I move—

The keynote of my appeal to the House today is: The labourer is worthy of his hire … but the soldier is infinitely more so! The Union troops raised and trained and sent into the field by the Right Honourable the Prime Minister have proved themselves as fine as any that the world can produce. From the Right Honourable the Prime Minister’s motion already under discussion in this House it is clear that the Union must prepare to send contingents of troops to areas beyond the continent of Africa to bear their part with their comrades against the Axis powers, and we must see to it that our men are as well paid as are their brothers in arms from other Dominions: Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. The cable news over the week-end tells us in a message from the Defence Minister of New Zealand that out of an army of 120,000 men, New Zealanders have won 4 Victoria Crosses, and 400 other decorations while 420 men have been mentioned in despatches. In addition the New Zealand Air Force of 30,000 men has won 338 decorations and its Navy of 7,000 has won 56. The Union’s record is a not less distinguished one in respect of the gallantry of its fighting men. The battle honours of our regiments will remain a source of imperishable pride to all generations, and the valour of such South Africans as Squadron Leader Malan, J. Nettleton, V.C., of Squadron Leader Hugo, and of Sergt. O. Smythe, V.C., and many more will never be forgotten. With the approach of the critical stage of the war, every country in this warring world is appealing to its fighting men. The week-end broadcast from Germany recorded a passage from Field-Marshal Goering’s speech, in which with a crescendo that left him breathless, he declared:

I have before me two lists showing the South African Permanent Force Rates of Pay and Allowances Applied to Volunteers during the War Period. One list is for unmarried members and the other is for married members. To my mind the only fair method of computing the pay of a soldier on active service is to debit him either for accounting or tax purposes solely with the cash which he actually receives in respect of his daily pay. The pay roll of the Union Private in the Infantry debits him,—in addition to the cash amount actually paid to him of (a) pay 3s. 6d. (b) Proficiency pay 6d.—with (c) lodging allowance 1s. (d) ration allowance 2s. thus making his pay appear to be 7s. per day. Items (a) and (b) represent what he receives in hard cash whereas (c) and (d) are book entries against him which figure to his debit irrespective of whether he receives regular rations and lives in hutments or goes hungry on the battlefield and sleeps in a slit-trench on the desert. The Union method of inflating the soldier’s actual pay by the addition of a ration allowance and lodging allowance which are not handed over to him is apt to give the impression that he receives 3s. more per diem than the State pays him,—thus creating an unfair tax liability. In armies with which our soldiers have been serving in the North,—the British Army for example—this system is not followed. Let us compare the pay roll of the Union private in the infantry with that of the British soldier of similar rank and service.

Now, Sir, if we were to eliminate the book entries for lodging allowance and ration alowance from the Union soldier’s account the reduction of his pay by 3s. brings his actual pay down, so that there is not a shilling of difference between his actual pay and that of the British soldier. In the case of a Union soldier who has a wife and two children he is debited with lodging allowance 2s. 6d., ration allowance 4s., family allowance 2s., thus making it appear that he receives 8s. 6d. more per day than is actually paid to him. The soldiers on active service do not receive the benefits connoted by these figures and they would prefer to have their pay computed in plain figures. On the vexed question of the taxation levied by the Union Government on the soldiers’ pay, I propose to quote from a letter which I have received from the father of a soldier in my constituency remonstrating against the methods adopted by the Department of Finance in assessing the amount of taxation due in respect of the soldier’s pay. The letter was written in consequence of a demand made in respect of the actual pay received by the soldier between July, 1941, and February, 1942. The actual pay for 232 days at 10s. received by the soldier amounted to £116, but the paymaster added to that sum for tax purposes 2s. a day for rations (for 232 days) and 1s. per day for lodging (for the same period), bringing up the total to £150 16s. The father of the soldier made the following comment:

I assume that the tax was the Personal and Savings Fund Levy imposed by the Special Taxation Act, 1942, but I have no specific information on this point. An editor of one of the leading journals of South Africa informs me that the soldiers resent the inclusion of the ration and lodging allowance in their taxable income. A comparison between the rates of pay drawn by members of the Union army with those authorised by the other Dominions serves to show that the Union rates are much lower than those paid to other Dominion forces. New Zealand: In December, 1939, the private’s pay in the infantry was increased to 7s. 6d. a day—a colonel’s pay was increased to 42s. per day. Canada: In December, 1942, the Canadian army pay was increased to 7s. 6d. per day for privates in the infantry, and the cost of living bonuses to the families of all ex-servicemen were increased so as to place their allowance on the highest scale in the world. Australia: In August, 1942, military pay was increased to 6s. 6d. per day for the privates in the infantry. A further 1s. was authorised as deferred pay—thus raising the private’s pay to 7s. 6d. per day. The wife’s allowance was increased from 3s. 6d. to 4s. 6d., and the allowance for the first child from 2s. 6d. to 3s. The rates for the women services were increased proportionately. The Prime Minister for Australia announced that the figure for exemption from taxation for the fighting force would be raised from £200 to £250 per annum. Can any reason be given for the great disparity between the pay of Union privates in the infantry and men of similar rank in the other Dominions? To my mind the time has arrived to do away with this unfair differentiation and to raise the rates for the Union non-commissioned ranks to those prevailing in the other Dominions. In the motion before the House it is proposed that the Union Government should consider the suspension for the soldier of the nation’s debt and tax laws. From what I have already said, it will be seen that in Australia the soldier is specifically exempted in respect of a tax upon any income earned by him up to £250 per annum. In the United States of America the payment of any tax on the income of a person in military service is deferred for the duration of the war and six months thereafter. If such person’s ability to pay the tax is materially impaired by reason of his service, no interest on the amount due or penalty for non-payment accrues during the period of postponement. In the proposals I have submitted to the House, I suggest that the Union Government should consider the advisability of extending to men and women on active service all such protection as is enjoyed by members of the armed forces of the United States of America. I had been informed that an Act of Congress, dated October 17th, 1940, sometimes known as the Sparkman Act, named after the member of Congress who introduced it, made extensive provision for the protection of United States soldiers during the war, and in reply to an enquiry which I addressed to the American Minister, I received a letter condensing into a few words the benefits conferred by this Act upon the armed forces of the United States. The letter stated:

In reply to my further enquiry as to the provision made for the insurance of soldiers, the American Minister replied:

Reference to the relative acts of the United States shows the extent to which the far-reaching benefits would be to the advantage of our soldiers and I commend an examination of these acts to the Minister of Finance. The Act passed in 1917 for the establishment of the bureau of war risk insurance was a comprehensive measure providing by law not only for insurance of the soldier, but for the payment of allotments and family allowances and of pensions. Under the insurance provisions, the dependants of a soldier became entitled to receive 10,000 dollars upon his disability or death. I commend the examination of all these provisions to the consideration of the Government in the interest of the Union soldiers.

I second.

Mr. Speaker, I have very great pleasure indeed in supporting the motion moved by the hon. member for Illovo (Mr. Marwick). I have raised this matter on several occasions in this House, and peculiarly enough on two occasions when I raised this specifically, the Prime Minister refused to make any statement. There is no doubt, Sir, that there exists in the armed forces in South Africa a feeling of resentment in connection not only with the inadequacy of the basic rate of pay, but particularly with the anomalies which exist in the Union forces. It is difficult at times to find out just exactly how and how much our soldiers are paid, and I rather think, as a matter of fact, that the hon. member for Illovo did err at least in one respect because I understand that where civil servants are concerned, this 2s. a day ration allowance is credited to their account when they proceed to the North. But let us examine for a moment or two some of the anomalies in the Union rate of pay. To begin with, I have already said so in this House, and I wish to repeat it, that in the South African Army the nearer you get to the firing line the less your rate of pay is. In other words, particular branches of the Union forces which are concerned with the actual fighting are the lowest paid branches of these forces. We have in the infantry, in the mechanised forces, and in the artillery, a basic rate of 3s. 6d. per day. A man who fights in these particular units has got to be physically fit. He is in the Al standard. But we find that, for instance, in the Air Force we were at one time actually signing on youths of 16 years of age, giving them six months technical training, and then giving them 6s. a day. And those youths could not be sent out of the country until they were 19 years of age. Ever since the beginning of the war we have been signing on men in the C category in the Medical Corps, men who could not possibly be sent out of the country, and we have been paying them 5s. 6d. per day. We have in the military police again C category men for service in the Union who can be signed on up to the age of 55 or something like that, and they are immediately made corporals and paid 6s. 6d. per day. Apart from that, we have these very strange anomalies in the allowances paid to soldiers’ dependants. The Government has to be congratulated on being so benevolent to their own service, but it seems to me they ought to extend that to everybody who is prepared to fight for this country. The Government scheme is that when a civil servant joins the army, his pay is made up to his civil emoluments. In other words, they take the army pay, and when that falls short of his civil pay, it is made up by the Government. In addition he is allowed to retain the 4s. 6d. per day which is paid as an allowance to his wife, and the 1s. per day to each child, which means that a civil servant earning £40 a month in his civil employment, is paid £40 a month by the army, and in addition he gets 4s. 6d. a day for his wife, and 1s. a day for each child; so that a man who is a civil servant and is married, and has two children, is approximately £10 or £11 per month better off in the army than in his civilian job. On the other hand, the Government says to individuals who are not in the civil service: “You must join the army at 3s. 6d. per day, and you will get 4s. 6d. per day allowance for your wife and 1s. per day for each child.” One admits, of course, that these allowances are to-day being very generously supplemented by the Governor-General’s Fund, but let us take the difference between the attitude of the Governor-General’s Fund and the attitude of the Government itself. Whereas the Government pays a wife’s allowance and children’s allowance additional to their own servants, the Governor-General’s Fund usually takes off a sum ranging from £5 to £8 from the civil pay in order to form a basis for making up that pay. And so the ordinary soldier who joins to-day and who is in occupation other than the civil service, is likely to get a rate of pay and allowances which total anything from £5 to £8 less than his civil pay. Now I want to enter a word or two on behalf of the single man. I have explained it to the Prime Minister before. Some time ago I heard the late Dan Pienaar rather proudly state that the average age of the First Division was somewhere in the region of 25. If that is correct, it means that a very large percentage of the First Division men must be unmarried, and yet they are veterans. What has happened is this, that many of these men who have been up North for two and two and a half years, joined the army somewhere round about 18 or 19 years of age. Most of them had not so far started out on any career at all. Many of them came direct from school, and in other instances where they had started their careers, it was probably only of a few months duration. So now we have the situation that a large number of men just a little over 19 years were sent to the North. They have been serving there for two to two and a half years, and they are now sent back to the Union, vetereans, at the age of 21 and 22. They are given 30 days leave by a grateful Government, and by a grateful Commander-in-Chief, and they are handed £5 5s. as their months pay to celebrate their 30 days leave. That is the position of our Union forces. They come back here, and they are given £5 5s., just enough for about one nice blow up. Fortunately, those soldiers who have only just arrived are taking their months leave in February, and they are a little more lucky, because they will get their next months pay. However, that is the position. These men have gone, one might say, from boyhood to manhood in the service of their country in the actual field, and they come back here, many thousands of them, and receive this miserable paltry pay of 3s. 6d. per day. Quite apart from anything else, 3s. 6d. per day is not sufficient. It is not a sufficient amount of pay to allow a soldier to buy himself those necessities which a modern civilised life demands. We have had numbers of these soldiers who, through no fault of their own, have been stationed in the Union for the last two and a half years. These men get their usual week-end leave, and their vacational leave from time to time, but they simply have not sufficient money to enjoy that leave properly. The result is that their income has to be supplemented by their parents or their relatives. Men who are prepared to fight for their country, should not be put into that position. I feel there is no justification whatsoever for the Government’s refusal to increase the pay of the soldier, and I want to deal for a moment or two with one or two of the objections which I happen to know have been advanced by the Minister of Finance in connection with this matter. I am given to understand that the sum of money involved is not terrifying. I believe to increase the rate of pay from 3s. 6d. to 8s. per day, runs somewhere in the region of £5,500,000 to £6,000,000, and in view of the money which we are spending on the war, and in view of the taxable capacity of the people of South Africa, £5,500,000 to £6,000,000 should not stand in the way of the Government, even at this stage, doing tardy redress to the men who were prepared at great sacrifice to themselves, to join up and fight for South Africa. I believe one of the first reasons why the Minister of Finance has not agreed to increased pay is that he feels if additional money was given to a large number of troops, they and their dependants would buy luxuries and their dependants would, in the course of time, become necessitous, and would cause the Government grave concern in and after the war period. That is one of the ideas of the Minister of Finance, an idea which I feel perfectly sure will not find very much support in this House. After all is said and done, if a man is prepared to go and fight for his country, why should he not be entitled to luxuries, and in any case the difference between 3s. 6d. and 8s. a day which the soldier would get, would not in present circumstances in South Africa, enable him to buy very many luxuries. I can assure the hon. Minister that there is a large number of dependent soldiers’ wives with children who are today in very much worse economic positions than they were before the war, because there are still a large number of women who just simply will not go to the Governor-General’s War Fund. They may be wrong in their outlook, but they simply will not go to the Governor-General’s War Fund. The second argument that is advanced by the Minister of Finance is that the Budget probably will not be balanced this year. Well, I think, in time of war, and from what I know of the capitalist system, to balance the Budget, almost amounts to a criminal act.

It has not been balanced since the war began.

If it had, it would almost amount to a criminal act. I understand the Minister of Finance has a third reason, that this would cost another £5,500,000 to £6,000,000. There is another objection of the Minister of Finance, the well-known bogey of inflation. He feels if additional money was given to these people, because of restrictions on imports, a larger amount of money in circulation with a smaller amount of goods to purchase, will inevitably lead to inflation. I am not particularly worried about the danger of inflation. I think the inflation bogey is a thing that economists and Ministers of Finance use from time to time as something to frighten th? people, but if £5,500,000 extra in circulation is going to cause inflation in this country, then we must be in a very bad financial position, and the hon. Minister must have led the country into that bad financial position. There is a story which I do not think will cut very much ice, and I certainly and the soldiers certainly, will not concern themselves over it. The soldiers are having a very lean time. Their rate of pay does not in most cases allow them to maintain the standard of life which they had before the war. The rate of pay, particularly in respect of the younger men who joined without any pre-war income, is not sufficient for a man of that particular age. I want to impress on the Rt. Hon. the Prime Minister and on the Minister of Finance, who is also concerned with this, that the soldier is entitled to the best this country can give him. It is not a question that should be considered by the ordinary financial canons which we use when considering financial matters in this House. If the youth of this country had not been prepared to answer the call, when the day of danger arose, as the Prime Minister himself pointed out, this country would have been in very serious danger of being overrun. These men proceeded to the North actually to defend this country. They proceeded to the North to fight for those of us who were left behind, and particularly my hon. friends opposite, and surely there is nothing too good for these boys. If a man is prepared to lay down his life for his country, if he is prepared to shoulder a rifle and take the chance of being killed, surely the least those of us who are left behind, for various reasons, can do is to see that they have no economic worries. This is a burning question with the soldiers themselves. They feel they are being unjustly treated. They feel that to start with the basic rate of pay is far too small, and they feel that the anomalous conditions which exist in so far as pay is concerned in the South African army should be removed. We hear a great deal about new orders. We hear a great deal about new systems of society. We are told about these things from the housetops. The Prime Minister himself has very often told us that this country has had its lesson and that things must be different after the war. I think as an augury of the Prime Minister’s good faith, as an example of what we may expect in the line of social reconstruction after the war, he can set an example now by increasing the pay of the people who have been defending South Africa for nearly three and a half years. It is all very well to talk about new orders. I believe I once quoted this instance in this House, but it bears repeating. Hon. members on the opposite benches are continuously talking to us about the past. They go back to the Boer War and the Great Trek. The Rt. Hon. the Prime Minister very often talks to us in this House about the future. He tells us what is going to happen in the new world after the war, and what is going to happen in the years to come. He tells us how civilisation is going to develop, but the men in the South African army are not interested in the past, and although they have to look to the future, the present moment is their chief concern, and they would rather have a little of the new order now than promises in the future. The soldiers, I believe, agree with me in this particular respect, and as an earnest of the Prime Minister’s good faith, they ask that all consideration should be given to the raising of the level of their pay and allowances to at least on a par with that of the other Dominions.

Mr. Speaker, I think the House is indebted to the hon. member for Illovo (Mr. Marwick) for the spirit in which he has introduced this motion, for the moderate terms in which he has stated his case, and for the helpful information he has laid before us. I am very anxious that this matter of soldiers’ pay should not become a bone of contention in this House. We all agree, I think, on all sides of the House, with the tribute which the hon. member has paid to our brave men who have earned honour and renown for South Africa, and whose cause should be above all party politics in this country. We know, of course, that our men have not fought for money, and they have not fought for pay, but that should be no excuse to us not to do our duty, and for this country not to do its duty to them. I want this matter to be dealt with today in that spirit, to do justice and fair play to our men, to express our feelings of gratitude to them for the services they have rendered, and in every way, whatever we are going to do, to do it in the best spirit towards our men. Well, Sir, the hon. member for Illovo has placed certain figures before us as to what is done in other parts of the Commonwealth. I think that information is valuable, but I think we should go into the whole position more carefully. I should not like South Africa to lag behind other parts of the Commonwealth in her attitude towards the men who are saving her, and the great cause that we have at heart. I think those figures which the hon. member has placed before us should be gone into. He has given us certain figures about the rates of pay in Great Britain for British soldiers, and also in regard to some of the other Dominions. As I say, I think those figures should be carefuly gone into by us, so that our standard of treatment of our men should not fall below that of other parts of the Commonwealth. But there are certain peculiar features about our situation in South Africa which have to be borne in mind, and we have to look more at the final outcome of the way we deal with our soldiers than at any particular items of pay. True, the pay of a private is not very high. We start him, as an hon. member has said, with 3s. 6d. a day. Then to that is added proficiency pay of 6d. a day, and there are other increments, which follow in subsequent years of 4d. a day, so that practically all our men who have been serving in the field for any length of time in effect get not 3s. 6d. but 3s. 6d. plus an additional 6d. proficiency allowance, and a 4d. increment, which brings their pay up to 5s. a day. Beginners, of course, get only 3s. 6d., but after they have served for a period—it is not a long period in the army—they get 5s. a day, and that compares more than favourably with the pay of the British soldier. I do not take into account lodging allowances and ration allowances, because I agree that that is not really in the nature of pay. It is a method of reckoning which I do not take into account. I think we may take it that a soldier who has been serving for any length of time in our army, gets 5s. a day, and the same pay is given to our women. The rates for men and women have ben put on the same basis, and for coloureds, Indians and Malays, a certain fraction of that. I think five-sevenths has been settled as the amount to be paid to them. Then in addition to that, we have the allowance for dependants. We have thought it not a good arrangement to pay a large amount to men in the field, and to leave their families perhaps destitute. In many cases the families would be the principal sufferers, so our system allows for allowances to the dependants, to the family, to the children, and so on, and they come in on a certain scale. To those two sets of payments, that is the pay to soldiers and the pay to their dependants, there has now been added quite a substanital amount in cost of living allowances, which I believe is now in the neighbourhood of 16 per cent. or something like that. But what we do for our soldiers does not stop there. Whatever criticism one may level against the Governor-General’s Fund, when we consider what in effect is done for our soldiers, we have to take that fund into account, and if you take it into account then the situation alters very substantially, because under our National War Fund system, contributed as it is by voluntary contributions by the public, we have in effect this result, that a soldier’s family is guaranteed up to a standard. It was orginally £30, and I believe it is now £45.

Special cases.

In special cases they go further. I speak subject to correction, because I am not quite certain of the facts, but I believe that not only up to £30 but up to £40 or £45 a family is guaranteed its pre-war standard. The Governor-General’s Fund, in making its additional alowances, takes into account what allowance the Government has paid for the family, and they make up the difference. So in effect owing to the action of the Governor-General’s Fund, our soldiers, our privates, our non-commissioned officers, are practically guaranteed a living standard for their families equal to their pre-war standard, up to £40 or £45.

Forty-five pounds.

That alters the pitcure completely. If one accepts that figure of additional assistance which comes by way of allowance from the Governor-General’s Fund, the whole picture is altered, and then it may be found that our soldiers, in effect, are as well off, or at any rate not much behind the soldiers, from even the most advanced parts of the Commonwealth.

The Governor-General’s Fund does not apply to single men.

Naturally the dependants come in there. I agree, my hon. friend is right. The Governor-General’s Fund only takes into account dependants and allowances to dependants and keeps up their pre-war standard. It does not apply to single men. I think that has to be taken into account. I know there has been a great deal of talk about the Governor-General’s Fund being a charitable fund, and something which we should not tolerate in a country where we should regard our public duty to our soldiers, but I do not think that there is really much in that. It so happens that up to date the voluntary contributions that have come in to support the Governor-General’s Fund, have provided that fund amply with money. There has been no difficulty about that, but it must be borne in mind that the Government stands behind that fund. If that fund was not to get the voluntary contributions which would enable it to keep up the pre-war standard I have stated, the Government would step in and by way of its contributions see that the Governor-General’s Fund remains in the position to make these payments, and maintain the pre-war standard up to the level I have referred to.

Hear, hear.

So that although the voluntary effort of our public is great, and is most commendable, we are not going to rely merely on that if it should not be sufficient. As a last resort, the finances of this country will be behind that fund, and will see it through. From that point of view, hon. members and members of the public outside should stop this campaign which one so often finds in the country against the Governor-General’s Fund as being a charitable institution. It is not a charitable institution. It is a voluntary institution. People are really paying a tax to this country by voluntary subscriptions, but if those voluntary subscriptions do not amount to the figure that is required, the Government will step in and this House will be asked to vote moneys to supplement that amount, and supply what is required. The effect is this, that when we come to deal with the treatment of our soldiers, and their dependants, in this country, we have also to have regard to the assistance which they get not as a matter of charity, but as a matter of voluntary contribution, voluntary taxation, if I may call it that, or self-imposed taxation.

One section.

My hon. friend the member for Umbilo (Mr. Burnside) has pointed out that we treat the people in the civil service very handsomely. Public servants, men from the railway service and so on, are guaranteed a minimum of their existing pay, and in addition they get allowances for their families, so their position is in effect better. People must not get the impression outside from what is sometimes said, that we are ungenerous or that the Government is hard-hearted, and that we do not recognise by our treatment of these men, the magnificent service they have rendered to this country. At the same time, we have to bear in mind that the cost is a pretty heavy one considering the size of our army. I believe if you take our war Budget as in the neighbourhood of about £100,000,000, as it seems now to be, practically half of that goes in pay. If the total amount is taken at about £100,000,000 it will be found on an analysis of the figures, that probably £50,000,000 of that go in pay, so that even when we are talking of small increments in pay, the effect will be pretty considerable where the total amount already is so large. I want hon. members to bear that in mind, and I want them to bear in mind that whatever we do for the men we have to do for the women, and I want them to bear in mind that it is not merely the cost of the European soldier, male or female, but the cost of the coloured and the native that must come up for consideration also. That is if we are to go in for a fair deal, let it be a fair deal all round. The amount may, in the end, be quite considerable, but even so I agree that we should do what we can in order to keep up a proper standard of pay and allowances, a proper, fair standard of making provision for our men in the army, and their families. I should not like us to fall below the standard which has been laid down in the other great Dominions of our Commonwealth, and I am therefore going to propose an amendment. In that amendment I want the figures in regard to other parts of the Commonwealth to be gone into, so that we shall know where we are. I am not much influenced by what they do in America. I do not know whether my hon. friend’s information about America is quite correct. My information is somewhat different, but I do know this, that they do pay a very high rate to their soldiers in the United States. I have heard it mentioned, almost as a matter of complaint, in all those countries where American soldiers have to fight on foreign soil, that they are paid out of all proportion to their comrades who do the same work, incur the same risks and are paid much less. As I say, I am not so much impressed by the example or precedent of America. I shall be quite satisfied with a more modest performance of the British Commonwealth in that respect. These are figures we should go into, but I am convinced if we do we shall have to take into account also the contribution which is made by our Governor-General’s Fund towards family allowances. We shall have to take that into account, because I do not look upon it as a charitable matter. I look upon it as a voluntary obligation which the well-disposed people in this country have imposed on themselves and which, in effect, has the same effect on families as an additional allowance paid by the State. I therefore think that I should propose the amendment which I think my hon. friend the mover of the motion, will heartily agree to.

Another commission?

Yes. I move—

I second. Mr. Speaker, I think every one of us will welcome a Select Committee that will enable us to go thoroughly into a question which has been vexing the minds of most of us for a long time past. We have got to realise one thing, that we have not got a mercenary army. We have got an army of men who are not working for pay, and no pay, whatever heights we raise it to, can ever recompense these men for what they are giving, for what they have given in many cases in their magnificent efforts in the defence of South Africa. It is not a question of adequate remuneration for services rendered. You cannot look upon it in that way, because it is due to these men of ours, and the men from the rest of the Empire, and our allies, that today civilisation has been saved from complete shipwreck in this world. You cannot, in terms of money, make any payment to those many of who, as I say, have already given their lives in that cause. But I do think, and I do feel, that we want to remove pinpricks. We want to remove grievances and we want to feel that behind these men we are doing our utmost to see that not only are they getting the fairest treatment, the best treatment, the best of everything we can give them, but that their dependants are not left in want or are not suffering hardship while their breadwinner is away. It has already been stressed by the Prime Minister, and I also think that the question of dependants is the biggest thing in the whole of this question of pay. If those men in the North, or wherever they may be serving, are happy in the knowledge that there is no hardship being suffered by those they have left behind, then I think many grievances will fall away. There was one little point which I was interested to hear the Prime Minister mention. He said: “I take no account of rations and housing allowances.” That is very true, but very unfortunately the Commissioner for Inland Revenue is not of the same opinion as the Prime Minister. He does take account of ration and housing allowances, and I do heartily agree with the mover of this motion that it is little things like that which probably cause a lot of annoyance, and pinpricks of that nature which give rise to the discontent which we are told exists in regard to pay and allowances. There is one thing as far as the dependants are concerned, which we should realise, and that is the question of bringing up the allowances of those who remain behind, to the pre-war standard. That does not obtain in the majority of cases of men who are fighting in the army. This policy only started after Tobruk, when the Prime Minister appealed to the country to replace those men who were lost. So many men found they were unable to go, and it was then that the system of bringing up the dependants’ allowances to enable them to live on the same standard of life that they were doing before the beradwinner went away, really came into operation. I think we have to get in closer touch between our soldiers and the Governor-General’s Fund. I agree to the full that this criticism of that fund should drop, but I also say to the Government that I think they will have to come forward and supplement the funds with a State contribution. I do not think the funds will be enough to realise the objects for which that fund was started. I also think there should be closer liaison between that fund and the soldiers. At the present time those administering the fund wait for the soldier to apply to the fund, or for his dependants to apply. I do not think they should wait for that application. There should be some liaison whereby each man serving should be able, through his officer perhaps, to make representations to that fund, or perhaps liaison officers could be appointed to keep in touch with dependants and see that they are not in want of the necessities of life. We want closer touch, if I may say so, between the fund and those who benefit. There is a great difficulty with regard to those men who have been recruited in the country districts. There is not that contact between those they have left behind and the fund that there is with those who are living in the town, and are therefore able to, so to say, walk across a street to the offices of the Governor-General’s Fund in any of the larger towns. We want to get into the country, and give to those drawn from the rural areas the advantages which are being given to those who are drawn from the urban areas. As I say, that is not being done in most cases. In fact, I do not know of a single farmer who is serving whose family is getting an allowance which enables them to live on the same standard of life that they were doing before that man from the rural area signed up. I think that is a very big thing, and it seems to me that there lies one of our biggest works which this committee can do in regard to these people and the Governor-General’s Fund. I do also put in a word to the keeper of the purse, the Minister of Finance, that the actual basic pay that a soldier receives should not be included in his income tax return at all. It should not be looked on as income. Nobody is going to tell me a soldier’s pay is something he earns in the way of income to support his family. It is a token of recognition of services. Nobody can call 3s. 6d. per day, plus ration allowances, more than a token of recognition of services rendered. That income, which represents his army pay and allowances, should not be included for income tax purposes. I say nothing of his income which is accruing to him from investments or business or other interests which he has left behind. That he should pay in the ordinary manner as every citizen pays, but let us free him from the pin-pricks of a tax which is levied on that small amount which is paid to him by way of recognition of his services. I do not want to take up the time of the House to go too deeply into this question. The Select Committee no doubt will do that, and I do not think this is the time to make any suggestions. That can be done and will be done at the proper time and place. I have never had greater pleasure, in a long political career, than I have had in seconding this amendment, which I think will do so much to create contentment in our army.

Mr. Speaker, in the early part of this debate, the discussion was limited to rates of pay and allowances pay able to European soldiers. I was therefore very glad to hear the Rt. Hon. the Prime Minister say that he felt that the rates of pay for coloured and Native soldiers, as well as allowances, should also come under consideration. I was going to deal with what in my opinion are very grave anomalies in these rates at the present time, more particularly in respect of Native soldiers. I was going to deal with that in some detail, but the Rt. Hon. the Prime Minister in his amendment has suggested that the whole matter be investigated by a Select Committee. I personally think that this motion, together with the more general question covering coloured and Native pay, would be much better canvassed in a Select Committee consisting of all parties of this House in order to arrive at substantial justice, rather than for the evidence to be adduced and the issues fought out before this House. I just want to have it clear from the Prime Minister in view of what he said on the amendment, that this Committee will also consider the rate of payment of non-Europeans, including Native soldiers. I take it that is clear. There are, however, one or two points which I should mention, indicating the nature of the anomalies I have referred to, and they arise more particularly in regard to the discrimination which exists in the rates and allowances of coloured people as compared with those paid to Native soldiers. The mover of this motion has dealt with the European rates, so I need not repeat them. With regard to the Coloureds, they are 2s. 6d. per day for the soldier himself and 3s. 6d. in regard to his family, which makes altogether in the case of man with a wife and three children—seeing that half of the man’s pay goes to his family—£1 13s. 3d. per week for a family consisting of the mother and three children. Now, with regard to the Native soldier the figure is 1s. 6d. per day and 9d. per day for dependants. Half of the man’s 1s. 6d. goes to the dependants, so that a wife and three children would get 10s. 6d. per week as opposed to the coloured family’s £1 13s. 3d. Now, that is a very wide discrepancy, and that should be gone into. There is a disparity of 3 to 1. I am not contending that the coloured soldier who is risking his life for his country is getting too much. In fact I think the Select Committee should also consider whether the allowances for the coloured man and his wife and children should not be extended to include allowances for each child. As a general principle I think that the dependants’ allowances should vary according to the man’s responsibility, and I do not think any fairminded person can deny the justice of that. As I have said the disparity between the pay and allowances of your Coloured family and your Native family works out at 3 to 1. That disparity does not exist in any other branches of our life in this country. Take the farmers. Take the coloured man employed in the Western Province—his wage is from 2s. 6d. to 3s. per day, and the wage of the Native in those parts is much the same. And on the Railways, the pay of the coloured man and the Native is exactly the same. The pay of all non-Europeans is on the same basis except for the marriage allowances recently given to Coloured workers. I am not discussing the question of the adequacy of that pay now. And the same thing applies in our industrial concerns. If the same kind of work is done by a Coloured man and by a Native the pay is the same and must be the same under the Industrial legislation of this country.

How can you say that?

I am talking of industry now.

It is not so in certain parts of the country.

Well, so far as I know it is the case everywhere—at any rate it is so in this part of the country. It seems therefore that we have this extraordinary position, that whereas there is a disparity of 3 to 1 in the Army, these disparities do not exist in ordinary life. It is not only a grave injustice but it is a serious anomaly, and I think the Select Committee should have the opportunity of dealing with that aspect of the matter. They should also have the opportunity of dealing with pay and allowances as compared with pensions. The Native soldier who is killed—his family gets more by way of pension than he got by way of military pay, whereas the general position with pensions is that only a proportion of the general pay is paid by way of pension. This is so in our industrial legislation, for instance in workmen’s compensation. There are a number of other points which I could bring to the notice of the Prime Minister and this House, but I think the more important points have been referred to and I think they should be investigated. I take it that the Select Committee will go into the position of the non-Europeans, including the Natives soldiers.

I heartily welcome the amendment of the Prime Minister that this question of soldiers’ pay be referred to a Select Committee of this House because I agree it would be a great pity from every point of view if this question were dragged into the arena of party politics. It is a question in which we are all very much interested, it is a question which has been exercising the minds of a great many people, and I am certain that a Select Committee on the lines suggested will go a long way towards removing many of the grievances which exist. At the same time there are certain difficulties which I am not altogether certain will be covered by the Select Committee, and which it may be necessary and advisable to bring to the notice of this House. The hon. member for Cape Eastern (Mr. Molteno) has spoken of some of the difficulties which exist in regard to the differences of pay between coloured and native troops, particularly in regard to the allowances of dependants, and I also would like to urge very much on the Select Committee, whoever they may be, that it is essential that this matter should have their consideration. It may not be easy for them to find points of comparison with what is done in other Dominions in the British Commonwealth in regard to coloured troops, but it is a question which I am certain should receive serious consideration. Now, quite apart from the rates of pay which are paid, there is one question which I think has loomed very largely in the public eye, and has caused a great deal of concern, and that is that the whole of our pay system is far too complicated, and one of the first things which should be done in order to alleviate the situation would be a simplification of our pay system. Now, I am well aware that this is a very difficult problem and that it bristles with difficulties when you try to tackle it. I know also that there is certainly no unanimity of opinion among those who concern themselves with pay and the high pundits of the army are very divided as to the best means of arriving at the proper conclusion—the best means of tackling the job. However, high you raise your basic pay, and try to do away with extra duty allowances, proficiency pay, etc., it has generally been the experience in all armies that it is impossible not to have extra pay for extra duties, and not to have proficiency pay. Unless there are these special allowances for special jobs the general concensus of opinion seems to be that you will not get the people to qualify for these specialised jobs, if the rates of pay in every direction are the same. Now I know that this is a very difficult problem, a problem which we have endeavoured to tackle from different angles before. So far I have not heard of any successful means of accomplishing what we want to do. But there can be no question about it, that this very complicated system we have and the very diversity of pay rates makes for a very difficult state of affairs which might well be simplified. And then there are those anomalies of which the hon. member for Umbilo (Mr. Burnside) spoke, where you have this peculiar position that your C.3 men, or C.1 men in various parts of the Union are in receipt of higher rates of pay than your A.l men in the fighting line. I know it has always been part and parcel of any defence scheme that artisan rates of pay are always higher than anyone else’s rates of pay. That has always been accepted as a natural carollary. At the same time there seems to be something lacking if such a position of affairs is possible. I think there again there are opportunities for simplification of the present state of affairs, which I feel would have a very good effect on the general position.

Do you want the artisan rates to be reduced?

No, I don’t say that, but I say that there should not be such a great disparity between the pay of the men who are fighting and the pay of the men, who though they are doing a good job, are not doing the same work as the men who are in the fighting lines. Now I want to deal with some of the difficulties that exist. One of the great difficulties which I think should be remedied, and I don’t know whether it will come within the scope of the Select Committee when it sits, is this, that there are many cases where soldiers do not get, or claim that they do not get the rates of pay to which they are entitled. Of course, I know that there are deductions and so on. There are many difficulties, I know, and one difficulty is that our army is run under permanent force regulations, and that we are trying to run our army on peace time conditions which are not applicable to, or not suitable to war-time conditions. That is one of our greatest difficulties. There is no elasticity in your permanent force regulations. There is no possibility of meeting exceptional circumstances which should be met, because it is laid down that such and such forms must be followed, and it takes a very brave officer to depart from the book.

When the proceedings were interrupted by the adjournment, I was endeavouring to make the point that one of the great difficulties in dealing with this question was the fact that the army operated under Permanent Force regulations which had been drawn up to meet peace-time conditions, and in many respects these are not applicable to war-time conditions. I was pointing out that there was nothing like enough elasticity or that there was nothing like enough opportunity for initiative under the prescribed regulation. I could give the House many instances of it, but I shall not weary the House by so doing. I can say that I remember on one occasion when I was endeavouring to deal with one matter as I thought it should be dealt with, that I received a letter from the Fortress Commander that he was surprised that an officer of my standing should make such a suggestion; did I not know that the regulations prescribed that this and this must be done? That is what is known in the army as a “raspberry”. I got many “raspberries” in the army. I think it is not generally appreciated that one of the great difficulties is that ours is merely an army of amateur soldiers. They are not professional full-time soldiers. They are amateurs who have become full-time soldiers in order to do a job of work. The great bulk of them are quite capable of commissioned rank, and they are well able to appreciate the duties demanded by their jobs. But they are under these irksome restrictions which militate against efficiency. The national corollary to Permanent Force regulations is the military discipline code, the M.D.C., as it is known. Well, I could write books on the subject of the M.D.C., but I will not weary the House by doing so. All that I wish to convey in regard to the M.D.C. is that amongst the many penalties that there are, there are deductions from pay. The point that I am endeavouring to make is that although the rates of pay are not very handsome, it is but rarely that the soldier gets the rate of pay which is laid down in the book. The other day I heard a very good description of the M.D.C. I know my hon. friend the Minister of Labour will appreciate that description. It was said by a legal luminary of high standing, and referring to the M.D.C. he described it very aptly as the Factory Act in uniform. A happier description of an unhappy object I cannot conceive. If is full of penalties that every soldier has to put up with, and the penalty nearly always carries with it a deduction of pay. The M.D.C. deals also with the loss of public property by neglect. I may tell you that there is a great diversion of opinion as to how a lost article should be described. There is great difficulty in describing the article lost. It may be public property, clothing, regimental necessaries or equipment. I remember on one occasion a highly trained legal gentleman told me to describe a pair of pants as public property. I said I did not think I could do so. But this illustrates the difficulties one meets under the M.D.C. A soldier is put on stoppage of pay until he has made good the value of articles lost by neglect. When you come to this question of articles lost by neglect, then at once you come to a very difficult point indeed in order to establish whether the soldier was neglectful, and how far he should be given a free issue of what he has lost, or whether he should be made to pay for it. Well, if the officer who is trying the case is a man who thinks for himself, he will probably say that the neglect in this particular case is not very well substantiated and he will say: “I will authorise a free issue for the soldier”; but in that case he will probably find that later he is surcharged for the article, and in a short space of time he becomes very dubious about doing this, and then the soldier has to pay for it. Let me tell the House what happened to a South African sailor. His ship unfortunately was sunk by enemy action. Fortunately he was rescued, but he lost all his kit, and amongst other things he lost his dentures in the excitement of the battle. He was issued a free issue of all his kit, but he was told that he must pay for his dentures. I cannot for the life of me see how it is possible to draw such a distinction when a man was shipwrecked and was eventually saved from the sea. But that was definitely the ruling in regard to this boy’s pay. He had to make good the value of his dentures.

Teeth are now public property.

Yes, you might almost describe it as public property. I am just telling the House some of the peculiar things that happen under these stoppages of pay in respect of the loss of clothing or public property by neglect. This is the sort of thing I am endeavouring to save. I am afraid that we are not covered by the terms of reference of the Select Committee. I am anxious to see that these rates of pay laid down for the soldier, shall be available for the soldier and that these irksome and stupid restrictions laid down in the M.D.C. should be properly reorganised. Let me say there is no one who is a greater stickler for discipline than I am. I am not suggesting that discipline should be lightened in such a way that the soldier is not going to be under rigid discipline, but I do say that we want a little common sense and a little more reason brought into our military machine. I repeat that ours is an amateur army of soldiers. They are not professional soldiers. They are not peacetime soldiers. They are amateur soldiers under active service conditions and I suggest that the code which is drawn up under peacetime conditions does not meet wartime conditions. Although it is necessary that the Select Committee should go into these questions which the Prime Minister has asked for, I am endeavouring to make it apparent that they will not cover the whole ground. They will not get rid of a lot of the irksome restrictions from which we suffer. I am asking that in addition to that, we might have an investigation into matters of this sort, which I am quite certain will help a great deal. Another point is this. I think it is not generally understood that in the natural course of events it takes a long time before any stoppages of pay are reflected in the soldier’s pay sheet. It takes a long time before the soldier is called upon to pay any arreas that may accrue, because the army has a habit of suddenly altering the whole system. The whole system is suddenly altered, a course which may be good from their point of view, but not from the point of view of the unfortunate paymaster, and the result is that these items are not put on the pay sheet until a considerable time has elapsed. And the man who thinks that his pay book reflects the money due to him suddenly finds that there is a long outstanding debit against him which he is called upon to pay. I am rather afraid that the Select Committee which will have to investigate the difference in the rates of pay in the various Dominions with our rates of pay, will not be able to find a panacea for all ills. But these other matters must also be taken into consideration. I plead again for a complete simplification of our pay methods. It should not be beyond the powers of our military staff to find out some other method which will simplify the position and make it possible to have a much easier system than we have now. I ask for the simplification of the military Discipline Code and I ask that consideration will be given to the fact that ours is not a professional army, that ours is a voluntary army, and I am sure that if that is done a great many of the difficulties which we have to contend with at the moment will disappear.

I was particularly glad to hear the Prime Minister say this morning that he wanted this motion to be considered in a spirit of justice and fair-play because it is to that sense of justice and fair-play of the House and of the Prime Minister that I want to commend the points which I desire to raise. I, too, am not at all sure, however, that the terms of reference of the Select Committee which has been suggested by the Prime Minister will deal with the matters which I want to raise, and therefore I want to draw the attention now of the potential Select Committee to those points, so that if possible they will consider them. As the House is aware, we have large numbers of women in the army—and there is a pressing need for more. I do not propose going into the discrepancies of pay as between men and women soldiers, except to say that the discrepancies are much larger than they are in civilian life as between men and women doing the same work, and that I want to get an assurance from the Prime Minister that the Select Committee will have the right and the power to investigate those discrepancies between the pay of women soldiers and men soldiers and between the pay of men officers and women officers, with a view to levelling up the pay of women soldiers to something more approximating the pay of the men. But the real point which has greatly concerned me, and indeed has aroused the ire of women throughout the country is that the dependants’ allowances which were granted last year for the dependants of women soldiers are on a considerably lower basis than they are for the dependants of men soldiers. May I be allowed to give a practical illustration. If a man soldier has a wife and four children, he makes an allotment of half his pay, then the Government allows 4s. 6d. for the wife and 1s. per each child, so if he has a wife and four children the allotment she gets from the Government, apart from his contribution, is 8s. 6d. plus cost of living allowance. But if the woman soldier who joins should perchance have an invalid husband she is only allowed 2s. 6d. for the husband and if she has four children as well, the maximum allowance is 5s. per day irrespective of the number of dependants. Now, sir, I have yet to learn that the dependants of a woman soldier, the children of a woman soldier, need less clothing, less food and have less need of good shelter than the dependants of a man soldier, and I must say that in the woman’s army this differentiation and discrimination against the women soldiers in the army have aroused the ire of the women—there is no single action indeed of the Government which has aroused such a sense of bitterness and injustice in the women soldiers as this discrimination against the dependants she has; and for my part I must confess that I am totally in sympathy with her on that particular point, because unlike the Ministry of Defence, I am well aware that the cost of feeding children is the cost of feeding children, no matter who has to support them. We have heard eulogistic comments made of the magnificent services the women are rendering, and of the fine work the women are doing in the army, but I feel very bitter when I hear those comments to think that when an occasion does arise, when the Government might show their sense of appreciation of what the women soldiers have done, that particular occasion should have been used to discriminate against the women soldiers, and to make them feel that in the eyes of the Government the children and dependants whom they support are of less value than the children a man soldier is supporting. And so I am very anxious to have an assurance from the Prime Minister that this matter will be investigated and remedied. I hope it can be remedied by the Select Committee which is going to be appointed. It is a matter of very considerable importance because I for one feel that all these eulogies and thanks which the woman soldier is getting for doing no more than her plain duty is being overdone. I don’t think the woman soldier needs thanks for doing her duty to her country, but what I do think she does need, just like the man soldier, is that simple justice and that simple sense of fairplay for which the Prime Minister has asked this morning, and it is in the spirit of fairplay and justice that I hope the Select Committee will investigate this matter of allowances for the dependants of women soldiers as well as the discrepancies in the rates of pay which I have mentioned. Further, there is another point which I also wish to raise. As the House is aware for a wife and children to get an allotment from the Government, it is necessary for the soldier to make an allotment of half his pay. Now, the soldier is under our regulations at liberty arbitrarily to cancel that allotment. If he chooses, for no reason whatever, he may simply cancel the allotment which he makes to his wife and dependant children, and the result of that cancellation is that the Government allotment to the wife and children automatically falls away, with the result that if the soldier whether justly or otherwise decides to cancel the allotment she and the children are at once left destitute because the army allotment falls away. Now that is a system which causes enormous hardship, and in most instances undeserved hardship. In civil life no man is at liberty simply to refuse to support his wife—because if a man refuses to support his wife and children she has the right to go to the courts and the courts will compel him to support her and the children. But in the army he need give no reason—he can simply cancel the allotment.

There is an appeal.

Yes, there is an appeal, I know, but the point I am trying to make is that the moment the soldier cancels his allotment the army allotment falls away and she at once becomes destitute until the appeal is heard. That seems most unreasonable and unfair. These are the points on which I would like an assurance from the Prime Minister that the Select Committee will have power to deal. And I should also like an assurance that these points will be considered in the proper spirit, in the spirit of justice and fairness. I want an assurance that these matters too, as well as the rest of the questions of army pay and allowance, will be examined in a sense and spirit of fairplay and justice to the women of this country, as well as to the men.

It gives me great pleasure to support the amendment put forward by the Prime Minister in connection with an increase of pay to the men serving in our forces, and I feel sure that when the Select Committee brings forward its report it will have the wholehearted support of the members of this House. Comparison has been made today regarding the pay of the American forces and the pay of our own forces. I feel that perhaps it is not necessary for us to compare the pay granted to the American troops with the pay given to our troops, as every country grants pay according to the conditions and cost of living in that country. I have been in contact with very many men in the army and I assure the House that many of them have serious complaints. I speak feelingly on this matter because in the last war I was a private and I knew then what it was to live on a private’s pay. I can assure this House that many men who have done excellent work up North are finding things very difficult when they return here on a private’s pay. It is true that many have been in the desert where there has been very little chance for them to spend their pay or to enjoy life, but I do feel that when they get back here on leave they deserve some enjoyment as compensation for all the things they have been through, and it is essential that we should see that they get a square deal. The Prime Minister has pointed out that when we take the Governor-General’s Fund into consideration the position is not so bad. That is so, but as has been pointed out here, that fund only applies to those men who held jobs or positions before the war, and in addition have dependants. It has been pointed out that many of the men were quite young when they joined the army—having just left school—and therefore are unable to obtain assistance from the Governor-General’s Fund. I should like the Select Committee to consider this question of pay from two or three aspects. I feel that if the Committee finds that an increase in pay is warranted, as I am sure they will find, then I would make a suggestion to the Select Committee that they should consider the advisability of recommending that a percentage of that increase in pay should be placed to the soldier’s credit, so that when he is demobilised he may have a fund available—a small bank balance—to set him on the road again. I would like the Select Committee to consider this seriously, because although we do know that when a man leaves the army he is provided, I think, with a suit of clothes and one or two other items, it is necessary for him to have in addition a bank balance to put him on his feet again. I heartily agree that a man who has volunteered to give up his life to defend his country should not be taxed on his reward—let us call it reward and not pay. I feel, however, that a private and an officer should be treated alike. Therefore, I respectfuly recommend to the Minister of Finance that when considering this matter from an income tax point of view it might be thought advisable to reduce the actual income of a serving soldier by an amount equal to the minimum pay paid to a private—whether he be an officer or a private—and thereafter simply tax the difference. There is a feeling among the men that officers score every time, and I do suggest that if consideration is given to this suggestion then the minimum pay granted to a private should be deducted from the income of all soldiers before arriving at their taxable income. This would not result in any great loss to the Exchequer. Many of the men serving are actually only in receipt of their army pay, and therefore the loss would not be great as in most cases they do not pay tax at the present time. If it is a question of money—that money must be found in exactly the same way as men and materials must and will be found if we are to bring this war to a successful conclusion.

In 1941 I ventured to inflict a short homily on this House on the subject of soldiers’ pay. Remembering the weakness of human memory I saved the best bit till the end, and the very last sentence I made use of was that the minimum pay for a South African soldier should be £1 per day. I am very sorry indeed to say that, when I originally suggested that, I did not subsequently receive a nice little note from the Minister of Finance thanking me for my kind and courteous suggestion—and, worse still, he did not carry it out—but I am entirely unrepentant and of the same opinion still, I am still hoping—

And you had better go on hoping.

Hope, like silence, is golden; but an issue of the hon. Minister’s silver would be of more use to the soldiers. I have been asked to be very brief and I shall be, because I am very conscious of and very loyal to what is the twofold duty of a Parliamentary backbencher; which appears to be to say little or nothing throughout the Session, in order to help on the business of the House; and to remember not to write to Ministers of the Crown during the Recess, because they are then far too busy (at whatever they are busy at!) to attend to any mere Member of this Assembly. But I must raise one or two points because I am very far from being reassured at the attitude taken up by the Prime Minister on this question. I don’t like the Minister’s plan meanwhile to leave the matter as it is. We are going to have a Select Committee—we shall undoubtedly have a report from that Select Committee, and then what else shall we have for the soldiers? It is all very well to say, as the hon. and respected member for East Griqualand (Mr. Gilson) said, that ours is not a mercenary army, that our soldiers are not fighting for pay. That is quite true, but that is all the more reason why we should treat them absolutely fairly. I don’t like arguments built up on facts turned the other way round. If anyone is going to make anything out of this war in the way of money or property it should be the soldier, and sometimes it appears to me that he is the only one who is not doing anything of the kind.

But the Parliamentary soldier does.

I shall come to that if members wish. The suggestion is that I have made something out of it. I have denied that before and I am prepared to disprove the suggestion at any place that hon. members may choose. There was one valuable point made by the hon. member for Griqualand East and that had regard to the Governor-General’s Fund. He did most wisely make the suggestion that it should not be a matter of the soldiers’ dependants approaching the Fund, but rather that the Fund should be charged with approaching the soldiers’ dependants; in other words, that it should act as a sort of sub-department of the State and be responsible for keeping lists and maintaining contact with these people. To ask these soldiers’ dependants to leave their homes and go and interview people they don’t know, and who in some cases may not want to know them, and to wait here, and to explain there, creates the flavour of charity to which the soldiers’ dependants object, and to which we also object. And I cannot agree with the complacency with which the Prime Minister referred to the fact that we are now, by the assistance of the Governor-General’s Fund, keeping the standard of living of the soldiers’ dependants on the pre-war level. That would be very nice if the pre-war standard had been in all cases high, but in many cases it was not high, but low; in many cases it was not very far from the starvation border; and it is not right, in my opinion, during this time of war, and while a bread-winner fights, to conserve that position. We have no right to keep in existence a condition of affairs which is a disgrace to civilisation. And that applies to many of the Europeans who joined, and it applies to practically every native who has joined. Their wives and children are suffering great hardships in very many instances. My correspondence is large on this subject, and I have no doubt that the Prime Minister’s correspondence will also grow, unless something on a comprehensive scale is done. I shall leave the matters dealt with by the hon. member for Umbilo (Mr. Burnside), except to say that I am unable to understand or to imagine what guided the people who first said that the soldier who carries the provisions into the battle area should get 6s. 6d. per day, and the man who fights with the bayonet should get 3s. 6d. Surely the man who takes his bayonet in his hand should be the highest paid soldier in any army, but he is not. That is what I have sometimes indelicately referred to as “cockeyed.” It is entirely wrong. The 6s. 6d. is not adequate, so what can the 3s. 6d. be? And this 3s. 6d. per day for the unmarried man, who is quite likely a skilled mechanic, earning £40 a month in civilian life, or a successful business man—3s. 9d. or 5s. even—£5 5s. a month—what can he do with it? A change in this regard is going to have its effect on recruiting. We are wanting other men for further service. I travelled a little while ago with one of the best men I ever met. He was a cheery First Divisioner, on leave, and he said he did not give his wife half of his wages by way of an allowance, because it was no good giving her the money and then taking it back from her again. This man claimed that he was not particularly extravagant, but that his expenses taken by and large, whether he was in Cape Town or Cairo or Mersa Matruh, averaged out at 4 to 5 pounds per month—that was for his very simple wants. And I submit it is not enough. It never was enough. It increasingly becomes less sufficient, and it must be made more. Well, now we are setting up a Select Committee, to enquire into and to consider figures which have been available for months and years. The figures are known to us all. The average pay, even if we are paying our bayonet-carrying soldier 5s. a day, is less than what other countries pay—the average pay by the Dominions is 8s. 6d. per day. The Select Committee will find that out. That is at least 50 per cent. more than what our men receive, whereas I assert that there are no soldiers in the world who deserve more than ours. When we look at the campaigns of the past two or three years, and see how much land has been lost by the Allied Nations and how little has been won,—and if we then look at British Somaliland, and Eritrea, and Abyssinia, we are more than proud of the exploits of the South African troops. If we based their pay on the land that they have taken if, they were paid by the acre, or the square mile, of captured territory, we feel they would be receiving not 8s. a day, or even 8s. 6d. They would be getting £8! All our soldiers, women and men, are worth very much more than they are receiving; they are entitled to more. And I am going to quote three lines out of a letter which I received today—it is topical news—

That is an extract from a letter from Corpl. E. Green. It is typical of a widespread discontent, a justifiable discontent which must be remedied.

The hon. member for Sea Point (Mr. Abbott) has come to this House with the reputation of being a new member sent specially to voice the case of the soldier. I think he has to be congratulated on the sensible and moderate and clear way in which he made his maiden speech, and helped to put the case of the soldier before the House. Particularly do I endorse one suggestion he made, and that is this, that if we are going to increase the basic pay of our soldiers—and I am certain we are going to do it—whether we should follow the example of Australia and place either the whole or portion of that increase into the form of deferred pay. Treat it in this way, that at least 1s. per day of the increase is dealt with as deferred pay and given to the soldier at the end of his service. Not in the form in which it is done today as a small bonus of £5 but a very considerable nest egg which he has accumulated throughout the period of his service. My hope is that the Select Committee will recommend and that the Government will accept an increase in the basic pay—I am only speaking of basic pay—of from 3s. 6d. to 5s., and that at least 1s. of that, if not the whole, should be treated as deferred pay and be due by the State to the soldier at the end of his service. I listened also to the hon. member for Jeppe (Mrs. Bertha Solomon) and to her very just plea on behalf of the women soldiers. I want to tell the House that when the hon. member for George (Mr. Werth) and the hon. member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge) and I were visiting a number of military camps, as we did, we found the most acute grievance on the part of women soldiers to be this, that in the workshops, the workshops at Roberts Heights and elsewhere, women mechanics were employed at 3s. 6d. per day. That is the basic rate for women soldiers. These women work at the bench for something like eight hours a day, and a mile or two away in the Government ammunition factory in Pretoria, they are getting up to £17 and £18 a month. Down at Vereeniging the women who are making bombs at Stewarts & Lloyds are earning at least £17 to £18 a month. These women, simply because they are women soldiers, are getting just the same rate of pay as any unskilled woman soldier in the army. I say this quite definitely to the Minister, that in my experience for the last six months—I think my colleagues will agree with me—that that was the grievance felt most acutely by women soldiers in the army. Another thing that is almost an intolerable grievance is the point raised by the mover of this motion, the fact that the State charges income tax to its soldiers on their lodging and ration allowance. Now, sir, it is fundamental in every army that when you recruit the soldier the State undertakes to provide him with lodging and food and uniform; that is part of the soldier’s pay. The State lodges him, feeds him and clothes him, and why, through a purely artificial concept the State should now say, as it does in this war—I doubt if it did in the last war—to the private soldier, “Well, we are going to charge you 2s. a day for your rations, 1s. a day for your lodging, and we are going to treat that as your income, and we are going to make you pay income tax upon it. That seems to me to be a petty and cheeseparing attitude to take up. I say this to the Minister, although I disagree with the hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson) in the matter of income tax for soldiers as a whole, there can be no question that it is wrong and a source of extraordinary irritation for our soldiers that their lodging and ration allowance should be brought up as part of their income. If they are to pay on these allowances, why not on uniform? Why not say, “We give you boots, uniform and blankets, and we will charge you income tax on that as well.” I hope the Minister will agree, if necessary, to amending legislation, so that in future these allowances are not to be treated as part of the soldier’s income tax. A plea was made by the hon. member for Griqualand East that in future all soldiers’ pay should be exempt from income tax. I do not feel that I can support that plea, I do not think it is a just one. My hon. friend says, “Treat the 3s. 6d. a day as exempt and do not charge income tax upon it.” The answer to that is perfectly simple. If all the soldier gets is 3s. 6d. a day, he does not pay income tax because it never reaches the statutory limit of £250, but if in fact that is added to other sources of income and it goes above £250, then quite rightly he pays income tax along with the rest of the community. I know of no community inside the Empire, in fact I know of no community at all which exempts soldiers’ pay as such. Australia recently announced that there would be no tax on soldiers’ pay up to a limit of £250. That is de facto the position in South Africa, because nobody whose income is below £250 pays income tax at all. Therefore, sir, in fact the position today so far as income tax is concerned, is that no soldier pays income tax unless his income exceeds £250, and then he pays it in common with the rest of the community. If you were to suddenly exempt this particular form of income, you would create a very bad precedent. The way our tax system is arranged is that everybody pays on whatever his income may be, and from whatever source it comes once he passes the £250 limit, and on no other basis can I think we could arrange the finances of this country. I go back to what I said, that it is ungenerous and unfair to treat the rations you give a soldier, and the lodgings you give him in a tent or in a hut, as taxable income. I am certain the Minister of Finance will consider that matter, and will alter it. There is this other question when the Prime Minister moved his amendment this morning, and I read the terms of it, I was uncertain as to whether this Committee that is to be constituted in conducting its investigations, will be able to take into account the very material differences in taxation that exist between this country and others. The Committee will be invited to compare South African rates with Australia, Canada, New Zealand and Great Britain. It must not be forgotten that each of these countries has its own scheme of taxation of income. I think I must say without fear of contradiction, that in each of these countries the rates of taxation are very much higher than in this country. Do hon. members know—I am speaking now subject to correction—because if ever there was a changeable thing it is this taxation, but every soldier in New Zealand in common with the rest of the country, pays a defence tax of 5 per cent. on all income over and above his ordinary income tax. They have the ordinary income tax the same as we have, only steeper, and then in addition to that, they have this defence tax. The same thing applies in Canada. But there I think there is an abatement.

Do the soldiers pay that?

I have not had time to look that up, but I believe the soldiers do, although I am not certain. In Canada there is a defence tax, but I think it only commences above the income tax limit. In New Zealand there is no limit and everybody pays a 5 per cent. defence tax on his whole income. The Committee will have to investigate that. The same in Australia. I don’t know whether they have got as far as the defence tax as yet, but their income tax limitation is low, and the rate is high. England has an income tax of 10s. in the £. There is a slight abatement; it does not commence at zero, but somewhere near £200.

One hundred and thirty pounds.

I thank the Minister, £130, and above that they commence to pay at the rate of 10s. in the £.

Not immediately.

I should correct that. They eventually reach 10s. in the £. All I am anxious is that the Committee, in comparing what we pay our soldiers with what they pay in other countries, must keep in mind that there is this difference in the rate of taxation. In England an officer getting £500 a year would get that with the one hand, and pay 10s. in the £ with the other, on his whole taxable income, whatever that may be. We are much more generous in this country, and that difference should not be lost sight of when this Committee commences its investigations. Finally, Sir, there is one other matter that is troubling me, and that is whether this time limit for the Committee to the end of February really can be attained, whether this investigation can be completed within that time. I am inclined to say to the Minister of Finance who, I take it, is representing the Prime Minister, that as soon as this motion is passed and it becomes known throughout the country that this Committee has been called into being, this House will be flooded with applications from organisations who wish to give evidence on behalf of the soldiers, and who wish to put special cases like the ones I have mentioned about the women artisans, before the Committee. I do think the Minister might consider extending the time to March 15th, and give a fair opportunity to the whole country to come before the Committee.

As a member of the Committee of the Governor-General’s National War Fund I wish to express my sincere thanks to the Prime Minister for what he has said about that fund. Many people speak about charity so far as that fund is concerned, but the position is that certain people have voluntarily undertaken the task of rendering assistance to our people who have gone on active service. Not one of the people who have undertaken that task will shirk their duties so far as that work is concerned. I am therefore gratified at what the Government has done in regard to this fund and also at what it still intends doing. The hon. member for Griqualand East (Mr. Gilson) has told us that the farming population don’t derive very many benefits from that fund. I have made it my duty as far as possible to go into questions concerning our farmers, and I should be pleased if members who experience any difficulties would first of all investigate matters before coming here and making public statements which tend to harm the fund. I am pleased that the Prime Minister has told us that this matter is going to be referred to a Select Committee for enquiry and report, and I hope that the deputation from the Governor-General’s National War Fund will also be allowed to give evidence before that Committee. The amount which we contribute to the pay of our soldiers is a very large one. I wish to quote a few figures and it will surprise hon. members to hear how the pay of our soldiers compares with that of other countries. I am not speaking of the unmarried soldier. I think all of us recognise that his position is a very difficult one. I am comparing the position of a soldier with a wife and two children with the position of a similar soldier in other countries. In the United States the total allowances to such a soldier amount to £18. The Canadian soldier, if his income before the war was £30, gets £17 5s.: the Australian gets £15 11s. 6d. and the New Zealanders £12 3s. 11d. Those are the total allowances which these people get for their wives and children. In South Africa the soldier who has his own home gets a total amount of £25. That amount is more than what the soldiers in other countries get. If the man used to live in a boarding-house, he gets £20, which is also more than what is paid in other countries. Take the case of a wife with three children. If the average earnings before the war were £30, that woman in the United States gets £20 10s.; in Canada £20 8s. 7d.; in Australia £17 10s., and in New Zealand £14 odd, and in South Africa, if she has her own home, £25 14s., and if she lives in a boarding-house £21 10s. I should add that the Governor-General’s Fund pays an allowance of £10 if she has her own home and £6 17s. if she has not got her own home. This shows the large contribution which the Governor-General’s Fund makes to the pay of our soldiers. I want to express the hope that when any matters concerning the pay of our soldiers are discussed nothing will be said here detrimentally to affect that fund. We have large numbers of voluntary workers, men as well as women, who are rendering yeoman service to make a success of the fund, and who do everything in their power to satisfy our soldiers. The fund should receive every possible consideration, and the people handling it should be given every opportunity of giving evidence before the Select Committee.

Mr. Speaker, with other members of the House, I would like to express appreciation of the Prime Minister’s action in calling into being this Select Committee to deal with this question of army pay, but I must express regret that the terms of reference do not include the investigation of anomalies that exist in almost every branch of the service. As stated by the hon. member for Port Elizabeth we started off this war, and unfortunately the powers that be attempted to run it, from the pay point of view, on the same lines as the permanent force. In other words, the permanent force rates of pay, and we have reached the stage today where the most serious anomalies are revealed, and those anomalies are causing a very great measure of dissatisfaction among the fighting forces. Sir, I am afraid that if they are not rectified in the very near future, those members of the Government who are associated with the defence of the country, are going to find themselves faced with a problem that is going to be very difficult to unravel. Now, what are some of these anomalies? Taking the broad aspect, one may safely say that the nearer the man is to the front line, the lower is his pay. That can be traced through almost every arm of the service. If we make a comparison of two men signing on, one joins the infantry and one the medical service. The infantryman qualifies as a machine gunner or a bayonet fighter, and goes through all the various departments of infantry training, and at the end of ten or eleven months, he reaches the front line. That man is paid 3s. 6d. a day. His friend goes into the medical corps, and after five or six months qualifies as a trained male nurse, and is posted to the Springfield Hospital in Durban to attend to sick soldiers. A very laudable job. He is paid 5s. a day. Now, is the man in the front line going to be satisfied very much longer with that grossly unfair and unjust state of affairs? I could go on for a long time, but there is one very serious case that I know of that I must draw the attention of the Minister to, and I must say, at this juncture, that if the Minister does not tackle this question of anomalies very soon, he is going to find himself in a most unhappy position. Take one case of which I have practical knowledge. Eighteen months ago the country was very short of recruits for the South African Engineering Corps. The authorities went right through the combatant units in this country, and combed them for men who were artisans in whatever branch they were trained in. After a matter of twelve or eighteen months, they found they had a very great surplus of engineers and could not absorb them. Other units had a shortage, and these engineers who were surplus were taken and turned into different forms of combatant units. At Potchefstroom today, you have the amazing position of an artillery regiment consisting of men who signed on as artillerymen, at the 3s. 6d. rate of pay. Fifty yards from them, you have a South African Engineering Corps turned into an artillery unit doing identically the same work, getting the same training, and getting 6s. a day, rising during the course of his training to 10s. a day. You can’t imagine how the artilleryman feels on his 3s. 6d., when he knows the engineer turned into artilleryman alongside is getting from 6s. to 10s. That is serious enough, but what happens when they go on service, and men are transferred from one unit to another. Men go from one battery to another to replace casualties and so on, and it is actually the case today that you have them serving together in the same unit and the same rank whose pay ranges from 3s. 6d. to 10s. a day. How long do you think this is going to last, Mr. Speaker? I do not wish to labour the point, but you can go right through the South African Military services, and you will find equivalent anomalies from start to finish. May I take the case of a man sitting in a comfortable base job, a motor driver or something. That man gets an allowance as a transport driver of 6d. or 9d. a day, according to rank. That individual finds himself transferred to a tank corps, forming part of a reconnaisance unit, in Libya, or wherever they may be fortunate enough to go. He is suddenly put into an armoured fighting vehicle with the most advanced troops, but he loses his allowance and goes back to 3s. 6d. a day, how long will he put up with that? It is amazing the patience that has been exhibited by our troops, who are showing their loyalty in the face of these anomalies? I may tell the Minister that if he does not get off his present perch, he is going to be knocked off, it is not going to last. I wish to raise one other point very briefly, which strikes me as being nothing less than a public scandal. We have something like 12,000 men who are prisoners of war in Italy. I know the Minister of Finance and everybody else feels just as sorry for them as I do, but I saw in one of our local newspapers this morning an advertisement appealing for funds. The prisoners in camps are receiving each week a food parcel weighing ten lbs. from the British Red Cross. Now, sir, we are not feeding these men, and it is the bounden duty of this Government to make sure that the British Red Cross people who are in a position to provide these food parcels, receive a full and complete subsidy from the Government to enable them to do this work. These men would have to be fed if they were with us, and they now appear to be dependent upon public subscription for additional food and comforts while they are in enemy hands. I think, without a shadow of doubt, everybody in the House, including our friends on the other side, would vote solidly for a motion ensuring that the British Red Cross had sufficient funds to send every South African in enemy hands as much food as they are allowed to receive, I would ask the Minister to take that matter very seriously, and let no time elapse before these things are put right.

It is done.

If it is done, why these appeals for funds, why do people pay for an eighth of a front page in a newspaper in order to appeal for £7,000 a month for this purpose. If it is done, as the Minister says, why not tell the people in charge of this particular fund that we do not need this £7,000 a month. We should not have to appeal to the public at all, as this is the bounden duty of the Government. I hope the Minister will not waste another day in seeing to this matter.

Whether the Select Committee proposed by the Prime Minister is an adequate and satisfactory step at the present time depends upon whether the Government will act upon its report. But I am prepared to accept the position that it intends to, and I see no purpose in traversing. They are matters into which the Committee will enquire. As I understand the terms of reference of the Select Committee, it has to take into account in its calculations the fact that the Governor-General’s Fund bears a responsibility towards soldiers’ dependants, but the Select Committee is not called upon to make any enquiries into the working of the fund itself. That fund is a subject one criticises with some reluctance, because it is fulfilling what, in the view of very many people, is a national responsibility. If that is so, one ought to do nothing calculated in any degree to jeopardise the good work of that fund, but at the same time if the Governor-General’s Fund is fulfilling a national responsibility, it must in turn enjoy the complete confidence of the public and in particular of those who seek assistance at its hands. There are two general criticisms of the Governor-General’s Fund. One is that it savours somewhat of charity. I do not want to embark upon a discussion of the fund from that angle. But I think it can be said as a fact that in the working of the fund there is a good deal of discontent suffered by those whose misfortune it is to have to go to that fund. I don’t for a moment believe that there is anything inherently wrong in the set up of this large organisation. I am perfectly satisfied that defects can be remedied, but I believe that the administration of the fund is very short of what it ought to be. I should like to see the scope of this proposed Committee expanded so as to permit of an enquiry into the administration of the fund, with a view to discovering just what it is that makes dependants who are obliged to go to the fund come away in many cases thoroughly disgruntled. It is perfectly true that the fund is administered by a very responsible executive. That rather tends to suggest that the weakness lies somewhere in the administration, possibly in the Provincial Committees. I want to add a word arising out of the fact that so much emphasis has been laid by those who have spoken of figures, upon the importance of the basic rate of pay. I think that we are on surer ground when we deal with children’s allowances because, while it is difficult to enunciate a principle which ought to apply universally in regard to the basic pay, in regard to children’s allowances there is the clear and definable principle which must apply, and that is that the soldier should receive not less than what it actually costs to maintain a child. The present allowance of 1s. per day was never intended to be a token payment; it was intended to be remuneration to the parent to enable him to maintain that child, and it does not take much calculation to know that you cannot maintain a child on 1s. a day. A soldier’s wife, in a very pertinent letter to the Press in Durban, said the other day that it cost her 1s. 9d. a day to maintain her dog at the S.P.C.A. home. She thought that that was perfectly reasonable. She did not quarrel with that. But what she did quarrel with was that she was expected to maintain a child on 1s. a day. One hopes that the Select Committee will accept the principle that a soldier is entitled, in respect of his children and dependants, to an allowance which will be sufficient to enable him to come out on it, and that any other standard will be a false one.

I think the House is grateful to the hon. member for Illovo (Mr. Marwick) for giving us this opportunity of ventilating the grievances of soldiers in regard to their pay. Personally, I have not heard many grievances from the soldiers themselves, but as one who comes into contact with recruits on a very large scale, I can say this, that our rates of pay have had a very great influence on our recruiting, particularly when we try to obtain recruits for our fighting units. The first thing that most recruits want to know is what the rate of pay is going to be, particularly in regard to certain units where they feel they would like to serve, and as soon as they learn that the rate of pay is 3s. 6d. a day and that they can get a much higher rate of pay by joining a non-combatant force or the Air Force, they immediately go to the Air Force. The Rt. Hon. the Prime Minister has pointed out that the Governor-General’s Fund assists the recruit to get his pay brought up to practically the same pay that he receives in civilian life. That is perfectly correct, and there is no doubt that since the fall of Tobruk the fact that the Governor-General’s Fund announced that it was prepared to make up the difference in the salaries of men earning up to £45 a month, less certain expenses which are ordinarily incurred in civilian life, had the effect of doubling recruiting. That proves conclusively that with adequate pay we will continue to get a good supply of men for our armed forces. I am also extremely pleased that the Rt. Hon. the Prime Minister said this morning that the Government is standing solidly behind the Governor-General’s Fund, and that there would never be a shortfall in the amount necessary to carry on the purposes of the fund. I think that is the most important statement which he has made so far, but I would have liked him to go even further and say that the time has arrived when the Government realises that in order to encourage donations to the Governor-General’s Fund it would contribute on a pro rata basis, and secondly that those who made contributions to the Governor-General’s Fund will receive some abatement of income tax on the amount so contributed. If that were done, very much larger contributions would come into the Governor-General’s Fund, and the Governor-General’s Fund would never have to look for money. The hon. member for Jeppe (Mrs. Bertha Solomon) referred to some of the difficulties under which women suffer in regard to allowances, particularly dependent allowances. I would also like to point out an instance which retards our recruiting of women, and that is in regard to the women who are asked to do the most irksome task of all—that is transport driving. They are also paid at the basic rate of 3s. 6d. a day. They are employed at great personal risk sometimes, and if anything happens to the vehicles which they drive, they are charged for the damage and it is actually deducted from their pay. They only receive 3s. 6d. a day and yet other girls, no better, doing ordinary clerical jobs, almost automatically gets non-commissioned rank and consequently higher pay. I think that is an anomaly that should be removed, but I do not envy the Select Committee appointed to carry out this task. This is a task which simply bristles with difficulties and it is going to require some financial genius to solve all the problems, which will be brought to the notice of the committee. I cannot see how a solution can be found which will please everybody, but I do hope that the Government will be able subsequently to take some steps to bring a more equitable pay-system into being. I also want to make a final appeal to the hon. Minister and to the Select Committee which will be appointed, to consider once again the possibility of giving dependants allowances for non-Europeans. It is a scandal, to my mind, that a non-European, particularly a coloured woman, should receive 3s. 6d. a day whether she has one, two, three or ten children. Then one also finds that certain coloured men can join the naval services and get European rates of pay and dependant allowances. One can understand the feeling of the ordinary coloured soldier in the ranks when he knows that this happens. I am glad that the Prime Minister has announced that the Select Committee will consider the pay question in all its aspects; in other words, that no increase of pay can be given to a European without giving it also to the non-European; in other words, a guarantee of a fair deal to all sections.

On most points that have been raised I feel that I can associate myself with the hon. member for Illovo (Mr. Marwick), but so far as his reference to the treatment of American troops is concerned, I do not know what the position is there—we have to take into account the financial position of this country, but I fail to understand why the Prime Minister, after three and a half years of war, now wants to appoint a Select Committee to enquire into the question as to what pay our soldiers should get. Speaking for myself personally I feel that if a soldier fights for his country it is the country’s duty to see to it that he is properly fed and properly paid, and after the war is over he must be looked after, and if it should so happen that the soldier gives his life, the wives and children of the people who have fallen in the battle should be looked after. I also agree with the hon. member for Springs (Mr. Sutter) who remarked that there is too much charity today in regard to this question. The Red Cross collects for prisoners of war in the camps in Italy, and it has been stated that it is costing £3 3s. per month for every prisoner of war. I feel that it is the Government’s duty to ensure that the prisoners of war are properly fed. I do not know what provision is made in International Law, but I feel that it is the Government’s duty to ensure that they are properly fed. The Prime Minister said that the Select Committee would have to go into the pay of these people, and he also said that the Government accepts responsibility for the Governor-General’s Fund which is looked upon by the public as a charitable affair, at any rate that is how it is regarded by a very large section of the public. If the Government accepts financial responsibility, why then does not the Government take over the fund; why does it not take over the control? Because we are given to understand that there have been many irregularities in regard to the fund. There is one matter which is causing great dissatisfaction, and that is that Civil Servants, members of the Railway Service and others, get half their salary when they join up, and then they get the ordinary 3s. 6d. or 4s. a day. Others who were not in the Public Service, however, only get 3s. 6d., 4s. or 5s., and this gives rise to considerable dissatisfaction. Government officials and people who used to be employed in large business concerns, and who perhaps get one quarter of their salaries when they join up, may be getting as much as £50 per month, while another soldier only gets about £10. This is causing considerable dissatisfaction. A soldier is paid 3s. 6d., but I understand that farmers in the Western Province pay their coloured labourers 4s. 6d. to pack fruit. I think it is the Government’s duty to pay the soldiers properly for the work they do, and that it is their duty to see to it that the soldiers get adequate pensions, and also to look after their wives and children.

I want to endorse everything which the hon. member for Springs (Mr. Sutter) said in regard to the prisoners of war. I think it is not right that there should be an appeal to charity to provide the necessary food for our men who are kept as prisoners in enemy hands. I think we have a right to demand that the Government of this country should shoulder the responsibility of looking after our boys there. Another point to which I would like to draw the attention of the hon. Minister is the fact that there is frequently a great deal of confusion in regard to the work which the Red Cross is doing today. There are often complications in the instructions given to parents and relatives. One week you are told that you can send a parcel every three months and the next week you are told that you can send a parcel every month. One week you are told that the parcel must not weigh more than 2 lbs. and the next week you are told that it must not weigh more than 10 lbs., and I wish that some uniformity could be arrived at before parents are instructed to send the parcels. I am speaking from experience. Another point is the question of the man’s pay. I have met many men from the front. As regards family men, I have not had one word of complaint. I have only heard complaints from single men, and I think the Select Committee will be well advised to consider the case of the single man who only draws the basic pay. Then there is the matter of Pension Boards. Many men discharged from the army feel that there is a very long delay before they come to the Pension Board, and they labour under the disadvantage that they sometimes have to wait for months before they are called before the Pension Board; and if the Minister can do anything to expedite this matter so that these men can be brought before the Pension Board at the earliest opportunity, it will be greatly appreciated by the men who are serving.

I would like to touch on an aspect of the question which should appeal to every serving officer, and that is the effect upon the man who is serving in the front line when he hears that there is anxiety at home due to the fact that there is not sufficient money to meet the needs of his family. A man is allowed to contribute two-thirds of his basic pay to his family, and his wife gets 4s. 6d. a day, and 1s. a day is paid in respect of each child. So that if the man has a wife and two children his family will receive £13 5s. a month, plus a cost-of-living allowance, amounting to £2 2s., making a total of £15 7s. If the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Defence really understand the conditions in the large towns where these men are recruited, they will realise that on £15 a month this family is going to experience tremendous difficulty in making ends meet. In the first place there is the difficulty of housing. The family finds that no hotel will take the children in, no flat owner will give them a flat and no landlord will allow them to rent a house because there are two children in the family, and the consequence is that these people are sent from pillar to post, and all this is costing them money. Eventually they end up somewhere where the conditions are not ideal. All these troubles are reported to the soldier at the front, and the effect on his efficiency and morale is really prodigious. An officer told me that if his men and non-commissioned officers could be relieved of all this anxiety, it would increase their efficiency by 50 per cent. If you can increase the efficiency of our soldier by 50 per cent. by expending a sum of money on his dependants, then you are helping to create an army which will be the envy of the world and the bugbear of the enemy. It is a peculiar comment upon the situation that his family would be in a better position if he is killed in action. His wife will then get £132 pension, his children will each get £30 and in addition there would be a gratuity of £220. I really think that this is an absurd anomaly, that a man while he is serving is of less use to his family than if he is dead, and I certainly think that when a man is actually serving, his basic pay and family allowance should bear some resemblance to a comfortable mode of living. I hope that nothing will influence the Minister to extend the time or the scope of the Committee’s enquiries. This matter of pay for soldiers is one requiring immediate attention, not attention in three or six months, but attention during this Session. The matter is urgent and it is one that must be tackled as soon as possible, and I hope that the Committee will be in a position to report by the end of February and that the Government, within three weeks, will carry out what I hope will be the recommendation of the Committee in regard to the allowances for the dependants of soldiers.

I think the House is indebted to the hon. member for Illovo (Mr. Marwick) for bringing forward this motion, because it has enabled us to bring to the attention of the Government some cases of which they were apparently not aware, and it is to be hoped that the army machinery will be overhauled to meet present-day conditions. It is somewhat alarming to hear some of the anomalies which exist, and if the Government is made aware of all the criticisms that are made throughout South Africa, not only so far as soldiers are concerned, but their dependants as well—criticism of the army headquarters in South Africa—I think it will be agreed that some drastic change is necessary. You will remember during the early stages of the war the chaotic state in which the Pay Department got. There is a feeling today that the army is in a similar condition and that something should be done to overhaul the entire machinery governing the army today. This is an army that will be going out of Africa and conditions will get worse. It is interesting to hear from the Prime Minister that the Government will be prepared to subsidise the Governor-General’s Fund. I have had a certain amount to do with the Governor-General’s Fund. I have had to represent quite a large number of cases to the Fund, and I must say that I have experienced no difficulty whatsoever with the people who are in control at the various centres. I make bold to say that the Governor-General’s Fund has carried out a difficult task under great difficulties, but they are endeavouring to meet the position. When the right people deal with the cases, they should have no difficulty in getting reasonable relief from the Governor-General’s Fund. But, sir, there is a Committee which is appointed by the Government and which is attached to the various headquarters and centres of the Governor-General’s Fund, and it seems to me that it is the Committee appointed by the Government that has caused most of the distress and trouble that women experience when they make application to this fund. I merely say that in passing, because I am convinced that the Governor-General’s Fund has played its part well in South Africa, and now that the Government is prepared to help it financially, most of its troubles should be over. I do agree with the suggestion put forward that if the Government will pay a £ for every £ subscribed, that they may get as much money as they require on a voluntary basis. The Prime Minister has agreed to appoint a Select Committee to deal with the motion of the hon. member for Illovo; but we have had Select Committees in this House to deal with a large number of matters, and it has not always been too satisfactory. The country is of opinion that something must be done for the soldier. A large number of soldiers will be remaining in South Africa for some considerable time, one would imagine, until such time as another expeditionary force is sent out of the country, and they will be watching Parliament to see if these anomalies are going to be removed. I think that if the Select Committee reports at the end of the month, it should give them ample time to consider the whole position and to see what can be done to adjust the rates of pay and to make them more favourable. I would have liked to hear the Rt. Hon. the Prime Minister say that he is not concerned actually with the other British Dominions, that South Africa can afford to pay the soldiers a little more than the other Dominions pay. That would have been a very welcome statement and a step in the right direction. I want to impress upon the Government that something must be done for the soldiers, more than is being done at the present time. It is almost criminal to allow these anomalies to continue. I have stated in this House before, and I make no apology for repeating it, that South Africa belongs to the soldiers who fought for it and who are going to defend it. Surely they are entitled to the very best that can be got for them. Unless that machinery is brought into being immediately to cope with these men, I can see very serious trouble ahead for any Government that happens to be in power when they return, and I would suggest that this Select Committee should be given the power to make recommendations for postwar conditions, so that our troops may come back to the happiness to which they are entitled; and I say once again that most of their troubles are financial troubles, and financial troubles should never be allowed to worry any man who is defending his country. We look forward, when the Select Committee reports, to the report being adopted by the Government and we hope that the Government will say: “We are going to see to it that the soldiers get a fair deal.”

I want to associate myself with those members who have stressed the necessity of equalising the rates of pay between men in the field and those who are employed as artisans; and I do hope that when this matter comes before the Select Committee, the whole question of administration will be considered. It is no good comparing our rates of pay with the pay in other Dominions, if we do not take into consideration how the other Dominions administer the policy of their armies. As regards leave, pay, allotments etcertera. There is no doubt that the officers in our army have not had adequate training as regards administration. There are all kinds of erros in administration which create dissatisfaction and tend to lower the morale of the men in the field. Even as regards uniforms, the uniforms of the men in the field are not satisfactory. They do not feel as smart as the troops of other dominions. I do not want to delay this debate any longer but I do hope that the Select Committee will pay special regard to all matters affecting our forces.

I am grateful to the Prime Minister for his amendment, which I gladly accept. I am sure it will be received with gratification by the soldiers throughout the Union. I only hope the Minister of Finance may find it possible to serve on the Select Committee. I am sure his presence there would be an earnest of the serious interest of the Government and would result in bringing to fruition the hopes of our soldiers in regard to pay. I think the Prime Minister has done well to mention the subject of the Governor-General’s Fund, and to try to get a better working arrangement between the fund and the soldier. I think there has been a certain amount of complaint on the part of soldiers dependants, and I think if we were able to secure the presence before the Select Committee of Mr. Justice Feetham, whose devotion to the cause of the Governor-General’s Fund has been outstanding, that would be a guarantee that whatever he brought before the Committee would have great weight. I trust the amendment will be adopted forthwith.

Amendment put and agreed to.

Motion, as amended, put and agreed to, viz.—

I move—

Mr. Speaker, if the Minister would be so good as to say that he is prepared to accept this motion, I will satisfy myself merely by moving it.

No.

I think that this motion will appeal to members on both sides of the House. My object in moving it is to remove an anomaly which exists in the South Africa Act, which discriminates between members of both Houses of Parliament, and members of the Provincial Council, to the disadvantage of the members of the Houses of Parliament. It is laid down in the South Africa Act that members of either Houses of Parliament shall be incapable of being chosen or of sitting as a member of the Other House, but this does not apply to members of the Provincial Council. It is difficult to understand what induced the framers of the Act to introduce an anomaly of this kind. The South Africa Act is not like the laws of the Medes and Persians, because it has been altered in some respects, I think with advantage, and it is quite capable of being altered again. I fail to see what difficulty can arise in making this alteration, or what objection can be raised to a simple amendment of this nature. Members of the Provincial Council may retain their seats, while up for election to one of the Houses of Parliament, and it is quite easy, sir, to see that a case may arise where a Provincial Councillor might be in a position to vote for himself. In the last election one candidate was a member of this House, and had to resign. The other candidate was a member of the Provincial Council, who had not to resign his seat, and therefore was in a position to vote for himself. It it not difficult to imagine that a case might arise where the supporters of candidates were evenly divided, and where the vote of the Provincial Councillor might decide that he himself is the man who should go to the Senate. I believe some such case did arise some years ago. If I remember rightly, there was a case in which a certain individual called from his party was put as a candidate for the Senate, and his vote decided the issue.

[Mr. Bowker seconded the motion.]

At 4.10 p.m. (while Col. Wares was addressing the House), the business under consideration was interruped by Mr. Speaker in accordance with the Sessional Order adopted on the 28th January, 1943, and Standing Order No. 26 (1), and the debate was adjourned; to be resumed on 19th February.

The House thereupon proceed to the consideration of Government business.

I move—

This motion is rendered necessary by virtue of the terms of Section 48 of Act 13 of 1928. In terms of that section, when the Pharmacy Board considers that certain substances should be added to the Fourth Schedule of the Act, substances which are named poisons, the Board’s resolution has to be submitted to the Medical Council for concurrence and then to the Department of Public Health. And, if the proposals are approved, it is necessary to bring those proposals, by way of resolution, before both Houses of Parliament. Now, Sir, the Pharmacy Board has considered that the items set forth in this resolution should be added to the schedule. These are substances which are sold by chemists at the present time. I do not propose to take up the time of the House in reading them, because they are set forth in the resolution, but if this resolution is passed, then in terms of Section 55 (c) of the Act it will not be permissible for any chemist to sell any of these substances to a member of the public without entering, at the time of the sale, details regarding the sale, the name of the purchaser, and the signature of the purchaser in a book called the “poisons book.” Furthermore, the chemist, the seller, will not be permitted to sell any one of these substances unless the purchaser is personally known to him, or is identified by someone known to him. In other words, the adding of any particular poison and its compound to the first division of the Fourth Schedule, is a measure taken in the interests of public safety, a matter of public policy, and only those substances are so added which it is considered by both the Pharmacy Board and the Medical Council require to be so controlled in the interests of the public generally. As the matter stands at present, indiscriminate sales of these drugs may take place. Their indiscriminate sale and use is permissible under the law as it stands at present, anyone may sell them as they are not scheduled poisons, and even such a precaution as the labelling of the bottle or the container, with the word “poison” is not required. This resolution is to rectify that state of affairs.

I move—

Mr. Speaker, the main purpose of this small Bill is to simplify the procedure laid down by Statute in regard to the registration at the present day of births which took place some time ago. Under our existing legislation, namely, Act No. 17 of 1923, the registration of births and deaths is compulsory. Prior to that Act there was a lack of uniformity in the practice in the various provinces, and it was not in fact until 1894 in the case of the Cape and Natal, 1906 in the case of the Transvaal, and 1902 in the Orange Free State, that there were any provisions at all relating to the registration of births and deaths. The result is that there are thousands of persons in the Union whose births have not been registered. In earlier days the use of birth certificates was not as widespread as it is at present. Birth certificates have become of increasing importance in the everyday life of the community. One requires a birth certificate for insurance, for instance, and for entering the Public Service, and they are no doubt required on many occasions for entering into business or professional occupations. In the case of school children, birth certificates are essential, and also, I understand, in all matters relating to soldiers and their dependants. If birth certificates can readily be obtained—they can be readily obtained where births have been registered, but if not, then the provisions of Section 6 of the Births, Marriages and Deaths Registration Act of 1923 have to be applied. Section 6 provides that no birth or death can be registered after the expiry of one year from the date of such birth or death, except upon the written authority of the Registrar and on payment of the prescribed fee. There is a proviso which says that after the expiry of a period of ten years from the date of the birth or death, as the case may be, no such registration shall be effective except upon the order of the court. It will be seen, therefore, that in terms of Section 6 of the Act, births may be registered up to a year after the date of birth. Thereafter, up to ten years after the date, they may be registered upon the written authority of the Registrar, of course upon payment of the prescribed fee. If any Union national born 30, 40 or 50 years ago wishes now to have his birth registered, because of failure to register at the time, then, sir, he must move the court for an order granting him permission to have the birth registered. That procedure is one which involves costs. It is quite a costly procedure in order to get what in many places is a mere formality. Cases have arisen frequently where applications to the courts have to be made, there are probably very many persons who would like to have their births registered, but are unable to do so or unwilling to do so because of the costs involved. If the Registrar of Births and Deaths is authorised under the existing law to register births up to a period of ten years after the birth, there seems to be no logical reason, no solid ground, for not permitting him to register births subsequently. Before the Registrar gives his authority he has to have the clearest proof of the facts of the birth, and of the circumstances relating to the particular application. The sort of information that will have to be furnished to the Registrar of Births and Deaths, would be the information that would be required in an application to the Supreme Court. In view of these circumstances, it is felt advisable, and is a matter of convenience to the public and a saving of cost to amend Section 6, and hon. members will see that the proposal now is to omit the proviso to Section 6. The result of that will be that in future the Registrar of Births and Deaths may be authorised to register if he sees good reason for so doing. I would emphasise that the Registrar will only act after most careful consideration, and there does not appear to be any danger whatever that the amendment proposed under this clause will lead to any abuse. Clause 1 provides the main reason for the introduction in the Bill, but opportunity has been taken to deal with two other minor matters. Section 2 amends Section 8 of the principal Act by the insertion before the words “in law” the words “this Act or”. The effect of that will be this. In terms of Section 8 of the Act the Registrar is empowered to insert a name in a registration of a birth, which may not have been given at the time of registration. Frequently parents wish to have the full names of their children registered, arid Section 8 entitled the Registrar to insert the full name. Section 7 entitles the Registrar to make alterations in the names on a registration. Then Section 7 also provides for the rectification of an omission of the name whether registered prior to or since the Act of 1923 came into force, but Section 8 only provides for registration prior to the Act of 1923. Finally, sir, Section 3 has been inserted to meet the convenience of the public. At present, in terms of the law it is not permissible to issue an order for the removal of a body from a certain area, except with the consent of the District Registrar, or the assistant District Registrar. These officials are generally not available on Sundays or holidays, and persons who want an order do not usually know where such officials live, but they can easily ascertain the whereabouts of the police station, and this provision is now being inserted to enable the spirit of the Act to be carried out without any resulting inconvenience to the public generally. There may be occasions where it is impossible to find the proper official, and considerable inconvenience may result. It is now proposed to meet that by permitting the officer in charge of a police station to grant such an order. Thereafter, that officer must make a report to the Registrar. There is no room for any abuse there, and I think hon. members will agree with me that this is a reasonable provision to meet the convenience of the public. These are the simple provisions of the small Bill, which I commend to the House.

I move—

This Bill deals with disciplinary cases of teachers in schools falling under the Union Department of Education; that is to say, particularly vocational schools. As hon. members know, the teachers in those schools are not public servants, they are in the same position as teachers in schools under the Provincial Councils, they do not come under Public Service Acts. In 1928, however, a law was passed by this House in regard to schools which dealt with the status and rights of teachers in those schools. In the main, so far as this aspect of the matter is concerned, the Public Service Act as it existed at that time was followed; in other words, the Public Service Act of 1923. In certain respects, however, the terms of the Public Service Act were not followed, the object being to make the procedure less cumbersome. In the meantime since 1928 amendments were made in the Public Service Act in this respect, and the Act was made more effective. Our law as it reads today, however, is still on the same lines as the Public Service Act of 1923 and it was not amended when the Public Service Act was amended. The main object of this Bill before the House is to make Clause 12 of the Act of 1928 conform to the Public Service Act as it reads today in view of defects which we have found to exist in the procedure laid down in cases where charges are made against teachers in regard to misconduct. At the same time the opportunity is taken to amend Clause 11 of the existing law. Clause 11 of the Act of 1928 contains a definition of misconduct. In the main the definition of the 1923 Act has been followed. In 1938, however, a further paragraph was added to the Public Service Act, that is to say in the Act of 1923, and what we are now proposing is to insert that paragraph also in regard to vocational schools. But the main object is contained in Clause 2 of the Bill. If it were not for that we would not have introduced this Bill.

Why don’t you leave out the first clause then?

It is of minor importance but were are inserting it merely to make our law conform with the Public Service Act. Clause 2 replaces the existing Clause 12 of the 1928 Act by a new clause. I repeat what I have said; in the 1928 Act we followed the wording of the Public Service Act as it read at the time, but we have made it less cumbersome. It was found that the Act as it exists today is not quite fair to teachers. In the Act as it reads today there is for instance no proper provision for the trial of a teacher who is accused of an offence.

Who brings the charge?

He is charged by the Department. If the Department charges him with misconduct the provisions for his trial in the existing law are not adequate, but what is more important is this. In the existing Act certain rules are laid down for his trial, but those rules are inadequate. The practice is that if a charge is made an officer is appointed to hear the trial, and under the existing law, if the officer reports, there is no appeal, not even to the Minister. The matter is disposed of. Last year there was the case of a teacher having been charged in accordance with the terms of the Act. An investigation was made. He wanted to appeal to the Minister, and although officials can appeal to the Minister and their appeal can be heard, the Minister cannot hear an appeal in the case of a teacher who teaches in a special school, because the law makes no provision for the hearing of such an appeal. For that reason, and that is the main object of the Bill, we propose taking over the provisions of the Public Service Act for our vocational schools. It is definitely in the interest of the teachers, and it assures them of a fair trial, and it places the procedure as a whole on a better basis than it was before.

The main objection I have to this Bill is to Clause 1. I just want to say that that clause is called the “barbed wire provision.” The clause reads as follows:—

There is a similar regulation in regard to the police. I am convinced that more than 75 per cent. of the charges that are made against the police are made under such a regulation and it usually is a question of what an individual may think about it—the officer who is appointed to hear the charge against the constable. In ninety out of a hundred cases he is guilty before the case is finished. It is so wide a clause that it covers practically anything. For instance, if I talk politics, I can be charged under that particular clause. If I say anything in class which is considered to be in conflict with discipline, or which may be detrimental to the amendment, I can be charged. There is not a single matter in connection with which a teacher cannot be prosecuted if somebody is determined to get him out of his job,—he can be brought up and charged for anything he says or does under this particular clause. Even a teacher who in the opinion of the principal of a school isn’t sufficiently capable may be charged under this clause. I want to appeal to the Minister to withdraw this clause. I know what it has led to in the Police Force where they have a similar regulation. I had the case of a policeman who remarked that Japan had a strong Navy, and that we had to be careful of Japan. For saying that he was charged, found guilty and fined £1. The position has developed to such an extent that one may be charged at any time and with any offence—one never knows when one is going to get into trouble. That is why this clause is called the barbed wire clause, and now the Minister also wants to introduce it for school teachers. Surely we don’t want to turn those people into slaves. If they commit an offence, I shall be the first to say that they shall be punished, but now they are not going to be brought before a court of law, they are going to be brought before a man who is going to be appointed by the Department, before a man who has had no legal training and who knows nothing about legal matters. A man like that has to try a case in exactly the same way as was done in the police. The Chief of Police who may know all about the charge and who has probably given authority for the bringing of the charge, is the man who has to sit there and judge, without his having the slightest idea of procedure. They don’t know what procedure to follow, they do not know how to lead evidence. In the past attempts have often been made to get school children to testify against a teacher. That sort of thing may happen again. We have had this alleged professor Eli du Plessis and we know what happened there. I am glad that the Government had got rid of this man.

They got rid of him to appoint a worse one.

I have no objection to discipline. I have served for twenty-five years on Councils which select teachers and which had to deal with school matters, and I know those people. As a rule the teachers are people one can trust. Occasionally one gets a bad type, but they are exceptions to the rule, and now the Minister wants to place the teachers in the same position as the police. A policeman never knows when he is going to be dismissed because this particular regulation may be invoked against him at any time. If a complaint is made against him he is in danger of being dismissed, and now the proposal is to put the teacher in the same position. Somebody lays a complaint that the teacher has done something to the detriment of the management, or of the discipline in the school, and it is left to the judgment of a man who has had no legal training to decide what has to be done to the teacher. For the slightest thing a charge may be brought against the teacher. He may be charged for instance with having undermined the morale of the school, in other words he may be charged with being a bad teacher. He is brought before a man appointed by the Department. The English text of this clause is very much clearer than the Afrikaans. It says this—

What does that mean? How is a person who has had no legal training to judge on a question like that? And then it goes on to say—

It becomes very easy now to bring a charge against a teacher. I shall be able to bring a charge at any time under this provision. Why are these people to be treated like slaves? Why are they always to live in fear of a charge being made against them? A school teacher is not allowed to open his mouth, he is not allowed to say a word because somebody may charge him with talking politics. This clause is only going to get teachers into trouble. The man is not allowed to express an opinion because if he does he runs the risk …

That is not the object at all. I am quite prepared to drop the clause.

Thank you, I am very pleased. But now I want to go a little further and I want to discuss the mode of appeal. A teacher is charged and he is brought before an officer who has been appointed to try him. The officer is an official in the Department. The teacher has the right to appeal within a certain period of time if he is dissatisfied with the result of his trial. He can appeal to the Minister. The Minister receives the record of the complaint as it has been framed, he does not hear the school teacher, he is simply given the report by the Department. The trial may not have been a fair one, but once the Minister gives his decision the matter is disposed of. The teacher is not given the right to look for justice in a court of law. I feel that the Minister’s sense of justice will induce him to accept an amendment so that the man will be entitled, if he is not satisfied with the Minister’s decision, to appeal to court. I think that any reasonable person, any person who does not stand for oppression, any person who wants right and justice to be done, will agree that an appeal should be provided for. I know the Minister wants to be fair. If he is prepared to be fair then he should give an accused person the right to go to a higher court. If he is not prepared to do that then he must not blame us if we think that he wants to take up the attitude of a dictator and that he does not want to give such an individual that opportunity. So far as the Minister personally is concerned I take it that he will try to be fair and just. He does not want to treat people unfairly, but the Minister will not always be here, and he will realise that we feel that some other Minister may take his place, a Minister in whose hands we will not want to place the fate of an individual who may differ from him politically for instance. We know that we already have a state of affairs where people are sometimes even afraid of our courts. We already feel that justice is not always done in our courts.

The hon. member must not pursue that point.

If that is the position the Minister cannot blame us for being afraid of placing so much power into his hand. I therefore ask him to give the man the opportunity of going to court.

I am very suspicious about this Bill in the way we have it before us. The Minister may have other intentions, but the question immediately arises why at this very time a Bill of this kind should be placed before us. There is not the slightest doubt that especially of late there has been a tremendous demand on the part of a certain political party for steps to be taken against teachers. Whether we want to admit it or not this Bill makes us on this side of the House feel that it is the result of the investigations made by this so-called Prof. Du Plessis, and that it has been introduced at the request of the Congress of the United Party. We are afraid that the result of this Bill will be nothing but a political smelling out of certain teachers because they express their views simply as Afrikaners. If they express their feelings as Afrikaners it will be interpreted as politics. I know that in my own constituency one of the prominent school principals has been slandered and called a Nazi by an anonymous correspondent, with the result that a campaign was started against him. Fortunately even the Fusionists in the town were indignant about the agitation, and today this man has been appointed as a principal of one of the biggest schools in the South-West. But if under this Bill an official is appointed whose views differ from those against whom a charge has been made, what is the result going to be? I therefore see a grave danger in this Bill. What is going to be regarded as a contravention of the Act and what not?

It is laid down in the Bill.

If a complaint is laid for instance that a man has not done his work properly, or that he has said things which he should not have said, and he is brought before an official who is hostile, what is his position going to be? A leading article appeared in one of the Government papers in which a fuss was made because a teacher had instructed the pupils in his class to write an essay on the subject of freedom. It was described as a political affair. Under this Bill people will be able to indulge in political prosecutions. But there are a few other points which may give cause to terrible injustice. First of all I want to express my agreement with what the hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. S. E. Warren) has said about a teacher’s future being at stake if a charge is brought against him. An official in the department is appointed to investigate the matter, that official has no legal knowledge and does not possess the necessary qualifications to act as a judge. He has to make an enquiry. All of us have seen in the past what that may lead to. All of us know that every question has two sides, and a matter may be represented in a onesided manner and a totally different impression may be created than what is justified by the circumstances. A one-sided report is handed in, and as a result of that report the man is suspended from service. But secondly, I want to ask what the position is going to be in regard to the witnesses who give evidence against a man who is charged? First of all there is the man who makes the charge, but there is further the danger that for the sake of political victimisation children may be used to give evidence. We have had experience of that sort of thing. The teacher’s life may be turned into a hell on earth. He may not have any evil intentions whatsoever, but he may be accused of having talked politics because his principal or somebody else had a grievance against him and statements may be made by children having no foundation at all. Possibly the child may not deliberately distort anything that has happened, but we know what may happen if children have to give evidence. Say ten or twelve children have to give evidence against a teacher. The Minister of the Interior himself at the Party Congress of the other side a year ago encouraged parents and children making charges before the secret commissions, which according to the Minister of the Interior, have been set up in every little town and dorp. This may result in a process of smelling out of the teachers. The Minister of the Interior made an appeal to parents and children in future to take active steps and to bring in whatever information they have. The Bill appears to me to be nothing but the outcome of that agitation. Now let us look at Clause (5)—

We know that some teachers have already been interned and in terms of this Bill a teacher will not be entitled to any salary whether he is guilty or not. The Minister a few days ago in reply to a question I put to him stated that there are people who have been detained already for seven months and four days without any trial, and this clause provides that they will not be entitled to any salary in such circumstances. Now I come to Clause 2 (10) which deals with the giving of evidence. What is the object of that clause? All I can see in that clause is an attempt to provide for a political smelling out. Information has to be secured from children and on that information a judgment is to be formed, whether the teacher is guilty or not. Let me just show how false such evidence can be. I feel that the Minister himself realises how wrong the impression which may be caused in the minds of the children may be. An experiment has been made. A certain professor made an arrangement with another professor that while the former was engaged in his class the other one would come in and say a few words, after which they would start quarrelling and fighting. After that he would get the students to write an essay about what had happened. Out of the thirty five students not two produced the same report, in regard to the beginning of the fight and in regard to the subsequent happenings. Now two reports were alike All this goes to show the kind of statement that may be made, and we can imagine the abuse that may result from such evidence. In Clause 2 (13) there is also something that worries me. That clause reads as follows—

In other words, children will be subpoenaed to give evidence against a teacher. Such a child who has to give evidence can do one of two things. The child can refuse to give evidence in which case it is punished, or otherwise the child may not want to make a statement against its teacher and it makes a statement then which is not true. Such a child is liable to a fine of £100. If this Bill is passed it may have disastrous consequences. A child may be placed in the terrible position of having to give evidence against its will against a teacher. The child may be found guilty of perjury and this may be the first step on the road to crime if a child is placed in that position. There is another point I want to raise. I think this comes under Clause 20. If the accused person is suspended from service and the official who comes to investigate the matter decided that he is not guilty of the misconduct which he is charged with, the accused person again gets his pay. I don’t want to quote the whole of the clause, but my objection amounts to this. If the individual is suspended provision is made in this Bill for the repayment of his salary, but what about his pension? A man may perhaps have been in the service for twenty five years. He has paid into the pension fund, but the Minister makes no provision for his pension. He has rendered faithful service for all these years, and whether he is guilty or not guilty—because the man who has to decide on his case is an unqualified person and not a lawyer—he may be dismissed, and then he loses his pension. Not only is his future ruined but he even loses what he himself has paid in.

No, that is quite wrong.

I ask the Minister whether he was making provision for the man’s pension, and he shook his head.

But even when he is suspended he is still in the employ of the State and he does not lose his pension rights.

If he is dismissed he loses his pension rights. If he is suspended he can get his salary back when he is reinstated, but if he is dismissed the Bill makes no provision for his pension. I have been pointing out that he may have been in the service for twenty-five years or longer. It has been his life’s work and when he is growing old he may be dismissed. Not only is he suspended but he is dismissed and he loses all his pension rights. Is that fair?

No, he does not necessarily lose his pension; the Pension Act provides for that.

Does he not lose his pension even if he is dismissed.

In certain circumstances he doesn’t lose it.

Exactly, that’s the point, it depends on the circumstances. Surely he has paid towards his pension and I feel that the provisions of the Bill are unjust. The Minister should realise that he is introducing this Bill under abnormal conditions. Feelings are running very high in this country. There are people in this country who fortunately or unfortunately do not agree with the Government’s policy; people have no control over themselves, and they may make a mistake. Perhaps they go further than they would go in normal times, or charges are brought against them and although they are not guilty they are found guilty, with the result that they are dismissed and lose everything. What is to become of those people? Are they to be left to the mercy of an old age pension of £3 per month? I cannot express myself strongly enough on this matter, because we are depriving our teachers of their rights in a most unfair manner. I have taught for years and I know the risks that face a teacher. There are teachers in the internment camps today who are quite innocent of any offence. I promised the Minister of Finance on my word of honour that I would not disclose any of the information if he showed me the charges that had been made against those teachers, so that I would be able to se for myself whether the people who had been interned had committed any offence or not. Well, that was not done. I feel that such things may happen again. Some prominent men have been interned. In the past great sacrifices have been made for the sake of education. The Minister of Finance has never been a teacher but he has been a professor, and he should know the conditions. No, I hope the Minister will enable us to go further into this question. I should like to have moved that this Bill be read today six months, but the Minister has told us that the Bill has been drafted with another object in view, because the position which prevails today is not fair towards the teachers, and because the protection granted to them is not adequate. If there is a chance of their getting a fairer trial than in the past then I don’t want to oppose that, but I hope the Minister will give us the assurance that he will be prepared to accept a large number of amendments in the Committee stage. We feel that there is a danger here for that section of the population, and if the Bill is read a second time I hope that the Minister and members opposite will show sympathetic consideration towards those people and that they will be considerate when we move our amendments.

I am glad to hear from the Minister that the sting will be taken out of this Bill. I only want to make one appeal to him and it is this. I think he has taken too much power in this Bill. I want to ask that after an individual has been tried under the provisions of this Bill the papers will be sent to a lawyer, or rather to a judge, so that the lawyer can see whether the person concerned is really guilty or not. The case can be reviewed as is done under the Magistrate’s Court Act to see whether the procedure laid down by the Act is properly complied with, and whether the individual concerned is really guilty. I want to ask the Miniser whether he is prepared to accept such an amendment. If such an amendment can be introduced our main objection from this side of the House will disappear.

I just want to explain again that the reason why this Bill was drafted was to give more rights to the teachers. It was done with the object of strengthening their position and with a, view to laying down a better procedure from their point of view. The main object of this Bill is contained in Section 2. There is no question of taking away the rights of teachers. More rights are given to them in that section. But at the same time, in drafting this Bill, my department thought that since, under Section 12, the procedure for them was brought into conformity with the Civil Service Act, they also wanted to avail themselves of the opportunity to bring Section 11, which contains the definition of misconduct, into conformity with the Service Act, and Section 1 (1) was added with that object only. I have already said by means of an interjection that I do not regard it as necessary. I do not want to create any suspicion against my department in the minds of the teachers. There is very little trouble with regard to the teachers of the Union Department of Education, and I certainly do not want to create the impression that I am inserting this section with any such object as has been ascribed to me. That is not the object, and in order to retain the good spirit in so far as the schools are concerned, and in so far as this House is concerned, I am quite prepared to move the deletion of Section 1 (1). It is certainly not necessary as far as my department is concerned, and it was only added with a view to uniformity. I should not like to create unnecessary suspicion. The hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie) said that I was willing to remove what he described as the sting in the Bill. With regard to the further provisions of the Bill, I do not think that any further amendments are necessary. The removal of the sting shows clearly that there is no question at all of “smelling out”. There is no such thing. The procedure which was laid down in Section 2 is the procedure of the Civil Service Act, which has been in force for seven years already and which was principally the procedure in the Act of 1923. That procedure was improved in 1936. It has been in force for seven years, and has been tested out. I know of no objection which has ever been made by the representatives of the civil servants against that procedure. Since that procedure has been tested out, I think that we should be satisfied with it, also in so far as the teachers are concerned. With regard to sub-section (1), against which objection was made, well, I shall personally move the deletion of that sub-section in the Committee stage.

I propose—

This Bill deals with a matter that has often been discussed in the House, namely, the interest subsidy on farm bonds. I do not intend to cover the field in all the particulars which we have often covered in this House. I merely want to give a summary of what led to the introduction of this Bill, and thereby an indication of what the Bill embraces. This Bill is an amendment of the law on farm mortgage interest of 1933. The purpose of the law on farm mortgage interest of 1933 was to extend help to farmers who found themselves with bonds contracted at a time when agricultural products were high in price, and who as a result of the drop in agricultural prices found it difficult to meet their commitments. As a result of this, and to meet them in that situation, the Government at that time caused the adoption by Parliament of a law relating to farm mortgage interest. And according to that law a subsidy of 1½ per cent. was extended to those persons who have those bonds on their farms. The law of 1933 provided for that subsidy only for a year. That subsidy, however, was extended, by way of resolution, in each consecutive year thereafter for the period of one year. This means that that subsidy has now been ensured to the farmers for more than ten years, and it means also that if this Bill is not adopted before 31st March, or if a further resolution such as that adopted in the previous years is not again adopted, then that subsidy will lapse. Hitherto the subsidy was on a very uncertain basis. As hon. members will recall, I appointed a committee in 1941 with instructions to investigate and to make recommendations in connection with this temporary and uncertain subsidy on farm mortgage interest. That committee consisted of the three members of the then Farmers’ Assistance Board—there are now four members—and of two representatives of the Department of Agriculture. They were the Acting Secretary, Mr. Joubert, and Dr. Grosskopf. Then the committee consisted also of the general manager of the Land Bank and the Commissioner of Inland Revenue who is entrusted with the administration of the law on farm mortgage interest. In its report the committee mentions inter alia the fact that to the end of October 1941 an amount of £5,000,000 was devoted to this interest subsidy. Since that date, to the end of this financial year, we shall spend at least another £500,000. That means that £5,500,000 will have been allotted to this subsidy over a period of ten years. But now we come to the point I want to emphasise. As a result of this subsidy we have not decreased bond burdens by a single penny. The burden of the capital debt has remained the same. On the contrary, we have encouraged those people not to pay off their bonds, for so long as they do not pay off the bonds they receive the subsidy. But as soon as they pay off the bonds the subsidy lapses. Thus the result of this existing system is to encourage farmers not to reduce their bonds. Well, that has been the position.

Nevertheless, it has had a good effect.

I do not want to deny that. It was a good provision at the time and it brought relief. I merely mentioned that aspect of the matter, that the outcome of the system was not to reduce bonds but rather to leave them unaltered. The committee went into that matter, and its first finding was that the cause which led to the introduction of the interest subsidy no longer existed as a general condition. In other words, they came to the conclusion that the general position of the farmer had altered appreciably since 1933. They did not go so far, however, as to recommend that the system should lapse immediately, and that we should cease paying further interest subsidy forthwith. They did, however, make a double recommendation. The first was that a period be determined for the termination of the system, and that the farmer should receive the assurance of receiving that help for that period. In other words, the farmer would no longer be on the basis that the assistance has to be extended from year to year, and that he can expect the subsidy to lapse at the end of any year. The first point in the recommendation was thus that a fixed period should be determined for the termination of the system. The second point was that a new system should be introduced in the meantime embracing the principle of capital redemption. In the spirit of those two principles they proposed their scheme. The scheme they proposed was this, that there would be no change in the system before 31 March of this year. They made their recommendations fifteen months ago. They proposed, therefore, that we proceed with the system to 31 March of this year. In the second place they recommended that from 1 April of this year all farmers who receive the subsidy should be given a choice, and the choice should be this—I mention here the proposals of the committee: Either that the subsidy should continue for a fixed period of five years as interest subsidy, but on a decreasing basis—that after the first year the subsidy should be 80 per cent., and after the second year 60 per cent., and so forth, and after five years it would disappear altogether; or, there would be this other alternative, the second alternative, that the subsidy would continue for a period of ten years, but not as an interest subsidy but as a subsidy for the redemption of capital debt. In other words, the farmer would then pay his full interest of 5 per cent., and if he is prepared to do this, then he would receive the subsidy for ten years, but the subsidy must be used only for the redemption of the capital amount of his debt. Now hon. members will recall that at the beginning of last year, at the beginning of the Session of Parliament, the hon. member for Kimberley District (Mr. Steytler) introduced a motion in this House in connection with the redemption of farm bonds. That motion led to a useful discussion, and in the course of the discussion I referred to the report of that committee, a report which I also laid on the Table of the House, and I added that the Government approved in principle of that report and was prepared to act on it. Special mention was made in the House at the time that the proposals as submitted by the Committee would specially favour the man who was in position to pay 5 per cent. interest. He would receive help for ten years, while the man who could not afford it and who needed the subsidy for reducing his interest burden, would receive assistance for five years only and that on a decreasing scale. I have taken into consideration the points raised here in this House, and at the end of last Session I thereupon introduced a Bill, although I made it clear at the time that I would not proceed with it in the course of that Session. It was introduced some 14 days before the end of the Session. It was intended as a basis for discussion and consideration, not only for members of this House but also for interested persons outside this House. In that Bill, as I introduced it, I again took steps for dealing with the two classes of persons on the same basis. The choice that I proposed in the Bill was that they would either receive a subsidy for eight years, this subsidy to be devoted only for the the redemption of debt, or if they themselves could not afford to pay the 5 per cent. on bonds then they would get the subsidy in the first place only for the reduction of interest, viz. for a period of eight years, but the portion of the subsidy apportioned for the decrease of interest would decrease by one-eighth per year, and the residual amount should be used for the redemption of the capital burden. The second person would receive from the Government precisely the same as the first person. But in the case of the first person the whole amount would be used for the redemption of capital burden, and in the case of the second person a portion would be used for the payment of interest and a portion for repayment on the capital burden. It is further provided that where money is available for the redemption of capital, and where the creditor is either prepared to receive the instalments for the redemption of capital or can be forced to receive it, the money would be paid over direct and the capital amount would also thus be decreased. But in cases where the creditor cannot be forced, or where he is unwilling to receive it, the amounts will be paid into a fund, and at the end of the eight years the full amount will be paid over to the creditor, who will then have to receive it. That is the Bill introduced by me into this House last year. It elicited a fairly general discussion in the country outside. On 13 August of last year a deputation from the South African Agricultural Union came to discuss the matter with me. They agreed with my proposal in the Bill as a means of terminating the farm mortgage interest scheme, and they told me that they gratefully accepted the proposal incorporated in the Bill. The South African Agricultural Union, therefore, has adopted that proposal with gratitude. But thereby they did not bind themselves in respect of the general question of bond redemption, and they reserved the right to raise it when the abnormal times are over. But this Bill they accepted with gratitude. The discussion on that occasion then went a bit further, and in the course of the discussion a suggestion was made which I undertook to give further consideration, and as a result of that consideration there appears in this Bill now before the House a third plan. The farmer now has not only a dual choice. But there is now a third proposal that the farmer can choose if he wishes. He thus has three alternatives, and the third possibility is this: That instead of us paying him in eight years a subsidy on the basis of 1½ per cent. for the redemption of the capital burden, we shall be prepared at any time to pay out the immediate value of those instalments which would otherwise have been paid out in eight years, provided that he is prepared to devote a similar sum of his own money for the decrease of debt.

On the basis of 5 per cent. interest.

It works out in this way. Assuming the farmer has a bond of £1,000, then the immediate value of the l½ per cent. will work out at £97. If the farmer then adds £97, then his bond is decreased by almost £200, and his interest commitments are also thereby decreased. After that he gets no further subsidy. A third possibility is therefore incorporated in the Bill. I now want to submit the Bill in this form to the House. I think that the proposal I now make is a very fair proposal. At present the farmer has no assurance that that subsidy will continue for longer than a year. This Bill gives him the assurance that he will have the assistance over a period of eight years, or if he wishes to avail himself of it he can immediately receive the equivalent amount. In the existing circumstances, as the Committee clearly points out in its report, a great deal could be said in favour of the complete abolition of the subsidy, particularly in view of the fact that conditions have further improved; instead of that we give the assurance for eight years, and to that we link a system of mortgage redemption. Although £5,500,000 has been devoted to this subsidy the bond burden has not reduced as a result, and in fact the subsidy has been paid in such a way that the farmer has been encouraged not to reduce his bond burden. The object of the Bill is clearly and definitely to encourage the farmer to decrease his capital burden.

By how much?

I have already explained that on a bond of £1,000 the immediate value of the subsidy would be £97. It the farmer wishes to draw it immediately it works out at £97, if he is prepared to add the same amount. That is the position. I think the proposal is fair. It is going to give the farmer considerably more than of what he is assured today, and it is a decided encouragement for him to decrease his capital burden.

The work on the agenda has been fairly quickly disposed of, and we did not quite expect that this Bill would come up for discussion today. Let me give the Minister the assurance in the first place that there is something in which he has succeeded, viz., to draft the Bill so unclearly that we as laymen have not the least chance to read and understand the Bill as it is now before us, and there are even barristers who cannot read and understand the Bill. Where there is a measure affecting the farmers, I would be glad if the Minister would take into consideration in the future that we farmers are in most cases not legal men. I fear that we shall enrich the attorneys considerably in finding out for us the significance of this Bill. Let me recall in the first place that the Prime Miniser said in a speech a few days ago that we have employed patch-measures in the past. He said that the time for patchmeasures should now be past. Here the Minister of Finance makes the same statement. He says that this is a Bill which he himself feels does not go far enough, but under the abnormal circumstances of today it is the best he could do, and, he added, a general bond redemption scheme will perhaps be taken into consideration when times are again normal. By that he possibly means the time when the war is over, but whether times in South Africa will ever become normal and whether we shall have the money to go further ist doubtful. This Bill boils down to three alternatives put before the farmer. The first is that the farmer, where he is not in position to pay his 5 per cent. interest without assistance, will continue to receive 1½ per cent. subsidy as he is receiving today, but next year only seven-eights will be devoted to that and one-eighth will be deducted from his bond, the next year it will be six-eights, after that five-eights until later seven-eighths shall be deducted for bond reduction. This applies, of course, only to the man who is poor and who cannot pay his full interest of 5 per cent., and whose only alternative thus is to seek refuge in this means. If the Minister works it out, he will see that after his so-called bond redemption scheme has expired, the poor man’s bond will have been decreased in this way by 4 per cent. It boils down to this, that the man who is today not even in a position to pay his interest because he has a bond that is greater than he can afford, will have decreased his bond by 4 per cent. after eight years. Does the hon. Minister think that this is going to be of much help to that man? It will gradually strangle the farmer until he is ultimately dead. There is no salavtion for him, so far as I can see. He will perish. He will merely die a more gradual death than under existing circumstances. Then we come to the second position, the man who can pay the full 5 per cent. He pays the 5 per cent., and the l½ per cent. is deducted from his capital debt, so that after eight years the bond shall have been reduced by 12 per cent. That is good so far as it goes. This man has decreased his bond by 12 per cent., but who has decreased it, the Government or the farmer himself? Today that farmer pays merely 3½ per cent. interest. From the time the Act comes into force on 1st April, the farmer pays 5 per cent., and then the Government will be so good as to save 1½ per cent. for him and after eight years it will then be deducted from his bond. The Minister shakes his head. But the farmer today pays 3½ per cent.

He has no assurance today that he will get the subsidy.

That is another matter because the law in connection with the interest subsidy must be renewed annually. Instead of the Minister saying openly that he is going to suspend it in future, and is going to give no subsidy, but is willing to contribute 1½ per cent. to the redemption of capital debt, the Minister now comes and gives a wrong impression. If the Minister comes openly, then we know at least that we lose the 1½ per cent., but that we get it back in a different form. In other words, that we shall be where we were in the past. Then we come to the third point, to the rich man who today has a little money and who can add £200 or £300 to the subsidy. He can then decrease his bond by those two contributions. The Minister contiues to rely on an interest rate of 5 per cent., where money can today be obtained at 3 per cent. Why must 5 per cent. be paid, while money can be obtained at 3 per cent? I think that the Bill in its present form is unacceptable to the farmers of South Africa, and I want to propose the following amendment—

1. (a) an effective scheme for the redemption of farm mortgage bonds registered before 1st April, 1933, as well as of those registered subsequently;
2. (b) adequate funds being granted by the Government to the Land and Agricultural Bank with authority to utilize such funds for taking over farm mortgage bonds at a rate of interest of 3½ per cent., and for the contribution by the Government of 1½ per cent. to the redemption of such mortgage bonds until the capital amount of any mortgage bond shall be reduced to 60 per cent. of the value of the farm, as determined by the Bank; and
3. (c) the exemption from income tax of that portion of the income of a farmer utilised from the reduction of an existing farm mortgage bond by an amount or amounts the total of which does not exceed £3,000.”

This amendment speaks for itself, and I hope the Minister will have no objection to accepting it. Let us take the first part. The Minister says that his Bill can have reference only to those existing bonds on which subsidy is paid. The Minister knows that farmers throughout the country, at congresses and so forth, described it as unjust. We know today of very wealthy men—the Minister himself has admitted it—who draw that interest subsidy. The Minister himself has said that in the past it has resulted in farmers not paying off their bonds. There are farmers in the country who have retained their bonds because they pay only 31 per cent. interest on them and they have invested their money elsewhere, where they are getting higher interests. In other words, you give help to people who do not in the least require it. Now the Minister goes further and helps those people to pay off their bonds. This measure is particularly unjust towards the North-West. The North-West did not have the boom of which the Minister spoke. They did not all get the higher prices for their products. It was not applicable to the whole North-West, for the simple reason that in those days when the prices were high, parts of the North-West had a protracted drought. A second point is that the people did not know the value of the North-West and land prices were very low. But from 1934 there were parts that had a good period, and furthermore new buyers came in as a result of the fact that the Native Trust had bought up land in other parts. Consequently the prices rose enormously and where the general basis formerly was perhaps 12s. 6d. per morgen, it is today £1 5s., or rather it was £1 5s. jut before the war. The people who paid 12s. 6d. get subsidy, but those who paid £1 5s. do not get it. Here the Minister comes and helps the people who are in a favourable position to pay off their bonds, while the others have no benefit. Today there is a greater proportion of farmers in difficulties and who do not fall under the law than there are rich people who are assisted to reduce or redeem their bonds. The Minister must therefore consider that it is an unfair measure. The law will apply only to those existing bonds that enjoy the subsidy. It will not apply to bonds contracted after 1933. The Minister will see a terrible agitation arise if the Bill goes through as he proposes. This is again class legislation. Then I come to the second point of my amendment, viz. that the Government should provide the Land Bank with sufficient funds. The Minister will not deny that money is procurable today at 3 per cent. I know of private persons and of societies and instsitutions that have a lot of money and that would be thankful to get. 3 per cent. The Minister knows that millions of pounds are lying idle without earning interest. Now the Minister comes here and says that the farmers, with the assistance of the Government, must continue to pay 5 per cent. We say: Release the monies that are lying locked up, give the Land Bank sufficient funds that can be obtained at 3 per cent., and decrease the bonds in this way. The opportunity is there today, but it will pass again. Let the Government obtain the money at 3 per cent., add 1½ per cent. for administration costs, and make the cheap money available by means of the Land Bank. What will happen. The farmers will in future not need to pay more than 3½ per cent. interest. I do not think the Minister would begrudge the farmer this. The Minister gives us the assurance that he is willing to contribute the 1½ per cent. We do not ask one penny more than he is willing to contribute. But we say that there is money obtainable at 3 per cent. and that he must make it available through the Land Bank. The bond-holder who gets 5 per cent. today will then be willing to take 31 per cent. He will be compelled to take 31 per cent. Then the Government will not even have to look for the money, because the farmers will be able to get the money elsewhere at 3½ per cent. This will really help the farmer and it will help all classes. It will not merely decrease the poor farmer’s bond by 4 per cent. in eight years, but by 12 per cent. throughout. I think the farmers of South Africa will never forgive the Minister of Finance and the Government if they miss the opportunity of making available to them money through the Land Bank at 3½ per cent. according to our request. But our amendment goes further. Under the Bill as it now is, the Minister is going to assist the rich man, even the millionaire. The farmers in South Africa do not want to be spoon-fed, but here the Minister can assist them onto a sound basis. The Land Bank today gives bonds up to 60 per cent. of the valuation and this can be considered as safe. Help the farmer onto that sound basis and then leave him alone. If the farmer has then brought down his bond to that extent and he is then not strong enough or has not sufficient willpower to pay off the rest of his bond, then he does not deserve to be assisted, except if he gets a very big setback for which he is not responsible, as often happens in South Africa with its abnormal circumstances of climate, etc. I hope the Government will take this into consideration. We do not want to spend the country’s money on behalf of those who can help themselves, but only to bring our farmers onto a basis that is sound. But I also have a third point, namely, exemption from income tax of the income of a farmer used to pay off existing bonds, to a maximum of £3,000. The hon. Minister will know that we in the Cape have already sent a deputation to the Minister from the Wool Growers’ Congress. I raised the same matter last year and the Minister seemed fairry inclined to accept it in connection with the redemption scheme, but in the meantime he has departed from it and it does not look as if he is willing to do it. Why do we as farmers request this? The Minister was at first opposed to the whole matter, but later he realised his mistake and chivalrously admitted that he was wrong and that the deputation who came to see him was right. What are the circumstances today? Any State official, any person has the right to step into the Post Office and to invest £3,000 of which the interest is not taxable. But if I as a farmer have a debt, in other words something that I do not possess, and I want to use £1,000 to decrease my bond, then I am not given the least encouragement to do so. The Minister does not want to do this. The old law, as the Minister has admitted, went so far that the farmer was not in the least encouraged to decrease his bond, on the contrary he was encouraged not to pay off his bond. It is now harvest time, the opportunity is now there of placing the farmer on a sound basis. If I have £100 over from my farming, and I know that I can deduct it from my income tax, that I need not have to pay income tax on it if I decrease my bond, then it will be an encouragement to me to do so, but if that is not the case, then I will perhaps spend it on a holiday at the coast or something like that. Or I will use the £100, or £1,000, to buy an additional farm or to buy sheep and cattle. That is happening today. If what I propose is done, it will also help to avert inflation, the inflation about which the Minister has spoken. The Minister loses nothing by it. He does lose something temporarily, but if the farmer is entitled to reduce his bond in this way to a limit of £3,000, then he cannot later deduct for income tax purposes the interest he paid on the amount, and the £150 that he no longer pays in interest becomes taxable. He can now deduct the £150, but in the future when his bond is reduced by about £3,000 he will not be able to deduct it any longer from his taxable income. Consequently he will have to pay more income tax in the future. It comes down to this, that the Minister encourages the farmers, but gets back manifold what he now loses temporarily. I do not think that the Minister can have objections. Where we ask this, the Minister has perhaps the opportunity of saying that there are political motives behind it. I can assure him, however, that what I advocate here I do not advocate on behalf of one section of farmers but on behalf of all sections, of all political parties. I do not ask it from a political viewpoint, but in the name of all farmers in South Africa. Resolutions have been taken at congresses, and I have here a resolution from a congress at which the majority were supporters of the Minister’s Party, and the resolution was taken unanimously. Also the Cape Congress of Wool Growers and the National Wool Growers’ Association adopted a similar resolution, quite apart from the smaller congresses such as the North-Western Congress, which also unanimously adopted a similar resolution. I therefore come on behalf of all the farmers of South Africa, and I say to the Minister that if he does this, small as he is, the farmers of South Africa will yet erect for him a monument that is hundred times bigger than he himself is. It is in the interests of South Africa, of the farmers and the whole population, to place the farming population on a sound footing. Then in the difficult times that are perhaps impending, they will be able to maintain themselves and be in a position as employers to keep thousands of people employed. I hope, therefore, that the Minister will meet us in the matter.

I second the amendment. I think it is quite clear that the Minister of Finance has not the moral courage to do what he would like to do, namely, to abolish the interest subsidy altogether. What he now proposes is a slow death. Surely he does not know what the position will be in 1951, and whether the subsidy may not then be more urgently required than it is today, perhaps even more urgently than it was required in 1933, when the original Act was passed. The Minister admits that the Act had a good effect. What reasons has he given in order to show that circumstances have changed, that the Act has not a good effect even today? It is not everyone who gets this assistance; those people who took a mortgage after 1934 do not get the subsidy. Now I want to put this pertinent question, whether he can assure us that farmers who received this assistance in 1933 on account of over-capitalisation, will be better off in 1951. He says that these people have not paid off their mortgages. The majority of them were not even in a position to pay their interest. How could they pay off their mortgages? For that reason they gave the subsidy to the farmers. We know that in certain respects the Act enabled farmers to get the subsidy when they did not require it. But I want to put this question. When the Minister of Finance discussed his excess profits tax, he said that we could not introduce a tax in such a way that it placed an equal burden on everyone. One person derives certain advantages, while the other suffers. There are always anomalies in such an Act. The same applies to this Farm Martgage Interest Act, and if people are assisted who should not have been assisted, why does the Minister not amend the Act? He says that we must understand that this Act has to be renewed every year, but I want to tell him that no government in the past has been able to stop the interest subsidy, because it was convinced that in doing so it would harm the agricultural community. I move—

It is not necessary for me to speak long on this matter, but perhaps hon. members would like to have an explanation of the position. The Defence Force has felt that they would like to have a military aerodrome near Mafeking. But unfortunately there was not a suitable piece of land available on the town grounds for that purpose. For that reason the municipality of Mafeking asked to exchange a piece of land situated in the native area for a piece of land on the town grounds. They are prepared to give twice as much land as the piece they receive. The idea at the time was that when the war was over the Military aerodrome would be converted into a civil aerodrome, and for that reason they wanted it to be on the town grounds. The natives have been cunsulted and are satisfied with the exchange. The select committee was satisfied with it, and therefore I consider that the House should adopt it. I think I should also say this to hon. members, that a few days ago I heard that the Department of Defence no longer intends to proceed with the construction of that military aerodrome. Notwithstanding that, however, I think the House can adopt the proposal, for it may be necessary in the future to construct an aerodrome there, and then the municipality will have suitable land for the purpose. At the same time it is in the interest of the natives to exchange that piece of ground. I may say that the municipality has undertaken to pay all the costs of transfer and to fence the land.

May I make an appeal to the Minister. Although this report was laid on the Table last year, it is now suddenly sprung on us because we have made so much progress.

It is not of much importance.

It may not seem very important, but it is in conflict with the principles of this party, in that we are now going to exchange a piece of land with the natives and that we are going to give them a piece of land in European territory, twice as big. Since we have made so much progress today both with regard to the work of private members and Government work, the House should have an opportunity of considering this matter. No one expected that we would reach Order No. 9 today. No member on this side and no member on the other side could have expected it.

I did not think that we would have to postpone the debate on the Farm Mortgage Interest Bill.

We do not intend causing unnecessary trouble in this connection, but I think we should have an opportunity of going into this matter further. European areas and native areas have been delimited, and when an exchange takes place, we should have an opportunity of considering the matter properly.

Very well. I do not want to force my hon. friend to discuss this matter now, and I therefore move—