as the administrative sections of the education departments are concerned, but when you are dealing with the professional sections of these departments, then I feel there is only one way open and that is the complete separation from the Public Service Commission.

This is something which I raised with the hon. the Minister’s predecessor and the reply I received was that it could not be done. The hon. the Minister’s predecessor said that the major objection was that once teachers were allowed to be separated from the Public Service Commission, other professional groups would demand the same. I feel that I cannot accept this as a real objection; to me it sounds more like an excuse. I believe that it is up to every single professional group to argue its case in the light of its own particular problems. It will then be the task of the hon. the Minister or that of the Public Service Commission to decide.

As a professional group, teachers suffer under a particular disadvantage which one does not find in other professional groups. I refer to the fact that there are no uniform professional qualifications for teachers. A person can become a teacher after having studied for two, three or four years. A graduate or a non-graduate can become a teacher. We find in fact something like six different categories of professionally qualified teachers. I am not going to go into this matter; I am merely going to say that I accept this as a reality. I am not opposed to the fact that we have these various categories although I believe that some of them can be abolished. The fact remains, however, that we start off having different categories of professionally qualified people in the same profession.

This of course necessitates different salary scales. There is also another principle involved and that is the necessity for the grading of different schools. All told, you find a situation where you have some forty different salary scales on the progression table. These are grouped together within eleven promotional steps. It is inevitable that anomalies and inconsistencies result from illogical groupings. These things give rise to dissatisfaction and sometimes they force teachers to conduct public campaigns in order to seek improvement in their conditions of service. I am afraid that as long as these things are happening the professional status of teachers will be harmed. I am quite convinced that as long as they have to operate within the framework of the Public Service Commission one will continue to have illogical post structures and salary scales.

I know that the hon. the Minister is going to say that in 99% of the cases the Public Service Commission is in fact only acting on the recommendations of the educational heads who in turn are acting on the recommendations of various advisory committees. I believe that is true, but the recommendations which these bodies make to the Public Service Commission are, in fact, inhibited, because those recommendations have to be made within a certain framework and as a result those bodies are obliged to make illogical recommendations. They have no option. It is like the hon. the Prime Minister asking his Economic Advisory Council to make certain projections, but at the same time he instructs the council to make those projections within the framework of an economic growth rate of 5,5% or 5,75%. Obviously this is the type of thing which they have to do within a framework predetermined by the Public Service Commission where it is inevitable that one has a system of equation of posts.

I want to proceed to another aspect. It concerns the relationship between the Department of the Interior and the Department of Immigration. I want to ask the hon. the Minister whether it is not possible to streamline the procedure whenever a person applies for extension of his temporary residence permit, with the view to getting greater co-operation between the Department of the Interior and the Department of Immigration. I refer here to a particular situation. I refer to a person who has a temporary permit and who has applied to the Immigration Selection Board to become a permanent resident but whose application has been rejected. Obviously he will then appeal against the rejection of his application. Before the Immigration Selection Board can consider his new application, the person must provide them with proof that he is in possession of a valid residence permit. This is where the whole trouble starts. Such a person normally goes to the local police station, fills in a form and sends off his passport. In a case which had come to my notice a person applied for an extension of his permit but was notified only two or three months after his original permit had expired that he had received an extension of his permit. In this particular case the permit expired at the end of November but the person was eventually informed in January that the Department of the Interior has agreed to extend his permit till the end of February. In other words, it was extended for a period of three months. It is only at that stage that the Immigration Selection Board can seriously consider his reapplication for a permanent residence permit. The point I want to make is that it should surely be possible for the Department of the Interior to inform the Immigration Selection Board as a matter of routine that such an application is under consideration and that they can go ahead considering this person’s application for a permanent residence permit on its merits. I have seen cases where once the date of a temporary permit had expired the person concerned was placed in an invidious position. The last thing such a person wants to be is to be unemployed because then he has no chance with the Immigration Selection Board. But because he is not in possession of a valid permit, you find that employers are sometimes reluctant to keep such a person in their employment. The employers feel that they are in fact employing a person who should legally not be in the country. All the employee can tell him is that his temporary permit is expiring at the end of February, March, April or even May and then the employer starts to panic and eventually it has a tremendous effect on the person concerned. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, to commence with I should like to convey to the hon. the Minister and the Government, on behalf of the officials in my constituency and the officials throughout the country, our appreciation for the concession which has been made in respect of the 100% housing loan scheme by increasing the limit from R15 000 to R20 000. This enables many more officials to make use of this scheme. I want to assure the hon. the Minister that this is greatly appreciated. With respect to the interest subsidy paid on such loans, the position is unfortunately such that there are a few officials who have obtained a house at some other place by way of a legacy or by some other means, or who have inherited a farm on which there is a dilapidated old house. Now in terms of the rules of the interest subsidy scheme, the interest subsidy that has been paid out to such persons is being reclaimed at 8½% interest. This has already caused considerable bitterness amongst a certain group of officials. I should very much like to ask the Minister whether such a matter could be handled with the utmost circumspection by departmental heads because it unnecessarily penalizes innocent people and causes them financial problems.

In respect of the housing loan scheme, there is a further aspect I want to mention. In and around Pretoria, just on the city boundary, in the smallholding areas—these are not the smallholding areas which are slums, these are the lovelier and more developed areas where fine dwellings are springing up on the smallholdings, dwellings for which mortgage bond loans are available from building societies—the interest subsidy is not being granted. It is only a wire fence that separates the city boundary from these smallholding areas, and the one official comes into consideration for the interest subsidy, but the other does not. I should like to ask the hon. the Minister to grant the interest subsidy to an official, wherever he may be living, if he has a building society loan, even if it is in the smallholding area beyond the municipal boundary, because otherwise this is not fair. I also want to lodge a plea again for the lower ranks in the Public Service, those who do not have enough to buy a house and who therefore have to fall back on flats where they must keep large families. I am again lodging a plea with the Government to see whether we cannot also make a plan to grant these people, who cannot yet buy a house, a rent subsidy, or whatever the case may be, so that the burden is not as disproportionately distributed as it is at present.

With the turbulence on our country’s borders, another problem crops up. Our officials of the Departments of Bantu Affairs, Customs and Excise, and others, are periodically serving in the border areas where, inter alia, terrorist operations are in progress. It is a fact that those relevant officials must depend solely on the ordinary travel and subsistence allowances, even though some of their possessions are burnt to the ground. I think there was one case where an official lost possessions to the value of more than R3 800. No fixed formula exists for compensation to these officials on the border. I am requesting that these officials should not be compensated on an ad hoc basis, as is being done at present, but that these officials should be paid according to a fixed formula when they suffer any losses.

I want to come to the question of pensions. It happens every day that—and all our colleagues will attest to the fact, colleagues on this side of the House and some of the smart colleagues on that side of the House, the hon. member for Umhlatuzana excluded—two or three years after officials have retired on pension, they find themselves faced with insurmountable problems. Then one is faced with the situation that these officials did not know what they were letting themselves in for upon retirement as far as the acceptance of a gratuity or otherwise was concerned. I want to request that the departments uniformly point out to all officials, before they retire, the consequences attendant upon acceptance of a pension and a gratuity so that they are very clear about what they are letting themselves in for. In respect of our Government officials on session duty, it is interesting to note that in the parliamentary residential town, Acacia Park, there are at present 1 072 people who are accommodated in 233 houses, while those who are unmarried live in 159 flats. There are 290 married couples and 91 unmarried persons, the majority of whom are officials. The rental for these houses varies from R33 to R62 while that of the flats varies from R44 to R28 per month.

Order! What do those data have to do with this Vote?

Mr. Chairman, I just want to point out that the session allowance of officials on parliamentary duty is at present R6 for married persons and R3-50 for unmarried persons. In contrast to this the travel and subsistence allowances for ordinary officials vary from R11 to R7 in the lower ranks. There has recently been an increase here. Since these officials have had to pay a 10% increase on housing this year while on session duty in Cape Town, I want to ask that their session allowances be adjusted. Officials who are serving in Cape Town for the parliamentary session have expenses which they would not otherwise have had. If I am permitted to elaborate further on this, I just want to point out that these officials have particular problems. I know of one family last year which had five children in five different schools. There is the greater expenditure in respect of high school children who have to live in hostels. These people do not come here of their own free will. They are sent here by their employer, the State. They do good service for the State. I should like to ask, in the interests of this large number of officials, and with a view to the increasing cost of living, that the Government take another look at the session allowances that are being paid, particularly those in the lower paid ranks, say, up to administrative officers. I think that the merits of the case justify further careful consideration of this matter by the Government.

Mr. Chairman, in the few moments before the debate adjourns, I want to take the opportunity of replying to one or two of the attacks made from the Opposition side. In the first place, however, I first want to say thank you to the chairman of the United Party’s Interior group for his few words congratulating me on my appointment as Minister of the Interior. I immediately want to assure him that I regard this Vote, as it is administered at present, with all the implications involved, as an extremely important Vote in the whole Public Service. The Interior Vote is most intimately concerned with the lives of everyone from the cradle to the grave. One is continually dealing with human situations and human problems. One is dealing, for example, with the position of race classification which, from the nature of the case, is a delicate matter which one does not like to interfere with if it is not necessary, specifically because it makes such severe and drastic inroads into the lives of people. The Vote is concerned with the whole question of the admission of people into the country and with passports allowing them to go overseas, all personal, intimate matters. With a view to this it is my point of departure and my policy that all these matters be handled with great sympathy and humanity.

I shall in all respects be humane in my approach to and handling of the difficult questions which this department has an abundance of. From the humane point of view I should also like to view the other side of the matter. As far as it is possible in practice, I should like to cause the least possible friction, human pain and sorrow. Having said that, I immediately want to tell the hon. member that I must not be misinterpreted in the sense of having said I am reluctant to implement the policy as laid down by the Government from day to day for the protection of certain rights that we have. My statements must not be interpreted to mean that in the implementation of the laws that may be embody certain problems I shall, for the sake of being humane or for the sake of avoiding problems, not implement the laws as contained in the Statute Book or that I shall be lax in implementing them. On the contrary, it will be my duty to carry out, with humanity, the policy and the principles of the Government in this department. That is how I see my task, and that is how I see the task of this department in its approach as a whole.

Before I go any further, I want to devote, on this occasion, a few seconds to my predecessor in this portfolio, whom I succeeded during the recess and who was still handling this Vote last year. I am speaking of the hon. Mr. Theo Gerdener. He served for a period as Minister of the Interior. He did excellent work. He acquitted himself very well of his task and, perhaps under difficult circumstances at times, furnished excellent service. Since he has decided, in the meantime, to retire and to venture into another field, we want to wish him every success on the new course he has taken and on the new task he has taken upon himself. I want to express great thanks and appreciation to him for what he has meant to this department and for what he achieved here in the execution of his duties. Wherever I go, I find that the foundations have thoroughly and firmly been laid and that one can successfully build on them.

The hon. member for Green Point put a few questions to me which I should like to reply to at once. In the first place he asked me whether I am going to furnish reasons for the refusal of passports. I now want to tell the hon. member at once that I can and will only do so if it is in South Africa’s interests to furnish the reasons. But we must also remember very clearly that at times it is not in the interests of the applicant to furnish reasons either. The hon. member will recall that a while ago a question was put to me by the hon. member for Houghton in connection with a person who was refused a visa. When I was asked whether I would furnish reasons for the refusal in that case, I said “no”. When she asked why not, my reply was: “It is not in the applicant’s interest for me to do so.” If the hon. member wants to know this in confidence, I shall give him the information, but I am not prepared, in the interests of the applicant, to divulge those reasons. It would, in actual fact, adversely affect the person himself. I cannot, for example, tell the world that someone cannot afford a trip abroad and that I therefore have to refuse him a passport. It is not in his interests. Neither can I say that he is trying to flee as a result of a criminal offence before he has been brought before a court. That is, of course, a reason for refusing a passport. I am, in fact, prepared to do what my predecessor did. I want to refer the hon. member to Hansard (Vol. 34, col. 8770), where this same matter was raised, and where my predecessor gave broad, comprehensive and general reasons why a passport could be refused.

He did, in fact, do so.

He did do so, but generally and never specifically. In that general sense one could also give reason— that is surely clear—if it is in the interests of South Africa.

He went further and mentioned specific cases.

Well, I should very much like to have examples. If he gave reasons in all cases, I should like to know how this was possible in any case. But as I have said, it is frequently not in the interests of either person himself, or the country, for us to give reasons for refusing passports.

Then there is just one further matter that I want to deal with quickly—in two shakes, Sir, if I may. The hon. member requested that there should be an appeal body to reconsider the refusal of passports. I just want to tell him at once that the issuing and granting of passports are exclusively the right of the executive authority, i.e. the government of the day. It is unthinkable for the Government, after having refused a passport, to allow an appeal to a body which could exert pressure on the Government or could decide that such a passport should, in fact, be granted. It sounds completely unrealistic to me; because the fact that our Government issues a passport does not mean that it is only providing a person with a travel document. It means, at the same time—this is written on the passport—that the Government requests the government, in whose area the holder of the passport is travelling, to offer him every possible assistance. The Government also accepts responsibility for such a person. If the Government consequently has reasons for refusing a passport, it cannot allow a private outside body, whatever it may be, to prescribe to it that it should in fact issue the passport, despite the reasons that gave rise to the refusal. Progress reported and leave granted to sit again.

Business interrupted in accordance with Standing Order No, 23.

House Resumed:

Progress reported and leave granted to sit again.