When the House adjourned yesterday I was about to finish. I merely wished to refer to the amount of £80,000 for Oudstryders. It is very little more than a token payment and I hope that when he can do so, the Minister will increase this sum very considerably. The country owes a great debt to the Oudstryders. The story of their exploits is an epic and their courage, their fortitude and the great sacrifices they made are part of the most glorious traditions of this land. We on this side are proud of the fact that we are being led by a great Oudstryder. When I was a young student in London in 1904 or 1905, I was shown a portrait of the present Prime Minister. Over his signature he had written this quotation, which I have always remembered: “Let us have faith that right is might and in that faith to the end try to do our duty.” In that faith he has led us into this war. In that faith he will lead us to a sure victory to the greater glory of this land and its people for ever.

I am sorry that I cannot continue in the poetic strain in which the hon. member for Pretoria City (Mr. Davis) concluded his speech. My impression of the Minister’s budget is that it is characteristic of the Minister of Finance. It is a budget which deals so leniently with the mines, that the shares are booming; this is a budget which imposes a tax on the travelling public, on the railway tickets for Europeans, whilst no corresponding burden is placed on the non-Europeans. That is typical. We should expect that from the Minister. But the main impression I received from the budget speech of the Minister of Finance is that here a further instalment has to be paid on the burden which has been placed on our people and posterity. I say this in view of the figures which have become known. The public debt has risen to £481,000,000 today and at the end of this financial year the figure will be higher still and our interest payments—for this young and small population—will amount to £16,000,000 per annum. I can only say that the present Minister of Finance will in future be known as the Minister of a policy of doom. What hope does the Minister have, what are his reasons for expecting, that in future we shall be able to pay this interest debt and capital redemption? Only yesterday we heard from the hon. member for George (Mr. Werth) that we have reached the height of the crisis, that the accumulated surpluses which had been built up under the sensible policy of the previous Minister of Finance, have disappeared, that the nest egg which the previous Minister of Finance carefully put aside for a rainy day, has been taken and spent by the present Minister in order to see this idiotic war through. I think that we can come to the conclusion that right through the budget speech of the Minister we heard one refrain, the refrain one may expect from the hon. members on the other side when the share market is booming, when the wholesalers obtain monopolies and when as a result of circumstances certain people draw fat salaries, and that refrain is: “Happy days are here again.” That is the refrain one hears from the other side.

That is right.

I am surprised that the hon. member for Rustenburg (Mr. J. M. Conradie) approves of it. What we witness today in our country is that the broad masses of the people and the middle classes are getting poorer, that the poor man is getting poorer still, whilst on the other hand the shares of the capitalists are booming and the shares of the millers’ combine have gone up by almost 100 per cent., and as we know the large companies in every branch of industry and commerce are tightening their hold more and more. The large masses of the population grow poorer, become more and more exhausted, but the little coterie sings the refrain “Happy days are here again.” When the Minister took over the Portfolio of Finance, he confirmed the policy of the previous Minister of Finance, viz. that every penny which gold would go over 150s. per fine ounce, would be taken by the State. He said that the Minister could by a stroke of the pen let that money flow into the coffers of the Treasury. What did happen? The Minister said that he would use the extra profit of the mines for the benefit of the State, since the mines only obtained those extra profits owing to the Government’s policy. The price of gold rose from 150s. to 168s. but only a few months after the Minister assured the country that he would follow that policy, he yielded to the pressure of the mining magnates, and they were allowed to pocket an extra £13,000,000 every year. The Minister comes here and tells us that he receives so much from the gold mines, nearly £16,000,000, but he does not say that on the other hand he allows them to rope in £13,000,000 extra every year. When we want to discuss these things, we hear from the other side: “War, war!” Those are the green pastures the Minister wants to make the people lay down in. If we come with sound arguments, the members over there shout: “War, war!” Hon. members on the other side are responsible for the war. The day will come when common sense will again prevail and then those who are now making pots and pots of money, those who made the war, will have to pay.

The farmers?

Unfortunately it is not the farmers who are making pots and pots of money, but the people who call themselves industrialists and business people and the drawers of double salaries and the building contractors, and others of their ilk. Allow me to tell you an anecdote. After the Anglo-Boer War one of the most prominent and typical old farmers came to the market to sell his products. A man who had had a business during the Boer war came up to him and playing with the money in his pocket said: “Have you got to sell such stuff to make a living? You were on the wrong side. Money is plentiful.” And he made the money jingle. The old farmer then replied: “Yes, when a disaster visits the country, the vultures prosper.” Today we are facing a disaster, a state of emergency. I notice that the hon. members over there are growing restless. I do not want to insinuate that they are vultures. They will understand what I mean and whom I mean when I say that the country is in danger and that the vultures prosper. There are some people who make stacks of money out of these conditions. I am often surprised at the mentality of hon. members on the other side. They only notice what is to their own benefit, but they do not consider what this war is costing the country. I believe that the Prime Minister has more respect for a man who gives vent to his convictions like a man, than for the people who do as if they fully agree with and take an active part in the war, whilst they are busy stuffing their pockets far from the battlefields. In this House of Assembly no battles can be won, and as far as the war is concerned I reproach hon. members on the other side and the Government that they are sitting here and put forward all kinds of accusations against us. The Minister of Lands for instance declared yesterday: “Do you want us to conclude a peace and hand over the country to Hitler?” We never advocated Hitler coming here. I am not aware that Hitler ever made any attempts or preparations to get hold of our country. But if Hitler should ever lay his hands upon this country, the members on the other side will be the guilty ones who played the country into Hitler’s hands by deliberately declaring war upon a great nation under Hitler’s leadership. If we have to lose the war, the hon. members on the other side will be the guilty one who brought that disaster upon us. They staked everything on the gamble which is being decided in Europe.

Just like Holland.

That is an entirely different matter. When two grown-ups fight a struggle for life and death and a small boy gets in between them, will they stop their fight in order to see the little boy home first? I have every sympathy with Holland, but it was its fate to be lying between the two large powers which were engaged in a life and death struggle. If the Germans had waited 14 days longer, I would have been surprised if England had not invaded Holland and marched through Holland to Germany. That is to say if they could have managed it. The great powers do not care tuppence if it suits their purpose, and proof of that I find in North Africa, in Iraq, in Iran, in the whole of Syria, and in Madagascar. I have every sympathy with Holland, but its fate was that it had to ly in between. Would the hon. member for Frankfort (Maj.-Gen. Botha) when busy fighting, first stop in order to bring the little boy into safety?

I would not attack a neutral country in that manner.

What about Madagascar and all the other countries? The only argument the hon. members over there have is: “War, war!” The hon. members on the other side always come here with all kinds of misleading representations. They are all blind in some way or the other. What we built up with sweat and blood, what the Prime Minister himself fought for, that is all being staked in the struggle for the European balance of power. The other side of the House has caused tremendous harm to be done to our country and posterity will express itself to that effect. The members on the other side are to be blamed not only for having dragged us into the war but also for the manner in which they are waging this war. Year after year our indebtedness grows so that the people cannot bear it any longer. Yesterday the hon. member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge) started pleading for a tax on landed property, and the hon. member for Kensington (Mr. Blackwell) supported him.

I never said a word about a tax on landed property.

Anyhow, the hon. member for Troyeville openly advocated it here and the hon. member for Kensington advocated a tax on wines. I want to ask the hon. member for Frankfort whether he is also in favour of a landed property tax.

Nobody here is in favour of a tax on landed property, except you over there.

Your own front bencher has openly advocated it here. The hon. member may not have been present. Everything that has been built up in our country, our whole future is being sacrificed for this idiotic war. We could have been in a strong position if we had remained neutral, we could have done a good trade and bettered the position of our people, we could have had a united people in South Africa …

I think the hon. member should not continue advancing arguments in connection with the war. That matter has been disposed of, and unless a substantive motion is proposed in this House, hon. members cannot argue against the war.

I should only like to show that owing to the war the Minister has had to impose more and more taxes.

The hon. member is entitled to do so, but hon. members may not repeat arguments in favour of or against the war.

I am sorry that I allowed myself to be distracted by interjections from the other side. I should like to deal with the position of the farming industry in South Africa. I feel worried about the position. We have an agricultural system which has no definite goal. It is a policy of living from hand to mouth, without planning. I am glad the Minister of Agriculture is in his seat for I should like to address a few words to him. I want to suggest to the Minister that as far as agricultural matters are concerned, a thorough investigation is required. Our agriculture is drifting. One year it goes this way and the next year that way and there is no clear-cut policy. I want to make a proposal to him. The Minister should appoint a Commission, a Planning Council for Agriculture. That will be much more useful than the propaganda Boards which are being appointed for war purposes. The Minister should appoint a Board or Council to investigate matters and to give advice to the Government in regard to schemes for putting agriculture on a more stable and lasting basis. I want to suggest a few matters requiring investigation: (1) In which way stable and reasonable prices for our agricultural products may be achieved; (2) the security of owning land, subject to an efficient use being made of it; (3) the solution of the farm labour problem; (4) protection against losing one’s farm owing to unbearable capital and interest indebtedness; (5) Conservation and regaining our national soil. On a certain occasion, before 1938, when I also spoke about the agricultural problem and the desirability of a long term policy, the Minister said that it was most opportune to speak about crop rotation and more scientific methods of farming in South Africa, as we were busy exhausting the land. At that time I already pointed to the dangers of over-cropping which is applied in South Africa. What was the Minister’s reaction. He said: “Tell that to the farmers. It is all very nice, but go and tell the farmers that.” The Minister, however, and not I as a single member of Parliament, has at his disposal the Department of Agriculture in order to preach that gospel truth to the farming population. The Minister, not I, has the power of legislating. I want to appeal to the Minister to have a thorough enquiry made into the five points I have mentioned, and in particular into the dangers which threaten our future as a result of over-cropping. It has assumed alarming proportions. The cause of it is that the prices which the farmers receive for their products are insufficient so that they from sheer necessity are taking refuge to over-cropping. The soil is being exhausted. The Minister should realise his responsibility in this respect. If you give the farmer too low a price for his pound of wool or his bag of maize or whatever he may produce, he does not receive sufficient money to maintain the fertility of his soil. Over-cropping is the result. The farmer has to keep on producing and exhausting the soil. The soil is bankrupt, the farmer is bankrupt and the country is bankrupt, if such a system is persisted in. We are going in that direction. I see the Minister still smiles.

I am smiling because you forgot to add the last one, namely that your party is also bankrupt.

To me all parties are bankrupt. For that reason I do not belong to any party. I realise they are all bankrupt. We need the assistance of the Minister to protect us against those dangers. This side of the House represents the farmers and champions the interests of the farmers. The Minister will receive our support if he devotes his energies to helping the farmers. He will receive our support and we shall not demand double salaries for it. We realise our duty as the representatives of the farming community. The other side of the House represents the mines, the wholesalers, the speculators and the drawers of double salaries—in one word, the Empire. But we shall support the Minister if he is willing to follow a sound agricultural policy. The Minister must save the farming community, lest all of us become beggars. He has the opportunity to do so. If he does it, statues will be erected to his memory. He should appoint a Planning Council and put into operation a long term policy, instead of going on with political manipulations and the haggling with tickeys here and sixpences there. Eleven centuries ago it was a punishable offence in England when a man worked and used his land in the manner we are doing it in South Africa today. What was the result? Today the yield of the land in England is better than it was 1,100 years ago. We in South Africa are, however, going on with over-cropping. We denude our veld because we do not get enough to make encampments. We are ploughing our land to a standstill—look at what happened in America where thousands of square miles of formerly fertile land have been changed into a drifting desert. We must get away from that type of agriculture, and the Minister has to take the lead, so that the heritage we leave to our children and children’s children will not be entirely exhausted and valueless. I hope the Minister will wake up and tackle this great evil.

The debate yesterday dealt with some features of the budget which I do not propose pursuing today, but there were certain remarks made by the hon. member for George (Mr. Werth), and later by the hon. member for Vredefort when they asked what Mr. Jagger and Mr. Merriman would have said if they had been alive today. Well, I don’t want to deal with that but I do want to say a few words in regard to their question what Mr. Havenga would say if he had to deal with a budget such as this. The hon. member for George said that Mr. Havenga would never have raided the Loan Funds to deal with a deficit. I venture to say that if Mr. Havenga had been here he would have dealt with the extra expenditure in exactly the same way as the present Minister of Finance has done. But what the hon. member for George did not tell the House was this, that when Mr. Havenga was faced with those very large deficits in 1931 and 1932 he did not raid the Loan Funds, but what he did do was to put an extra tax on the cost of living of the poorer sections of the community. He increased the Customs Duty—and in one year alone the increase amounted to £2,600,000 covering every range of imported articles which greatly affected the cost of living, and if there is one striking feature today in this budget it is that it does not affect the cost of living at all. It only affects the cost of living on what you may call luxury articles where his predecessor who has been acclaimed as a very great Finance Minister—and no doubt in his time he did very good work, when he was faced with this problem of finding the deficit he raided the cost of living and hit the poorer sections of the community. I just want to deal with one specific tax introduced by the Minister, and that is this tax on Railway fares. The other taxes will be dealt with in due course under the various bills. And may I say in passing that I think both the budgets of the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Railways are particularly fair—they are well balanced, and with one exception, so far as the Minister of Finance is concerned, I think that they have been well received throughout the country as eminently fair measures. Now, the Minister of Railways, who gave one of the lucid statements of policy this House has ever listened to, pointed out certain difficulties. Now, I don’t want to go into questions of Railway policy except to say that when the Minister of Railways started rolling off the list of losses on the different sections and told the House how he had carried Defence Force people at a loss, farmers’ products at a loss, road motor services at a loss, passenger fares and so on—when he told the House that each section was carried at a loss and yet wound up by showing a surplus—I could not help thinking of the story of the man who had two balance sheets—the one which he presented to the income tax authorities, and the other which he presented to his bank manager. I think the losses would be shown to the income tax authorities. Now, in regard to these Railway fares, I do not know whether the House realises that in the Minister’s surplus of £2,181,000—£1,200,000 is a direct contribution by the Exchequer to the Railways; this year when the Minister of Railways anticipates a surplus of £1,600,000—out of that approximately £1,200,000 is a direct contribution by the Exchequer to the Railways to cover certain agricultural subsidies in respect of certain agricultural railway rates. It may be retorted that that is a matter of Government policy. Yes, it is the Government’s policy to carry all agricultural products at a low rate. It is also Government policy to carry many other products in this country at low rates for the development of this country, but I cannot help feeling that a very grave injustice is done, particularly at a time like this, to put this additional tax of the Railway users, and the Railway users who will have to pay will be mainly the people coming from the Interior to the Coast, and people, who perhaps are urgently sent away for health purposes, when at the same time the Exchequer is making a contribution to the Railways of £1,200,000. If that contribution were deducted from the Railway Estimates this year the Minister would have had another £700,000 which he would have been able to use and he could have used it to defray some of the extra taxes which have been put on.

You are giving me ideas.

Well, that is a point which I think the Minister should consider. I think it is a very unfair thing not only to tax the additional Railway fare but to give the Railways practically £1,250,000 and then the Railways come and say: “Look at the surplus we have got.” This is not a genuine surplus, it is a surplus made by the Exchequer. Now, I want to deal with a matter today which has been greatly affecting the people of this country, and that is the increasing cost of certain articles of food. This Session we have heard complaints and constant pleas, particularly from hon. members opposite, for further protection for the farmers, further help, for relief for the farming community and so on. From all reports which one can get I think the farmers of this country have never been so well off as they are today, but what is really a very serious matter is the effect on the increase in the cost of food to the people of this country, and the way in which the cost of food has increased during the past year or two. I am not only blaming the farmers for that, but I want to suggest certain measures which should meet the farmers’ side and the consumers’ side. The problem is becoming so acute that people are really becoming restless. We have a good deal of waste going on on the one side, while on the other side we have increasing shortages of certain basic foods. And it does not appear that the measures that have been taken so far meet the situation or cope with the difficulties that have arisen. Let me quote the index figures showing the increases in the cost of living. Let me take them for 1938. The increase in cost of food—the food index figure — in South Africa, is 25 per cent. That is to say 1942 shows an increase of 25 per cent. over 1938. If you take food, fuel, light and rent, the increase is only 17 per cent. showing that with regard to those commodities costs have not risen to anything like the extent that the cost of food has. And if it includes sundries as well—which consist of clothing, articles of wear in all forms—then the increase is only 20.2 per cent. over 1938. So that while it has been possible to keep down the prices of sundries, of clothing, fuel, light and rent, the price of food itself has gone up above any of the other index figures. That, I submit, is a very serious item indeed. And when I deal with one or two basic foods hon. members will realise how very much more serious the position is. Now, control is exercised over the cost of bread and recently the price of bread was brought down to 6d. A very satisfactory measure showing that with efficient control rising costs can be kept down. Butter is another commodity where the price has been kept in hand, and that has been done in spite of certain shortages of basic stocks, such as butterfat etc. The price of butter today is roughly 1s. 10d. which for an essential food is far too high. But one of the most serious positions in this country is that in regard to meat and I do not know how far the seriousness of this position is realised.

Do you say it is serious so far as you are concerned?

I want to give some figures to show the increases that have taken place, the increases in slaughtering. The increases in price, and I want to show the difficult position we are getting into. I am only referring to actual cattle and sheep that pass through the Municipal abattoirs, and not the cattle and sheep that were dealt with in the rural districts, or in the Native Territories.

It is no use giving those figures only.

These are purely the figures for the animals passing through the Municipal Abattoirs. In 1937 there were 635,000 head of cattle and 2,893,000 sheep which went through the abattoirs. In 1942 that figure had risen to 863,000 cattle and 4,645,000 sheep. An increase of 36 per cent. in the case of cattle and 60 per cent. in the case of sheep. Whereas the previous increased slaughterings were roughly 2 per cent. or 3 per cent., in respect of the cattle they have gone up in five years to a matter of 36 per cent. instead of the normal 15 per cent. Now, it is very doubtful whether the increased slaughterings are really giving any increases in meat. Certain tests were taken at one of the big abattoirs and they showed that although there had been an increase of slaughtering to an extent of 3 per cent., the increase in meat made available was only 1.7 per cent. And in regard to mutton, although there has been an increase of 7 per cent. in the slaughterings, there was actually a decrease of 7 per cent. in the quantity of meat available. Now, there are certain other aspects into which I do not want to go too fully—but I want to say this, that the number of breeding stock of the country is being very seriously drained—we are drawing very seriously on the breeding stock available in this country. In 1937 the slaughtering was 11 per cent. of the total. In 1942 it was over 14 per cent. The figures have gone up to a very much greater extent than would normally appear to be the case, and in spite of the fact that prices have gone up, this has had no effect at all on the consumption or on the supply to the market. In January, 1939, the price for compound meat was 32s. 5d. per 100 lbs. as against 48.75 in January, 1943. Mediums had gone up from 34.75 in January, 1939, to 53.50 in January, 1943, and good mediums went up from 36.75 to 59.75, showing that the increase in the case of stock in this country is tremendous, and from all evidence we must come to the conclusion that we are encroaching on the capital reserves of our cattle through these enhanced prices and through supplies sent in. But there is another point which is even more serious, and that is the question of the retail price. Now the index figure for 1939 was 127. For 1940 it was 131—an increase of 4 points. In 1941 it had gone up to 139. But from 1941 to December, 1942, it had gone up to 207, so that there was an increase of 68 points in twelve months and of 62 per cent. over 1939. That is the increase in the retail price, so can one wonder at the outcry that has been raised against these increased prices. Now, I want to say this. One can understand that there is a big increase in consumption because of the large supplies to military camps and so on. And then there is another point; it is very difficult to get processed food today, processed meat, in this country, because of the shortage of tin plate, and although one can use other containers, when you deal with processed food you have to have a tin plate. And there is very little hope of getting an extended supply or of being able to get extra preserved food supplies to relieve the shortage which is coming in regard to meat, and one thing I am afraid of is this, that within a year—and the price of meat should actually be coming down now—it has come down by ½d. per lb., that is so, but that was only a token—but I venture to say that before the end of this year the price of meat will go up very much higher than it is today. It must do so. I think there are measures to be taken to deal with this situation and I think they should be taken. Now, take our green vegetable position. It has always been one of the most difficult problems to solve—this uneven distribution of green vegetables. In Pretoria the other day green vegetables were sold on the Pretoria market at practically half the price you pay here. We were sending from Pretoria to Maritzburg, by a Government contractor who supplied military camps, green vegetables which had been grown in Pretoria. The green vegetable position is one of the most difficult to cope with. I was very interested the other day to see that this problem had been tackled in Great Britain, where apparently similar difficulties had arisen, and in the “Economist” of November 21st, 1942, they deal with this scheme. They don’t say exactly how the scheme was worked out and I have not got it here to give to the House, but they are dealing with the matter under the Minister of Agriculture, and the new measures which they have taken apply to vegetables. This is what they say in the “Economist”—

And then in the “Economist” of the 9th January they also refer to this scheme which has been brought into use, and they say this—

Now I would submit that if it is possible to achieve some scheme which is going equally to protect the producer and consumer in England it is equally possible for us to work out a scheme here. Another item which I wish to refer to is this. Take this question of mealie meal. Mealie meal is an item of food which is used by the major portion of the poorer section of this country, and yet what do I find in regard to price? In January, 1938, the wholesale price of mealie meal was 13s. 1d. per 100 lb. bag. In Desember that price had gone up to 18s. 11d. or say an average of 17s. 6d. for the year. Now, I know very well that we have serious trouble this year in getting supplies. I know the difficulty which the Minister’s Department has had to deal with this problem of short supplies, and I want to make a suggestion as to the way in which I think this thing should be tackled. I do not think it is going to be possible to prevent a strict rationing of meat in this country.

Whom do you want to ration?

One may hold up one’s hands in horror, but one thing is certain, that if the price of meat goes up much higher the poor section will not be able to buy it at all …

Whose fault is that?

And another point is this,—it does not matter—throughout the country as a whole the people are getting good wages, there is more money in circulation than ever before.

Speak for yourself.

And people are buying far more than they did in the past. Consumption has gone up enormously, and I venture to say that the consumption per head today in this country is far more than is normally needed by the average person out here …

What about your convoys?

Oh, yes, the convoys have taken a lot.

You say that the consumption is more than is necessary …

You are talking nonsense.

I am talking about the richer sections.

Is your point that the population is over fed?

No, some sections are getting far more meat than they need. And I say that if a strict form of rationing was introduced to provide that every person should have an adequate quantity of meat per week, I am perfectly certain that you would find that the total consumption would come down.

What about the farmers?

Of course the price would come down.

What about the profiteers?

The hon. member talks about profiteering. We had the report of an expert committee on that, and their finding was that there was no profiteering at all. I know that certain convoys did get meat and that there has been a shortage, but that does not affect the major question of rationing. The expert committee went into the position; they examined the prices from the wholesaler down to the retailer. They found that as far as the retailer was concerned, there was no profiteering, and with regard to certain wholesalers they were making huge profits out of convoys, but there was little evidence of other profiteering. Generally, I think we have to overhaul this question of the marketing system as far as the Department of Agriculture is concerned. I believe that not sufficient use is made of the business people in this country in organising schemes to distribute food products. It is not a question of profiteering. I would like to see—and it can be done—all your profits controlled. Profits in commerce are regulated today. No man in commerce today is allowed to get the same ratio of profits he did in the pre-war days.

He is allowed the same, though.

He may make increased profits by reason of an increased turnover, but he is not allowed to make an increased ratio of profit. His ratio of profit is decreased. I see no reason why it should not be extended right through. I would like to say, first of all, with regard to essential foodstuffs, that the Government should take over and purchase the existing stocks, right through the country, of various commodities. They should take that over at certain prices. You will have a ceiling price fixed for it, and if there is a loss the Government will have to stand it. It does seem rather drastic, but I want to point out that we are today faced with costs of living allowances going up, and these costs of living allowances are rather increased by the costs of food, and if we can take any steps in this country to bring down the cost of food, if we can bring down the costs of living, we would be able to reduce the cost of living allowances considerably.

What about rents?

Rents have already been curtailed and reduced. I would submit that although the State may be faced with an expenditure of several millions a year to control the essential foodstuffs of the country, you are going to achieve a far better distribution. It is not going to cost the State in the long run as much as is anticipated, and you are going to create a very healthy position. Take butter, for instance. The price for butter today is 1s. 10d. per lb. If it can be reduced to 1s. 5d. per lb., it would involve a considerable loss, but there is or was a loss in sending butter overseas, and the loss will not be as great as may be expected. I want to urge the Government very seriously to consider this matter. I can say that throughout the country there is a growing demand that measures should be taken to control these prices. The Government will find ready support from the producer and retailer in the country, and I think that any measures taken to bring down the price of cost of living by reducing the price of essential foodstuffs, will be in the interests of the country as a whole.

I was surprised about the speech of the hon. member for Pretoria, Central (Mr. Pocock). He tried to argue two points. In the first place he said that this is a well-balanced Budget. As far as this is concerned, I must say that he either supports the Government implicitly or he does not know what appears in the Budget. The final point he made was a rather important one. He, who has no knowledge of the difficulties of the farmers outside, appears here as a front bencher on the other side and as a shadow member of the Cabinet to advocate the fixing of the price the farmer is to get for his products and that after it first has to be reduced before it is fixed. That shows that the hon. member, and I take it his Government too, is entirely unsympathetic towards the farming community, for if he knew anything about the difficulties of the farmer, he would not come here and draw comparisons between the farmer on the one hand and the general dealer or business man on the other hand. The dealer and the business man made pots of money and we also know how they made it. On the other hand we find the farmer who has to struggle all the time and who now sees a chance of selling some of his products, but they at once step in and want to reduce and fix the price the farmer is to receive. I, as a representative of that section of the population protest most strongly against anything of the sort. I do hope that the Government will not screw up its courage to do a thing like that. But I see a smile on the face of the Minister of Finance and I suppose he gives his assent to what the hon. member for Pretoria, Central said here. I now want to come back to the Budget itself. This Budget has been drawn up in a very clever way. It is one of the most unjust and unfair Budgets ever introduced in this House, especially if we take into account the taxes already imposed on the population. I want to refer the Minister to the Budget of last year. When he introduced those estimates he imposed new taxations on the people to the amount of £9,285,000. That was additional or new taxation. If we go through his Budget speech of last year we find that he said that there was a gap of £9,495,677 which had to be bridged. In reality it was only £9,250,000. That amount he obtained in the shape of new taxes which had to be paid during the current financial year. At the time I warned the Minister that he was making his estimate too high. I said at the time that he was over-estimating by about £5,000,000 and I added that it was unnecessary to burden the people with that additional amount. His intention of course was to be able to show an impressive surplus at the end of the year so as to prove that he is a wonderful Minister of Finance. I pointed out that when a Minister of Finance over-estimates it is to the detriment of the country because it puts an unnecessary burden on the taxpayer. The facts have shown that I was correct in my statement. The Minister announced that there was a surplus of £3,500,000 and then a further amount of £1,425,000, i.e. together an amount of about £4,925,000. That is the amount he over-estimated at the time. We know that he has already allocated a large part of that surplus, viz. £3,500,000 to Defence. In a way he therefore was correct. But allow me to point out here that, according to the policy of the Government the Minister of Finance should have worked matters on the fifty-fifty basis, namely 50 per cent. of the war expenditure to be paid out of loan funds and 50 per cent. out of revenue. In other words the Minister should not have used the whole £3,500,000 out of revenue but he should have used £1,750,000 of it. That is the share of the money which he should have allocated in accordance with the policy of the Government for meeting the deficit on Defence. I mention these figures in order to prove that I was correct at the time when I said that the Minister had made an overestimate to the tune of about £5,000,000 and that it would not be necessary to burden the people still more in that way. This year we find that the Minister is again estimating that he will have to impose new taxes to the amount of £9,195,000. If we take that together with the additional amount of taxation imposed last year, it means that during the past two years the Minister of Finance has imposed a burden of £18,480,000 on the population of our country by means of new taxes. Everybody will agree and will have to admit that ultimately this becomes an unbearable burden for the people, and when we say that the burden of taxation is becoming unbearable, as we do in our amendment, everybody will have to admit that we have the fullest right to do so and that our assertion is firmly based. It is an unheard-of thing not only in South Africa, but also in other countries that such a relatively high amount should be imposed on the people in the shape of new taxes within a period of two years. It may be that such high taxes are being imposed in England but we simply cannot justify them. It is unfair and unjust. I still want to point out to the Minister of Finance that he stated more or less as an afterthought that another £8,000,000 will be needed which he now wants to collect out of the pockets of the taxpayers. I maintain that that is not necessary. It looks really as if the Minister is trying to make the people believe something. He says that another £8,000,000 will be required and on what does he base this statement? He bases it on the excuse of the Government that we had £16,000,000 additional expenditure because we had the diaster of Tobruk and also because we took part in the conquest of Madagascar. That £16,000,000 was spent on those two things and that was the excuse, not only of the Minister of Finance, but of the Prime Minister also who pointed out that these additional amounts on the Defence Vote went to pay for those two important purposes. It was largely caused by those two things. If that is the case then I should like to say to the Minister of Finance, or I should like to hear from him why he repeats that amount of £16,000,000 this year again. That amount according to statements was spent on these two special matters and why should it appear again this year. He does not know what is going to happen or does the Minister want to intimate to the country that he is expecting a diaster like the one of Tobruk or that there will be another expedition of conquest like the one to Madagascar? I therefore maintain and my argument is well founded, that it is not necessary to repeat that amount of £16,000,000 again. If such conditions should again arise, then the Minister of Finance should again come to this House in order to ask for the necessary amount in additional estimates. But as that is not necessary now, and I strongly maintain that it is not necessary, it should not appear on the estimates. The Minister will admit that in accordance with his policy to take £8,000,000 of it out of revenue it means that the people will now be taxed with an additional amount of £8,000,000 quite apart from the further amount of £1,195,000, and it is not necessary. The people are stooping under an unbearable financial burden, and I make bold to say that this burden is of such a nature that it will become impossible for the people to bear it in future. I hope that the Minister will not go on with this amount of £8,000,000 for which he now wants to impose fresh taxation, so that the people need not carry that extra burden. I now want to go further and deal with the taxes which are being imposed on the people this year. I want to say that the taxes are being imposed in such a manner that I make bold to say that they bear unjustly and unfairly upon the people. Let us first of all take the gold mining tax. It has been increased by 2½ per cent.—that is all. On the original amount it is 12½ per cent. but on the total is is 2½ per cent. What is the reason for this increase being so insignificant as compared to the increase made in other taxes, especially taking into account that this is a strong and large industry. The Minister says that he made the increase not larger because both the income and the profits of the industry are rapidly decreasing. Is that actually the case or is it mere eyewash for the public. Is it true that the mines are yielding less and making less profits? I want to go into this point briefly. The yield of the Gold mines was 14,120,617 fine ounces.

What year are you referring to?

That was for the year 1942. The value of that production was £118,613,118. Now compare this with the figures for the year 1941 when they had a record yield of 14,386,361 fine ounces the value of which was £120,845,424. Let us analyse the position still further and see what kind of ore has been crushed by the mines. The grade of the ore has been lowered. They do not crush high grade ore at present, but only lower grade ore, and I shall prove it. The ore crushed this year was on the average of a yield of 4,050 dwt. per ton. When comparing that to the last year’s figures we find that last year the average grade was 4.127 dwt. per ton. The ore has therefore been reduced in grade. Why is that? They keep the high grade ore back and as soon as the war is over they are going to use that high grade ore with the idea to make the shares boom again and in that way cash in on the money which will flow from the pockets of the population of South Africa. The Minister should keep an eye on all these things but for some reason or other he does not maintain his grip on these matters. The gold mines are better informed about matters and they arrange their things in a cleverer way. One would naturally expect that, if the yield of mines is really less and the profits actually lower, they would also pay less in dividends on their shares. I want to quote a few examples. South African Lands paid 3s. per share in August last year and now 3s. 1-1/5d. Van Dyks paid out 7½d. in August and now 9d.; Vogels 9d. in August and now 10½d.; New Reefs 9d. in August and now 1s. 3d.; West Rand Consolidated 1s. in August and now 1s. 3d.; New Unions 3d. in August and now 4d.; Grootvleis 2s. 3d. in August and 2s. 6d. now; East Daggas 1s. 3d. in August and now 1s. 5½d.; Durban Deeps 1s. 9d. in August and now 2s. 3d. The House will therefore realise that if there had been an actual decrease in the income of the mines, these increased dividends would not have been paid. If they proceeded along conservative lines they would not have increased their dividends at a time like the present. The whole position is that the mines have made the Government believe that their yield and profits are sinking. They did so to give the Government a start, so that the Minister would treat them leniently when taxing them. The Minister should first have considered the matter and should then have gone into it thoroughly, for the way he is now acting here in distributing the taxes is not fair and just. I now want to come to another point. The hon. member for Krugersdorp (Mr. M. J. van den Berg) represents the Labour party on the Rand. He always tried to represent the workers, but with the additional salary he is receiving and also because of a few pips he wears on his shoulders, he now is a capitalist. We therefore cannot blame him that he no longer represents the workers. I want to tell him this. I do not know whether he knows that the working expenses of the mines have been reduced by £333,388. The working expenses have been forced down and one would expect that members of the Labour Party with a Minister in the Cabinet would not allow such a thing. As it is, however, it only shows that they are ignorant of these conditions and we therefore must not blame them. I now want to discuss the other taxes. In the case of the mines the increase is the least. The tax on companies has been increased by 14¼ per cent. on last years tax. The personal and excess profits taxes have been increased by 15 per cent. We now come to something which has struck me in particular, namely that the man with an income of £300 or £400 has to carry a very heavy increase. In this so-called well-balanced budget, as the hon. member for Pretoria, Central called it, we find that those people have to pay 50 per cent. more in taxation, whilst in the case of persons receiving £250 the increase is 66 2/3 per cent. Then the Minister of Finance comes along with a sort of sugar-coated pill—he is going to give one free meal a day to schoolgoing children. That is the alms he is dishing out. Give the alms to the coloureds. The Europeans do not want alms, but want decent wages so that they can feed their own children. That is the principle we stand for and the Minister should not try to keep the people quiet in that manner. He should not believe that he will be able to make the people believe that the Government is looking after the interests of the country. What else do we find? We find that a tax is being imposed on the publip by means of the Railways. The amendment clearly indicates that this is an evasion of the provisions of our Constitution and an unfair burden on the rural population. I have no objection to the Minister exempting season tickets. He also exempts tickets up to 10s. That means that people in the Western Province as far as Paarl or Wellington will not be affected. The whole of the Cape Peninsula is exempted. But the people in the rural districts are affected by it and that means that the Minister is discriminating between one tax payer and another. He at once imposes an additional burden on those who have to travel further by train. He is thereby hitting the farmers hard, for the farmer cannot obtain enough petrol to enable him to travel long distances by motor car. The magistrates have now been converted into a sort of idols in the rural areas. They have all the say. There are of course exceptions among them who treat the farmers decently. But when a farmer goes to a magistrate today he is received curtly. Members on the other side do not know it, for they do not come into contact with these people. I maintain that it is unfair now to impose a taxation on the people of the platteland, and especially on the farming population which does not possess motor cars, and even if they do have motor cars they cannot get petrol. If a farmer is sixty miles away from his village, how far can he go with his petrol? But the position is as follows. We are nearing a general election and the natives and coloureds of the Peninsula have to be pampered in order to keep members on the other side in their seats so that they may draw double salaries. What else do we find? We find that the poor man or woman in the rural areas whose only pleasure may be the writing of letters or he or she who is in Cape Town wanting to write a letter home …

Did you say he or she who are writing one another?

I do not know whether the Minister does so, but he would be more sensible if he did correspond with a girl. I understand he does not write letters so it does not affect him. In any case we are now again facing the question of taxation through postage stamps and this yields a fairly large amount. If we compare all these taxes with the burden imposed on the gold mines, an industry which yields £120,000,000 per annum and which sends out of the country £20,000,000 in annual dividends to investors abroad, then I think that everybody will admit that the taxes the Minister has imposed are not only ineffective but most unjust too. This is also very clear from what we read in the newspapers. Mining shares have advanced and the London newspapers write articles about the taxation on the mines being not so heavy after all. As far as this is concerned, I want to remark that I am glad that the Minister accepted my suggestion to increase the tax on foreign shareholders. He can increase it with another 12½ per cent. and I hope he will also accept this suggestion on my part and that he will do that rather than imposing such heavy taxes on the poor people, and I also hope that he will not, apart from the heavy taxation he places on the farmers, curb farming activities still more as suggested by the hon. member for Pretoria, Central, viz., by forcing down the prices of the farmers’ products, and then fixing them.

The hon. member for Prieska (Mr. Geldenhuys) posed here as an authority on mining taxation and mine dividends. I am not very conversant with the interests of the shareholders but I am conversant with the interests of the workers who extract the gold for the people who own the shares, amongst whom the hon. member for Prieska is such a prominent person. As far as that is concerned I cannot compare myself with him; there the hon. member meets me on unequal terms. But if he wants to say something in regard to the interests of the mine workers then I can discuss that matter with him.

It is a pity that I have to teach you in regard to such matters.

The hon. member says that it is a pity he has to teach and assist me in regard to these matters. I did my best to learn something from him but nothing emerged from his speech from which I could learn something. He said something personal in regard to myself, but I do not think it is necessary to reply to that. Allow me, before I come to the Budget, to say something in general about the attitude of the Opposition. They have again changed their opinion. It is very difficult when the Opposition constantly change their opinion in regard to the big questions at issue. If they accept once and for all, just as the Government side, a definite policy and stand or fall by it, then a person knows where he stands in regard to the Opposition. But here we heard that the hon. member for George (Mr. Werth) stated: He has changed his opinion somewhat because Russia came into the war. But he did not say what his attitude now is in comparison with his original attitude. The main reason which members on the other side advanced why they did not want to support the Government’s war effort was because they said that it is England’s war and England must pay until her funds have been exhausted. We have heard that remark ad nauseum but now my hon. friend comes here and he says that they have changed somewhat. The hon. friends on the other side dance to the tunes played by Zeesen. As the position changes there, so they also change here. Now my friends on the other side, we have had it from speaker after speaker, are afraid of Communism and they line up in rows to practise target shooting at their own shadows, and then they say: Look at the Communists there!

You look very much like one.

My hon. friend sees his reflection in me. He looks into the mirror and then he mistakes himself for a Communist; he looks into the mirror, and then he says: That fellow Van den Berg looks like a Communist. They have carried on about the Communistic stories ad nauseum, and they want to frighten the Government with their own shadow. No, those members change as the position overseas changes. At first they were neutral. Now the hon. member for George says, now that Russia is in the war, they have changed somewhat. Therefore, if I understand them correctly, then they say that they were neutral at first, but now they take up a different attitude because Russia is in the war. What does the opinion which they now hold mean? If they are no longer neutral, what, then, is their opinion? It is a pity that the hon. member for George could not be here, and the other hon. members on the opposite side are remaining quiet. If they are no longer neutral, are they now in favour of active participation, and on what side? On the side of Germany? The hon. member for George is the official mouthpiece of the Opposition. He says that they are no longer neutral; they have changed somewhat because Russia is in the war, and they now want to take active participation on the side of Germany? Members on the other side owe us a reply on this question. Let us take the position into review. I consider that there is a very small portion of the followers of the Opposition members who will agree with them on that opinion. If they want to take an active part on the side of the enemy, then they will receive a terrible shock, because, according to the official declaration of the Opposition, they are no longer neutral, because their position has changed somewhat. They do not say whether they now support the opinion of this side. They justify their standpoint against Russia; in other words, they are now for Germany.

But you are now contradicting your friends on the other side.

Mr. Speaker, you remember when the war against Russia had been in progress for two months, Zeesen broadcast this: The Soviet army has been wiped out; the Russian army is something of the past. Then they pretended here that they stood on the side of the triumphant Germany. Now the German forces are squealing and calling in assistance; now they say that the Communistic danger is going to destroy the world. That is the Power, which, according to them, was wiped out completetly. Now that Goebbels and Goering are moaning for assistance, the hon. friends on the other side are squealing and saying that we must look at the great Communistic danger. They blame us if we do not want to look at their shadows at which they are busy practising target shooting at. Speaker after speaker on that side has stood up and said that we must go down on our knees and beg for peace from King Hitler. At that time they said it was not only a question of conditions; the question was on what conditions Hitler would grant us peace. Germany had triumphed, and that was their attitude then. Now they say that Germany and the world is in danger, that the Power of the Soviet is threatening the world. They dance here according to the tune played by Goebbels and Goering. The position has definitely been reversed. Let us now see what the position is of members on the other side. They have now also a totally different opinion, and that is why we find it so difficult to reply to them. The one day they stand on the one side, and the other day they stand on the other side. They cannot take up a consistent attitude and adhere to it. I do not blame members on the other side because they made a mistake. It is human to make a mistake, but I do blame them because they refuse to be convinced and to admit that they made a mistake; that they possess that stubbornness, and, that, despite all these facts, they do not’ want to admit that they were wrong. Every person can make a mistake. Now they want to justify their standpoint by referring to the Communistic danger. That is a matter to which we have already become accustomed. When it suits a party, then it speaks about the Communistic danger. When a black Communistic danger for South Africa is referred to, then my friends must not close their eyes. There is no danger of Communism, but there is the danger of a black Fascism.

Why?

Because there are Europeans in the country who make propaganda for the doctrines of Fascism. Our friends of the Opposition change of opinion and I should just like to express the hope that they will take up a consistent attitude in the future. What is the position of their followers today? They must say today: Look, those people have given us the wrong lead; they said Germany will achieve the victory and one day will have all the say here too, and now they are saying again that Russia is the danger. At first they said that it would be the might of Germany which was going to triumph, and now they say that it is the forces of Russia.

Who said that?

The members on the other side who now indicate that they are afraid of the Communistic danger.

When the business was suspended, I was busy showing how my hon. friends on the other side had changed their opinion. I want to round off that allegation with a final proof that when the treaty between Germany and Russia was in existence, there was still less talk of Communism and Communistic danger in South Africa. Then it was not referred to. Even then the leading articles of the newspapers which make propaganda for the opinion of my hon. friends went so far as to say this—

Now that the triumphant Germans are fleeing and a cry of distress went out on the part of Germany, my hon. friends begin to refer to the Communistic danger. I hope that in the future they will cease to put up nine pins and to knock them down for political pleasure and to practise target shooting at their own shadows. There is postively no Communistic danger in South Africa but there is a danger of black Fascism in South Africa. My hon. friends must be careful of that. Before I refer to the Budget I consider that it is becoming of me to say a word of appreciation on behalf of the electors of Krugersdorp to all the soldiers who have taken part in the struggle up to the present. I think that the soldiers of South Africa have once again achieved a wonderful prestige on the battlefields; they demonstrated to the rest of the world that they did not go there purely for adventure but that they went there to wage the struggle against Fascism and Nazism until both are destroyed. When the war broke out, my hon. friends of the Opposition said: You are going to fetch the enemy and you are going to bring him here; you will bring the enemy here and the enemy will come here. But what happened then? The enemy was pushed further and further back and the danger grew less and less, and the enemy subjects who were here—they are now in the prisoner of war camps—are the only enemy subjects in this country and not as stated by my hon. friends on the other side that the enemy will come here in triumph. Not even at this juncture is the Opposition prepared to admit that the country has to thank the soldier for the fact that the country can still live in prosperity and security today; thanks are due to the soldiers that my hon. friends opposite are still busy today making pots and pots of money. Now I should like to consider the budget. As a war budget it succeeds in its purpose of providing the necessary funds for the prosecution of the war but I do not agree with the increase in taxation on the worker. I do not agree with it. The increase in taxation in the case of a person with an income of less than £600 is under these circumstances not justified. Today an enormous amount of money can be collected for war purposes, for social betterment, for social security; an enormous amount of money can be collected for the extension of manufacturing industries and that is why I should like to suggest that the taxation should only be increased in the case of that person who receives more than £600 a year and not in the case of persons who earn less than £600. Therefore I disapprove very strongly of the taxation on a person who earns less than £600. I am in favour of the taxation being increased pro rata from £600 to £5,000 and I am of opinion and recommend that every penny in excess of £5,000 should be taken by taxation. I know that perhaps you will not like that but I say that every penny in excess of £5,000 ought to be taken. That money can be utilised more effectively for the prosecution of the war; I say take every penny in excess of £5,000 and utilise it for war purposes, for the erection of factories and for social security in the country. Those are sources from which the Minister can obtain money; do not increase the taxation on the person on whom the burden is already resting so heavily. There is a lot of money in the country which the owners are saddled with today. They do not know what to do with it. But instead of the Minister of Finance milking that big, very fat full udder cow, he sits in the shade of the cow and milks the cats; in other words he is milking where there is no milk to be found to the consternation of the cat and amusement of the cow. The Minister of Finance may, perhaps, ask what right have I got to say that. I take a lot of notice of what the hon. member for Maitland (Mr. Mushet) says. The hon. member for Maitland told us here that the Chamber of Commerce and those people who possess money suggested that the Government should take from them everything which it needs in order to see the war through to a conclusion; in other words the rich people suggested, but the Minister declined, that offer and the poor man has to be taxed more heavily. The cow with the big full udder wonders why the Minister does not milk her.

You consider this is a cat’s Budget.

That is why I say that the Minister is busy taxing where the burden is already greatest, and where there can very easily be an increase of taxation, there we do not find it. The soldier is the one who has had to bear the brunt of it so far in the war. He is not only called up to fight but now this taxation is also forced on to him and the rich man who, until now, has experienced unprecedented prosperity and who has not fought is, to a great extent, exempted from that burden. The person who has already placed his life in danger, the man who has already done everything in his power, is still being taxed and the person who has experienced unprecedented prosperity in this war is not affected. That is why I suggest, and I say that we must consider—I know that now I have not got many friends—introducing the English system here and to take every penny in excess of £5,000. Why not? I want to put myself for a moment in the position of some hon. members who will say you must not take the income in excess of £5,000. I think this system works very well in Engeland and I cannot see any reason why it will not work very well in South Africa or even better because the rich people completely escape today. The Chamber of Mines is passing through a glorius time; the people who speculate are passing through an unprecedented enjoyable time. So far as they are concerned the war can continue; it does not make any difference to them but the poor person who has to pay taxation on a glass of beer or who has to pay taxation on cigarettes feels it. The hon. the Minister of Finance may perhaps say the poor man can go without those things, that they are luxury articles. But now I should like to ask, and the soldiers of the country ask it: Must I fight to make the country secure just for the rich man so that he can enjoy luxuries while I am not entitled to enjoy those luxuries. No, there is no justice. This country has no right to impose further taxation on the things which are used by the ordinary man every day, tobacco, cigarettes and other articles which the poor person uses. No, I trust that the House will not approve of that. Then there is another point against which I wish to protest. It has already been mentioned by this side of the House, viz. that we disapprove very strongly of the taxation on railway tickets. South Africa is a big country and a country of vast distances and this is a matter on which I have consistantly clashed with the Government for many years when they impeded travelling facilities and transport. The travelling facilities are already restricted. There is a tax on petrol and now, in addition, the Minister wants to tax railway train tickets. That is definitely wrong. There are people who work for a year to save a few pounds and who are then at the end of the year barely in a position to take their families away for a holiday. To proceed now and to impose a tax on railway fares, on that — I hope that it will be opposed more and more in this House until the Minister will decide to abandon that taxation.

Are you going vote against it?

No, the double salary.

You can argue just as much as you like but there is only one just form of taxation viz. income tax. The other taxations, on tobacco and on matches, and on foodstuffs, only affects the poor man; the food account of the rich man is slightly increased without him feeling it. I am in favour of income tax. I am further, and it will perhaps meet with considerable opposition in the House, in favour of a tax on capital.

What about a land tax?

I have just been waiting for that question. I know it is a very sore point with hon. members on the other side. They do not want a tax on land, and land taxation forms part of capital taxation. But I want to ask hon. members who are so touchy in regard to the land tax if they are against a company which possesses 12,000,000 morgen of land, which is does not work but which is just lying idle, being taxed? Do you see there is now silence in the Court? To that question one cannot receive a reply. I want to ask hon. members whether land which is not occupied or worked should not be taxed because then the landlords who put their capital into land will also have a turn at paying. But that is an old matter of dispute. From childhood days I have heard how hon. members on the other side were against the tax on land. I am in favour of a tax on land which is not worked. Capital must be taxed and then you will find that there will not be so many people escaping as do escape under the present system of taxation who ought to pay. Naturally I also pay just as other members on the other side pay, and I am thankful I can pay my small share because then I at least have the consolation that I had it. But I raise objection against the position that other people with three and four and six times as much income, escape. If you have a tax on capital and they can no longer hide their losses by allowing for lambs which die, lambs which they probably never had, or expenses in connextion with the head of a windmill which was damaged, or the strap for fastening the linchpin of the wagon which broke, then they will also have to contribute their reasonable share.

Tell us how you earn your double salary.

Is the hon. member now speaking about his Leader.

He works for his salary.

I also work for my salary, and I think that we can leave it to the country to judge which one of the two of us works hardest for what we receive out of the Consolidated Revenue. I or the hon. member who sometimes gets a brief from the Government.

What do you do for your mliitary salary?

There is another matter to which I should like to draw attention, and that is the food problem. The Minister of Agriculture said to me: Leave the problem to me, and to my Department. I wish we could leave it to them. Now, I should like to say that I do not want to attack the Minister as such. I am afraid that the Department of Agriculture will wear out this Minister, just as it has worn out other Ministers of Agriculture, until later the Minister will not be able to go a step forward. If the Minister says that his Department and the Secretary for Agriculture are in a position to solve the difficult marketing problem, then they must prove it. They have had years in which to do it, good years, normal years, bumper years, and lean years; but one scheme after the other of the Department of Agriculture was a failure, and they must still prove that they can do it. Without wishing to boast, I want to challenge the Department to make a success of it. Up to the present they have made a failure of it. Let us take the matter which was referred to by the hon. member for Pretoria, Central (Mr. Pocock), viz., meat. When we see that the Department of Agriculture, with all its marketing schemes and all its control measures until the present has arranged matters so that there is a gap of from 400 per cent. and 500 per cent. between what the producer of the sheep gets and what the consumer in the towns must pay, then the Minister cannot blame us when we say that until such time as his Department proves the contrary, we cannot place confidence in the Department. The public share the opinion that the Minister’s Department is not competent to solve it. But I am afraid I am up against a cement wall. The Minister is also up against the wall. The Minister will perhaps say: What must I do if the officials do not succeed and are not competent to find a solution while they are being paid for the work? I must honestly say that I also do not know what you can do with them. That is the difficulty. I am afraid that is the difficulty which you have in many departments. An official reaches a certain stage and becomes head of a department, and whether he is competent or incompetent, if he knows as little as I do or just as much as the Minister, he must remain in that position, and that is how we struggle along. The Control Boards were a failure, and the dissatisfaction amongst the consumers and producers has continually increased. Allow me to point out what signs of weakness a person finds in the Department. A few months ago we had the difficulty in connection with meat. What did the Department do? They fixed the price. Then the wholesalers in the meat trade organised an agitation of public opinion in such a manner that the wholesalers were able to refuse to supply sheep to the retailers, so that when the public came for mutton they could not obtain it. The result was that the public became dissatisfied, and the aim of the wholesalers was to create a tremendous agitation on the part of the public, so that the Minister would be compelled thereby to allow the wholesalers to have their way, and so that they, if they succeeded in achieving their purpose, could say: We have now proved that we are the bosses and we will dictate. And there was a 99.999 chance that they would have succeeded in achieving their purpose of inciting the people against the Government, because the traders would not subject themselves to the price fixation, and today the position is still just as unsatisfactory as ever, in spite of the control measures, etc. You still find markets which are over-supplied and others, where at certain times, no meat is to be obtained, and the prices are still terribly high. I am not looking for a quarrel with the Minister, but I think the public of South Africa feel that the Minister’s Department had many opportunities, but you can place 100 Ministers in his position, and before they are there very long, because they run up against a wall of officials, all the Ministers will be unpopular with the public in general and with the farmers. And the Minister receives the blame. I want to say today that the blame must be placed somewhere else. Events since 1937 prove that. There were normal times, when there was no war, there were good times, and all the time they achieved nothing. If there are good times, then they cry about over-production. If there are lean times, then the Department complains that they cannot obtain sufficient supplies. The Department in no circumstances is in a position to master the problem. The onus rests on the Administration to prove that they are in a position to control marketing in an effective manner. Do not say that the public are whining for no reason, do not say that the farmers are always unreasonable when they complain. They cannot all be wrong all the time. The tree is known by its fruit, but the Department of Agriculture, with its successive Secretaries has failed to obtain its purpose. There are the malpractices on the Witwatersrand and elsewhere of excessively high prices and bad distribution. In conclusion I should like, so far as social security is concerned, once again to express the earnest desire that the Government must in the quickest manner possible give attention to that matter. The sooner something is done, the better for the country. I do think that the matter should not be rushed, but I should like to repeat again that we must not kill that idea, the golden idea of social security, by our slowness.

After listening to the hon. member for Krugersdorp (Mr. M. J. van den Berg) one can only exclaim: “How pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity”. I shall come back to his speech just now, but I first want to point out the following. The hon. member attacked us first of all because of our attitude towards Communism, and he said that when we see our own shadow we imagine it is a communist ghost running around. The hon. member even went further and said that when I watch my own shadow I think it is Van den Berg, the Communist, running behind me. I want to ask you, Mr. Speaker, in all sincerity, whether this is not a case of libel. I am hereby reminded of something else which happened in this House when the question of the women’s franchise was under discussion and when you were in the Chair. At that time there was another member, a very good chap, who also was not exactly an Adonis or Narcissus, and he asked you to look at him and to tell him which woman, if he voted in favour of the women’s suffrage, would vote for him? I hope the hon. member for Krugersdorp will take that to heart.

I bet you I shall get more votes from women than you will.

As far as the hon. member’s attack on the Budget is concerned, I hope that the Minister of Finance has listened and I hope that the Prime Minister has listened. You will remember the Prime Minister a few weeks ago boasting with a beaming face of the unity of the party behind him. How united they are, appears from the fact—not to speak of other unpleasant comparisons—that the hon. member for Krugersdorp told the Minister of Finance that he is also sitting in the shadow and milking cats. I have known for a long time that this cat-milking business will in the end develop into a fight of cats and dogs on the other side. We have witnessed it today. Whilst listening further to the hon. member for Krugersdorp, I came to the conclusion that they are now demanding from the Prime Minister not only 15 seats but 16 seats. I hope that the Minister of Finance when he imagines that his Budget has met with general approval, as the hon. member for Kensington intimated, will also consider to some extent what the hon. member for Krugersdorp said and that he will realise that the general opinion in his own ranks is not that his budget was very good. I hope he does not imagine that his budget is popular with all sections of the population. The hon. member for Krugersdorp and other hon. members we have listened to so far, intimated that the Minister’s budget was only going to place an unbearable burden on the country. As far as the budget itself is concerned, I first of all want to ask the Minister why the Loan Estimates have not been tabled at the same time. It has happened a few times already that we had to conduct a budget debate without having the Loan Estimates in front of us. There is no reason for this procedure. When we take part in this debate, we ought to know what the Loan Estimates amount to and how matters are. The Minister undoubtedly will have some excuse, but whatever it may be, it is wrong and he ought to see to it that the House will not be treated in such manner in the future and that we shall have the Loan Estimates as well as the Main Estimates in front of us. As far as the budget is concerned we demand that in the spheres of economy, social welfare and industry reconstruction of a comprehensive nature shall take place, in order first of all to put an end to the existing evils of inequality, in order to eradicate the oppressing poverty and to obtain a fair distribution of the essential commodities of life, at the same time developing positively and effectively all sources of production and welfare in such a manner that they will be serving the common good and will be yielding a maximum measure of advantage and blessings for the people of the country in social, material and spiritual respect. In South Africa this is especially essential for the following reasons. First of all South Africa is agriculturally poor and our population is consequently poor. South Africa has a poor rainfall and quality of soil when compared to other countries. For that reason we have unheard-of poverty in South Africa; for that reason we only have a white population of 2¼ million although Europeans have come to South Africa since 1652 and it has been a European state since that time. Another reason why it is doubly essential in South Africa is that for the creation of new sources of wealth and income, as for instance by the construction of large irrigation works and the establishment of industries and factories and the development of the riches of the soil, both in regard to base and precious metals, there is only one possibility, and that is that it be undertaken by the State or otherwise by the big capitalists. If there is one thing we do not want then it is that these sources should be developed further by big capitalists. Another reason is that, according to the Government’s own Planning Council, when this war finishes, we shall be saddled with 230,000 unemployed Europeans who will be like uprooted plants and for whom a solution will have to be found. On top of that we have the position that one of the most important sources of income so far, viz. the gold mining industry, is a disappearing asset—the Government’s own expert maintains that a considerable decrease in the production of gold has to be reckoned with during the next ten years. If we realise the part which the gold mines in particular has played in the past to secure the slight measure of welfare we did enjoy, then we also realise the disaster which will be facing us if that source of income will begin disappearing rapidly during the next ten years, which will be the case according to the warnings of experts. We cannot afford to wait with the absolutely essential reconstruction and development in the economic, industrial and social spheres until the war is over. Then it will be too late to begin. You will then have a state of chaos and revolution. Our plans in this respect have to be laid down now; the policy of the Government has to be formulated and the machinery should now be set up and put into motion. As far as the budget is concerned, it is itself a reflection of the Government’s economic and social policy also in this connection. What do we find? In the estimates we find hardly a trace of these things. In the budget not the slightest notice is taken of it, there is not the slightest indication that the Government realises the position and there is no indication of what the Government intends doing in this connection and what its policy is. The Minister of Finance, and in this connection it goes for the whole Government, do not worry about tomorrow—they are only dealing with the present. That was also the reason why the first speaker who stood up in the benches opposite tried to defend the Government and his only cry and excuse was “War, war and war again.” The same applies to the hon. member for Maitland (Mr. Mushet). He is so overwhelmed by the idea of war that in his speech he clean forgot that this is a budget debate, and instead of the hon. member rather withdrawing and sitting down quietly in order to reflect upon his responsibilities in regard to the matters that came out in the debate on the cost-plus contracts, the hon. member used the Budget debate to again discuss that subject here. His whole speech was another attempt, not to reply to the speech of the hon. member for George (Mr. Werth) in connection with the Estimates, but to refute the speeches of the hon. member for George in regard to the cost-plus question. That was his attempt, in which he fared badly. The hon. member for Maitland apparently does not yet know the difference between cost-plus and cost-plus-a-percentage. In spite of that, he constitutes himself as an expert on economic matters. The hon. member for Kensington, on the other hand, intended to make a speech in which he wanted to deal slightingly with this side of the House. He has nothing to do with us, but what did his speech amount to?

I only had 40 minutes.

What was the result? He is also imbued with the war spirit, and he became so embarrassed that he forgot his whole speech and held an entirely new speech in order to reply to the hon. member for George, to the accusations and analysis of the position by the hon. member for George. I again say that in this Budget we do not get the slightest indication that the Government possesses any scheme or policy in regard to these matters. Here and there we come across a poor effort, like the few million pounds made available for Iscor and the Industrial Development Corporation, and the promise that every school-going child will receive one meal per day at some future time. We do not raise the slightest objection to poor children being given food when they do not get food at home. We are even in favour of grown-up people, who have no food, receiving food from the Government. But surely that is not a policy for the future, that is not a salvation of the people. The policy should be to enable the parents to earn the necessary money themselves, so that they themselves can provide their children with a decent meal. Then there are the war veterans’ pensions, which are going to be increased by one-third, after all the promises and soft talk we had. That aspect of the matter I shall deal with afterwards. At the moment I first want to deal with another matter in connection with the Budget, and I want to put the blame on the Government that during the past few years; whilst the war was being waged they wasted the assets of the country in a manner which will be an eternal disgrace to them. The total war expenditure till the end of the coming financial year will amount to £329,000,000. Within a period of four years £329,000,000 has been made available for prosecuting the war, but the Government cannot spare more than £80,000 per annum to give to the war veterans. The Government can spend £329,000,000 on the war, but not more than £80,000 on the war veterans. I want to ask the Minister of Finance whether he has already tried to visualise what South Africa would have been like if this £329,000,000 had been used to develop South Africa socially, economically and agriculturally; if these £329,000,000 which have disappeared through the muzzles of guns, had been used to develop South Africa’s resources, its wealth of base and precious metals. Can you visualise what a paradise South Africa would have been as compared to what it is today? All these schemes of development we continually put before this Government and previous Governments. The reply was always that there was no money, but this Government sees fit to find £329,000,000 to take part in a war which is not in our interest. As far as the public debt is concerned, I shall be glad if the Minister will correct me where necessary. According to these Estimates, the public debt stands at £422,000,000 in round figures, but according to the White Paper laid on the Table on the same day he made his Budget speech, it amounts to £426,689,000, a difference of approximately £5,000,000.

I mentioned the correct figure in my Budget speech.

That means we now have three figures. Which is the correct one? I, furthermore, want to point out that provision is made in the Estimates for the payment of just over £14,000,000 in respect of interest on the growing public debt which now stands at £422,000,000. But if the figure of £426,689,000 mentioned in the White Paper should be the correct one, then the Minister has estimated £150,000 too little in his Budget, for the interest on the extra £5,000,000 has to be added. The Minister reckons that he will borrow another £55,000,000 this year, so that the public debt at the end of the coming financial year will amount to £470,968,000 nett, or nearly £471,000,000. This in itself is most alarming. On the 31st March, 1940, the public debt stood at £283,000,000. Now it will be £471,000,000, an increase of £190,000,000 within a period of four years. This is really nerve-shaking. And along with the debt, the interest to be paid rises from year to year. Reckoning this at an average interest of 3⅓ per cent., it means an interest of £5,700,000 and if this war goes on for another two years and we go on spending at the same rate, we shall have to make provision for an interest payment of at least £17,500,000 every year. Do you realise that this is so to say equal to the total estimates of South Africa shortly after the coming of Union? Can you visualise what the position of our country is going to be when the war is over and the period of inflation is past and when the years of spending these millions, which the Minister now needs for the war, are over and we shall have to pay annually an amount of £17,500,000 in interest on the public debt? And if the war should last much longer, that amount of interest may easily reach the £20,000,000 figure. What is the position of our country going to be if after the war this enormous amount in interest has to be paid. I can well imagine that even long after the death of the present Minister of Finance posterity will not cherish his memory. As far as the taxation burden is concerned the hon. member for George and other hon. members have already reviewed the position. I only want to emphasise that these taxes are especially affecting the poor man. The poor man who drinks his beer, who smokes cigarettes, who drinks brandy and smokes a pipe, he is being taxed in the same measure as the rich man. I want to lay stress upon one aspect, namely the 15 per cent. levy on railway tickets. The hon. member for George told the minister that this Budget was a scrape-together-budget, a budget of bits and pieces. It is an unjust and unfair budget, for it imposes this unjust tax of 15 per cent. on railway tickets. Why should the people who, living near the large towns, already enjoy a lower tariff on the railways than the people who live far away, why should the people living near the large towns where there is much traffic and where they pay a lower tariff on the basis of a mile, ten miles or twenty miles, again be exempted from this tax, seeing that they already enjoy a lower tariff? Why should the woman who comes to Cape Town every day to buy goods, or who comes now and again, pay the tax when her ticket is more than 10s. whilst the people living here around the town and who also have to come in every day, are exempted? On what basis can the Minister justify it? Another question is: Why should the poor man who travels second class but not first class, but who is just as poor under the present Government as the native and the coloured man, why should he have to pay a tax whilst the natives and coloureds need not pay it. He is just as poor as they are, but on account of his status of European he has to travel second class and has to pay the 15 per cent. tax, whilst the natives and coloureds who travel third class need not pay it. How on earth can the Minister justify it? This is discrimination. I now want to come back to the industrial development of our country and I want to say that there is lack of positive policy in this respect on the part of the Government. On a previous occasion I already pointed to this lack of a positive policy in the furtherance of our industries on the part of the Government, whilst we must emphasise our need for such a policy. It is obvious that we have to develop our country industrially when we look at one large problem only, viz. that South Africa can today hardly supply the means of existence to two million Europeans. Against these two million Europeans we have eight million non-Europeans and if we take into account the British territories of Swaziland, Bechuanaland and Basutoland, the two million whites are facing ten or twelve million non-Europeans. If we take the whole of Africa into account, then we have the position that we are a few million whites against 200,000,000 non-Europeans. This in itself is sufficient reason why everybody should realise that South Africa must be developed in such a manner that it can provide a living for a much larger white population than two millions. It cannot do so in the field of agriculture. Everybody knows that South Africa is so poor agriculturally that it cannot provide a living for a larger agricultural population. The gold mining industry is a dwindling asset. The Government’s own experts declare that the gold mining industry will dwindle considerably during the next ten years. That source of wealth is drying up. The only thing possible is therefore the industrial development of South Africa on a large scale and to the fullest extent. The only way out is that we exploit our base minerals and metals, that we develop our factories and industries, so that we shall have a larger industrial population, and when we have achieved that we shall be able to have further expansion of agriculture too. I need not emphasise this further. The Government’s Industrial and Agricultural Requirements Commission did so already. May I just read what that Commission stated in this connection. On page 83 the Commission’s report reads—

There you have it. And then follows the recommendation—

After this report it is not necessary for me or other members on this side to emphasise the need for industrial development in South Africa. The Government’s own Commission advocates it and point to the fact that a policy of developing our industries is warranted by the country’s industrial potentialities. On a previous occasion I already said that in South Africa we unfortunately had the position that the development in the industrial field has lately been retarded. I want to repeat that. It is being retarded mainly because we are considered to be a subdivision of the British Empire. In the past the British Empire derived its greatest power and wealth not from its own soil, but from its colonies and dependencies and also from other parts of the world where it had invested money, and owing to the economic hold on those countries, it obtained from those countries the raw materials which it processed in its industries into finished articles, which in turn again were sent to the same countries in order to be sold in those markets. In other words, the British Empire played the part of middleman and through generations and generations earned millions of pounds in that manner. According to the Royal Institute for International Affairs the British Empire had invested abroad not less than £3,726,000,000 in 1930. Can we now imagine the tremendous hold the British Empire had on those countries as a result of these investments? Apart from the influence it exercised, it meant according to the Royal Institute of International Affairs that England received an annual income from her investments abroad of not less than £200,000,000. It should be clear to everybody that, apart from the political influence, England in this manner exercised a tremendous influence on those countries by capitalistic wire-pulling behind the scenes, and that it retarded industrial development in countries such as South Africa by every possible means. It does not help to deny it. English industrialists who want to be impartial, will admit that this is the case. We had the experience in South Africa. We know all about the struggle the Nationalist Party had from 1924 tot 1932 in connection with the industrial development of our country. We know how the Imperialists and capitalists from the other side fought tooth and nail against our industrial policy, against the protectionist policy of the old Nationalist Party. I now ask: What hope have we got, and I want to ask the country, what hope has the country as such got that we shall have the necessary industrial development here, the development which is emphasised today by the Government’s own commission, and without which we shall not be able to have a happy and a white South Africa in the future; what hope do we have that we shall obtain that development if the present Government should remain in power? I go even further and ask what hope do we have, if the political stranglehold of the British Empire on South Africa should continue, that those things will be established. I say today that if that should happen, then all these projects are and will remain dreams; then all the speeches in connection with this problem are but rhetoric platitudes. In this regard I want to read something from the periodical “Industry and Trade” of January, 1943. That journal writes under the heading “Platitudinous Rhetoric”—

That is the position. If that hold of the British Empire on our country has to continue, and if this Government has to remain in power, then our industrial development in South Africa will be an empty dream. In this connection I also want to read to you what the British Minister of Finance, Sir Kingsley Wood, said the other day in the British House of Commons. He said the following (translation)—

It may become dangerous! And now listen—

There you have it. If the British Empire succeeds in keeping its hold it will mean that we shall have to fight the same struggle again; the same political and economic influence will be brought to bear on us in order to impede the industrial development of South Africa and to keep it in check. If we in South Africa, if the Argentine, where England has invested much money, if Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and India should become independent in industrial matters, and were to manufacture themselves the articles which used to be imported from Britain in the past, England must inevitably go under. If England and the British Empire should remain standing and continue to maintian their stranglehold, then it will in all ways and manners, and with all the power at its disposal, devise and put into action schemes which will retard, and if necessary prevent, this industrial development in other parts of the world. I am not worrying about what the Minister of Finance and the friends on the other side may say about this, for I am certain of one thing, and that is that the stranglehold of the British Empire on South Africa and on other parts of the world, both in economic and political respect, is dwindling. That political hold on South Africa and on other countries is rapidly dwindling. I do not want to dwell on this point, but rather proceed to the economic stranglehold. I maintain the economic hold of the British Empire over others is also beginning to disappear. In 1913 Great Britain had investments in South Africa amounting to £370,000,000. In 1930 those investments of the British Empire in South Africa had decreased to £263,000,000. It had therefore been reduced by £107,000,000. I make bold to say that this was largely the result of Nationalism which in those years was developing in South Africa. This war is speeding up the process. In this connection I want to focus the attention of the House on a few matters. The investments of the British Empire in the United States amounted to just over £200,000,000. Not a penny of that amount is left. It has been used and liquidated in order to provide Great Britain with credits for war purposes.

Was that also the result of the coming into power of Nationalism?

That shows you what the Minister of Native Affairs is capable of. This Government may be the cause that Britain has used and liquidated its investments in America. In the Argentine the same process is going on. We know what happened in India. During the few years of the war India paid off its total indebtedness of £350,000,000 to Britain. British investments in the public debt of India have disappeared altogether. That source of revenue has disappeared. The same process is going on in Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. I want to refer to South Africa. In South Africa the Minister paid off debts; he reduced our foreign debt to Britain by £69,000,000, and only £16,000,000 remain. Whether they like it or not, it is essential for Great Britain to use its foreign investments and to liquidate them in order to obtain credit for the war. This as far as loans are concerned. What is the position of other investments in South Africa? Until a few years ago 60 per cent. of our mining shares were held by investors abroad. Now the reverse is the case. The majority of shares are in the hands of people within South Africa. Do you know why? In England the burden of taxation is so heavy, that the English owners of these shares were forced to sell and liquidate them, and those shares are being bought by people in South Africa. In that respect, too, England’s hold on South Africa is beginning to vanish. The war speeds up this process. England’s influence in the world will disappear, and with it its political influence. I now come to my last question to the Minister of Finance. Why is he so secretive about the repayment of Government loans in England? I was not here when he made his Budget speech, but I read through the report of that speech, and I could not find a single word in it with regard to the £39,000,000 which the Minister paid off. There was not a word about it. What is the Minister’s policy in this connection? He paid off those loans, and I understand that some of those loans were repayable in 1970 only. I have here a list of them. One was repayable in 1964, another one in 1965, and, further more, others in 1975, 1973, and 1970. Twenty and thirty years before the time the Minister pays back those loans. He says that it is in the interest of the country. We are also in favour of wiping off completely our foreign debt. That will make us economically more autonomous and independent. But there is another aspect of the matter to which I wish to refer. Is the same thing going to happen after this war as happened after the last war, namely, that England refuses to pay its foreign debt? Its indebtedness to America is going to be higher than after the last war, and everybody knows that what happened after that war is going to happen again after this one. England will not pay its debt to America. But we find now that our Minister is paying back our debt to England thirty years before the time. If England has the moral right to refuse to pay its debt to America, surely we have the same moral right to refuse to pay our debt to England, in view of all the services we have already rendered in this war? Why is the Government, by paying back those loans so prematurely, throwing away the opportunity it still has to get some compensation for the /sacrifices South Africa made? I do hope the Minister will shed more light on this aspect of the matter. If the Minister does not want to take our word for it, if he does not believe us when we say that the people outside are damning this Budget, then he should at least listen to what the people on his own side have to say about the Budget and about these taxation proposals; he should take notice of the protests from his own ranks. I want to predict that the protest which came from the hon. member for Krugersdorp is not going to be the only protest. Similar protests will come from other members, too, against this unfair and unjust burden of taxation which is being imposed on the country by this Budget.

Mr. Speaker, as the hon. member for Waterberg (Mr. J. G. Strydom) was speaking, the impression might have been gained that because of war expenditure, therefore the expenditure in connection with social services is being neglected. As he spoke I looked up the estimated expenditure for the current year in connection with all those services which may well be described as social services, and what do we find? There is an increase of £134,000 on Union education; an increase of £92,180 on industrial schools and reformatories; an increase of £56,000 on mental hospitals and institutions for the feebleminded; on public health an increase of £43,000; on social welfare an increase of £137,000. I think it is only fair, Mr. Speaker, that when a case is being made out for the huge sums which are being spent on defence, that the impression is not to be created that it is being done at the expense of our social services.

Are you satisfied with what is being done?

I am not, but it is only fair to show that there are increases, and that these services are not being neglected. Moreover, Mr. Speaker, it might perhaps have been pertinent if reference had been made in laudatory terms on the part of the Opposition in connection with that which, to my mind, is the most important part of this budget. I refer to the fact that the Government is providing for meals for school children. I know criticism has come forward to the effect that it is a feeble start, but nevertheless it is a start. [Interruptions.] I know it is not an enormous sum, we know all that, but there must be read into it an indication of the intention of the Government to expand social services, it is an index of the intentions for the future with regard to all these matters, and for that reason one hoped that this House would have welcomed it instead of criticising it. I have no doubt that, as this debate on the most important budget ever presented to this House proceeds on its appointed course, there will come forward three types of criticism: There will be the criticism from those Honourable Members who will condemn the budget purely on the grounds that the Honourable Minister is asking for big sums of money for defence purposes. It will not be the first, nor I imagine the last, occasion to hear such criticism in this House. Already in the preliminary skirmishes on the additional estimates we have heard them call upon the spirits of departed former Ministers of Finance to come and witness and pass judgment on the financial machinations of the present Minister. They have foretold a gloomy doom for him and for the Government of which he is a member. The answer so frequently given in this House is the obvious one. These vast sums of money are required by this country in order for it to make its contribution in the waging of the deadliest and costliest of wars in the history of the world. Perhaps the leader in one of our local papers gave the complete answer when it said: “It is part of the declared policy of this country, repeatedly affirmed in Parliament, that South Africa shall continue to play its full part in the war to the uttermost end.” It is true that the amounts asked for defence are gigantic. The Honourable the Minister is calling upon the House to support him. He need have little doubt that the majority of the Honourable Members in this House and the people in the country outside it will give him the support for the measures which he is proposing in order to make these sums available. This country, like the other countries with which it is associated in this struggle, has but one aim. It wills victory. Those who will the end must will, also, the means. One of the means of victory, a very important one, is finance. A Government which will lead us to victory has the right to demand sacrifices in order to attain it. Criticism of this budget will emanate from another source: From those who will question the methods which the Honourable the Minister proposes in order to raise additional sums by means of taxation. Encouraged by the Minister’s own description of this budget as drastic, they may be inclined to complain about the additional burdens which is proposed for raising the additional sums. Such critics, Sir, must be reminded that in spite of the additional proposed taxation—and this has been pointed out repeatedly—our burden in this country is still lighter than that borne by the public in any other of the belligerent countries engaged in this war. Of course it may, in the case of some, imply certain sacrifices, but what are these sacrifices compared with those of our fighting men. They are sacrificing home, careers, health and life itself. It is fitting, therefore, that those who remain behind, and especially those who are benefiting financially from the war, should make their maximum financial contribution. These are the people, Sir, who may well point to the rapidly rising national debt. They will, no doubt, remind us that, on the eve of the war, the public debt of the Union was, roughly, £278,876,000, whereas it may well reach, next year, the figure of £477,000,000 or thereabouts. Certainly a terrific upward swing. Let them, however, be comforted by the fact that in actual debt burden per head of population, it represents £3 10s. per head as against £2 15s. per head in the last pre-war year—admittedly not too “extravagant a price to pay for having made our contribution to the cause of freedom in South Africa and in the world.” Moreover, as the Honourable Minister has pointed out in his speech, this country, as a whole, can “take it”. The financial position of the country is sound, as evidenced by the crowning success which attended the loan issues during the current year to the tune of £78,370,000. He correctly interpreted this success as proof of the people’s confidence in the country’s financial stability. There will be heard, no doubt, the third type of critic, the one in whom the strongest feelings are aroused not by the amount we spend but by the amount which, in their opinion, is being wasted. Such critics, Sir, must necessarily be reminded about the task which confronted this country at the outbreak of war and about the achievements which have characterised the three and a half years since then. Starting from scratch, there has been created, during the past three and a half years, a great fighting force, which on land, on sea and in the air has won everlasting honour and glory for the country which gave it birth. That force, Sir, had to be recruited, examined, sorted, trained, clothed, fed, equipped, despatched to the theatre of war, maintained in fighting trim, cared for when sick or injured and finally brought home again in safety in order that they may enjoy their well merited re-union with their loved ones at home. To do all that ’call for a vast building programme, for camps and areodromes, administrative buildings and hospitals, and a vast expansion of industry to produce the armaments of war. Simultaneously with the creation of this Fighting Force there had to proceed fortifications of our shores and the adoption of the necessary measures for our internal security. If, in addition to what has been said, it is remembered that modern warfare demands the services of at least 8 persons at the home front to keep one man in the field, then one is truly amazed at the prodigious nature of the task involved and the success with which it has been carried out. Detailed discussions on defence matters during time of war are always difficult. Defence is necessarily a subject which must be veiled in secrecy. There is, however, one aspect of this vast programme about which some remarks may safely and advantageously be made, viz. the military medical effort. It is, moreover, one on which I am privileged to speak with some personal knowledge. It is perhaps particularly fitting that such remarks be made on this occasion. It will serve to place on record a description of the great service which Sir Edward Thornton, the Director-General of Medical Services, is leaving behind him to his credit on the eve of his transfer to another equally important sphere of activity. I shall have occasion to refer to this later. The achievement in this department of the defence effort is not unique, but must be regarded as an indication of parallel achievement in many other, if not all, of the other departments of defence. Three years exactly have elapsed since it was my unenviable task to describe to this House the trials and difficulties with which we were confronted in the early days of the war. In those days we had to depend on tent hospitals, improvised buildings and beds loaned to us in hospitals belonging to Provinces and local authorities to accommodate the sick amongst the military personnel. The medical and nursing personnel was in the process of being assembled, sorted, trained, and posted. Even under ordinary circumstances this was no mean task. Unfortunately, as hon. members will remember, there descended upon us in the midst of these trials and improvisations a very sharp influenza epidemic. This unexpected visitation, reinforced by a certain incidence of other diseases, converted what was already a difficult task into an almost overwhelming one. However, undaunted, those in control of the medical organisation proceeded with their planning, constructions, and administration. The initial difficulties were surmounted; gradually, methodically, and surely there grew and emerged the great machine, the South African Medical Service as we know it today. As I will show, this organisation has not only met all the demands made upon it in connection with our own U.D.F. sick and wounded, but has also rendered the most valuable assistance in the care of the many Imperial soldiers in the various theatres of war. I hope the House will bear with me when I give a few details in connection with the services. It will serve to show the energy, money and enterprise which had to be called into being in the establishment of this but one of the departments of defence. It may help hon. members to realise the vast sums of money which had to be spent in order to make possible these achievements. Let me first say a word on personnel. There are today nearly 1,000 medical officers in the Army. The majority were practising in civilian practice before the war, either in general or specialised practices. Their ranks were reinforced by young house surgeons and physicians, by young graduates from our medical schools, and by a few who enlisted under War Measure No. 39 of 1941. There are today some 30 lady doctors in the Army, employed either as medical officers to members of the female corps, or as anaesthetists, pathologists, or in the department of physical medicine and radiology. Before these practitioners were enlisted, they had to obtain the sanction of the Central Emergency Committee of the South African Medical Association. This body was entrusted with the duty to maintain a constant guard under civilian medical needs. In fact, on representations from this committee, it has been necessary from time to time to release certain military medical officers in order to enable them to return to certain areas in this country, where there existed urgent civilian medical needs. Simultaneously with the recruiting, training and posting of this medical personnel, there proceeded that recruiting of dental personnel for the dental section of the South African Medical Corps, and the recruiting of the nursing personnel for the South African military nursing service. The dental service now maintains some 56 dental detachments, sub-detachments, and mobile dental units throughout the Union. The dental service may justly claim to have rendered our Army dentally fit. As far as the Military Nursing Service is concerned, it is as well to remind ourselves that at the outbreak of the war it consisted of one matron and 14 trained nurses. Today its personnel numbers two and a half thousand, of whom over one thousand are trained staff (including 300 Canadian Nurses) 15 hundred untrained staff and the remainder is made up of masseuses, radiographers and dental nurses. This nursing personnel is distributed between 33 hospitals in the Union, 4 outside the Union and one hospital ship. In order to ensure the most effective use of this vast personnel, it became necessary, early, to institute special courses of training. Amongst such courses may be mentioned those in connection with radiography and radiology; physical medicine and aviation medicine; treatment of gas casualties and blood transfusion technique. The primary aim obviously was to keep the troops in the fittest possible condition. This called for the closest attention to their nutrition, housing, clothing, physical training and medical supervision. Under expert guidance a well balanced diet was drawn up for all ranks and all sections of the U.D.F. Continous scientific researches proceeded in connection with food values, vitaminised foods and their keeping powers, dehydration and preservation of foods and the employment, where necessary, of Vitiman C tablets to safeguard against deficiency diseases. In addition, the strictest measures of supervision had to be introduced in connection with the milk, meat and other foodstuffs which were used for the troops. To give effect to these measures called for highly trained hygiene personnel. Further all troops had to be immunised against smallpox, enteric and tetanus and, where necessary, against yellow fever and plague. Steps had to be taken also to avoid the introduction of yellow fever into this country. This resulted in the establishment of a number of anti-amaryl aerodromes. Let me now deal with the large military hospital organisation which has been built up in the Union for the care of those, who, unfortunately, became ill or were casualties of war. This hospital programme had to be planned so as to meet multiple needs. These included necessary hospitalisation facilities for Union troops, including R.A.F. personnel attached to the S.A.A.F., stationed at the various military centres and camps in the Union; for Union casualties from theatres of war in East and later in North Africa; for casualties resulting from possible enemy action against our coasts of naval action in the vicinity of our shores; for British and Imperial forces in transit, and for those amongst them evacuated from theatres of war in Africa and the East. Hospital provision had to be made also for the prisoners of war sent to this country. The hospital organisation to meet these requirements called for different types of establishment in different areas catering for the specific needs in such areas. The establishments thus created range from the small regimental first aid sick bay to the permanently established, solidly constructed, completely equipped and specially staffed big military general hospital of the Voortrekkerhoogte type. Between these two extremes are to be found the camp hospital, the auxiliary hospitals, the special hospitals (mental and tuberculosis), and convalescent depots. Whilst the planning of this programme was determined primarily by strategic military needs, the possible postwar use of these institutions was constantly borne in mind …

Not in all cases.

The location of those hospitals built for Imperial casualties were determined by War Office policy, primary considerations being strategy, economy in transport, and ease of administration. I now propose to quote a few figures. These are no secret, and have been made public on previous occasions, but they bear a petition. It will interest the House to know that the hospital programme thus far completed comprises nearly 14,000 beds. Amongst these are included well over one thousand beds in the auxiliary hospitals which have been made available by the Red Cross, St. John’s Co-ordinating Committee …

That will cost us another couple of millions.

These two voluntary organisations will merit the praise of this House and of the country for the great work which they have done in assisting this great undertaking. The ultimate hospital programme, when fully completed, including the contemplated big Imperial hospital and convalescent depot of 3,600 beds, will bring the final figure near the 20,000 mark. I need hardly stress the value of such additional accommodation to any future health plan in this country. To ensure and control a supply of medical stores and requisites to these institutions necessitated the enormous expansion of the pre-war central medical and veterinary stores. The latter is today housed in a specially designed new building, and from it is distributed, by means of several subsidiary depots, regular medical supplies to all centres. With the discharge of soldiers from the Army on the grounds of physical and mental incapacity, machinery had to be established to pave the way for them for re-entry into the community and for their participation in a life of full citizenship. There thus came into being, in February, 1942, the National Readjustment Board for disabled soldiers. This rehabilitation scheme is bound to assume ever-increasing importance with the discharge of more and more volunteers. It is bound to call for the establishment of occupational therapy in the larger military hospitals, for the special training of occupational therapists and hospital social workers and for the closest integration of these services with the purely medical work carried out in these different hospitals. It is gratifying, therefore, to learn that Sir Edward Thornton, who was until now the Director-General of Medical Services, has accepted the position of Director-General of Rehabilitation Services. This appointment is particularly gratifying in view of the fact that he was in charge of similar activity in the hospital in Richmond during the last war. I maintain, sir, that there is a great future for this Rehabilitation Service. After the war its activities will presumably be enlarged to include casualties from civilian life. Nor is it unreasonable to anticipate that, once the wartime casualties have been disposed of, industrial casualties requiring occupational rehabilitation will reap the benefits of the experience which is being gained as the result of these special war circumstances and conditions. I humbly commend to the critics of this budget the outline which I have attempted to present to the House in connection with but one aspect of this country’s great military undertaking. It will have to be multiplied many times in order to obtain a true appreciation of the comprehensive and combined task which has been accomplished in connection with the entire war effort during the last 3½ years. Before concluding I desire to refer to that which to my mind is the most encouraging feature in the Hon. Minister’s budget, viz. the Government’s intention to expand social services and his indication in connection with further future steps towards social security. I am referring to his decision to make available, in due course, up to a million pounds for the purpose of supplying one meal a day to every school-going child, irrespective of colour and race. I desire to congratulate the Hon. Minister on this decision and to ensure him that he will find in it an excellent national investment with the prospect of dividends out of all proportions to the sum spent. I read in it the Government’s accurate interpretation of the people’s desire for the great expansion of such social services and their preparedness to be taxed in order to make them possible. It is, in fact, an index to the intentions of the future and as such it cannot but be welcomed by all sections of this House. The war, Mr. Speaker, like all wars, will end. The money spent on it will be forgotten, but it will be forever remembered the contribution which this country has made towards victory. Her reward will be an honourable place amongst the peace-loving nations of the world. She will be remembered kindly by the ships which found shelter in her harbours, by the men on those ships who have found a welcome in the hearts of the people in those ports and by the sick and wounded who were received in her hospitals and cared for by her doctors and nurses.

To begin with I want to say that I am sorry that the hon. member for Krugersdorp (Mr. M. J. van den Berg) attacked the officials of the Department of Agriculture here, where they cannot defend themselves. Last year I spoke about the maize problem but then I did not think that it would again be necessary this year to draw the attention of the Government to the maize position. I am sorry that the Minister of Agriculture is not able to be present in the House at this moment, but I understand that he had to meet a deputation somewhere. At the beginning of this year conditions in general were so rosy that we did not think it would again be necessary to plead on behalf of the maize farmers in this House. Unfortunately owing to drought the maize farmers have lost 25 per cent. of their crop which they expected to harvest in January. On Monday we tried to interview the Minister in connection with the maize position. Unfortunately we could not get hold of him. I thereupon suggested that the Department should send wires to the various magistrates to find out what the maize position is. This morning I was told that the Department could not find out up till now what the position is, since many of the magistrates have not yet replied to the telegrams sent to them. I cannot understand why the magistrates could not have answered those telegrams at once, for surely every magistrate knows what the position in his own district is. Early in the year the Minister stated that the price of maize would be 12s. 6d. per bag. We then formed a committee here consisting of members of both sides of the House and we suggested that the price should be fixed at 15s. at the elevator and 16s. when supplied in bags. We hardly got home again when we heard that the price of the bag would be deducted and that this and that would be deducted with the result that we would get only 13s. per bag. We only had half a crop and now we get a price of 13s. per bag. This Committee of which I spoke calculated that the minimum price at the elevator ought to be 15s. and 1s. more plus the bag, except in the case of Grade II maize which should be 1s. more. We were of opinion that Grade II maize should be 1s. more because Grade II maize is being used for samp and this is being used instead of rice which is practically unobtainable. I believe rice is £6 10s. per bag and 8¾d. per lb. and today we can hardly get any rice. Samp is being made from Grade II maize and also for making starch and for that reason we think that they ought to fetch 1s. more. When a farmer today hands over a bag of maize to the miller, the miller keeps the bran. I want to suggest that the farmers should have the right to keep the bran. Today the miller is allowed to register as a broker and also as a miller and seller. As a broker he receives 1d. and he can add 3d. for profit and 3d. for handling. The miller is now making that 7d. which used to be made by the trader. I think that the Minister could halve that amount and in that way meet both the consumer and the farmer. I also want to suggest that the price which we are now asking should at once be laid down as the fixed minimum price with effect from 1st April instead of 1st May. We shall be consuming another million bags of maize before the new crop is in. This year we shall not harvest anywhere near 24,000,000 or 25,000,000 bags. The moisture contents should be abolished now and the Mealie Control Board should go out of the market until the dry mealies become available. The Minister may perhaps ask why the maize farmers should get more. Kaffir corn is sold at from 35s. upwards; the farmers sell it for 18s. or 19s. and the difference goes into the pockets of the traders. The hon. member for Pretoria. Central (Mr. Pocock) said this morning—and I agree with him there—that the Department of Agriculture is now busy meddling with our livestock. Last year I suggested that the Minister should prohibit the slaughtering of young heifer calves, cows and ewes. I believe it should not be allowed. The position should be as it was after the last war when a farmer was not allowed to slaughter young calves, but only old cows and when he had to have a permit if he wanted to slaughter a young cow. The only gold mine in South-West Africa was the karakul skin. Now the Minister allows karakul ewes being sent to the market. I do not think that should be allowed except in the case of old karakul ewes. The hon. member for Pretoria Central spoke about the exorbitant prices the farmers were getting. Does the hon. member know what it cost the farmer to feed his stock? Meat of the national blue mark grade cost the farmer in food 80s. per 100 lb. before he makes a penny on it. The hon. member said that the prices of practically everything have been doubled, but he did not say anything about the commodities the farmers have to buy from the merchants. He did not say what the price is the farmers have to pay to the dealers. He did not speak about the convoys which empty the markets with the result that prices soar enormously. He said that the farmers were deriving profits from this war. I maintain that not the farmers but the traders and other people in the country are deriving advantages from the war. Our farmers are faced with climatic conditions and various other difficulties. The prices of farming requirements have increased by leaps and bounds. Take for instance wire. Wire which used to be 10s. per roll is now £2 per roll. The hon. member for Pretoria, Central said nothing about that. He also did not tell the House that he is now selling stockings at £1 5s. per pair which used to be 4s. 11d. per pair. Furthermore there is the black market. The farmers do not have that. What is happening today in the country. It is terrible the way farmers are being exploited at auction sales. They have to pay 6 per cent. or 7 per cent. to the auctioneers. I should like to see the Minister intervene and exercise control here. I know of cases where a farmer sold oxen and had to pay £1 10s. commission and the following day the oxen were again sold in Johannesburg, and a further £1 10s. commission being cashed. What is happening at auction sales in the Free State? An ox is sold for £50 and this fact is published all over the place. What happened, however? The buyer of the ox gets a refund of £10 or £15, but the price is forced up to £50 in order to create the impression that the market is booming. In the Free State the farmers have to pay 2 per cent. to the Provincial Council, whereas they do not pay it in the Transvaal. The hon. member for Pretoria, Central told us here how flourishing the farmers are. He suggested that the prices of all products should be controlled. I am convinced that the farmers will welcome it if the Government decides to control all prices. I believe our farmers will be glad if they will be protected in that way so that they can also make 8 per cent.

It is not my intention to deal with the budget in general terms. I feel that there are others who claim to be experts on financial matters, who may be able to deal with those questions more effectively. I only want to say this, that I regret that the hon. member for Waterberg (Mr. J. G. Strydom) found it necessary to comment on the fact that the increase in Railway fares had not also been extended to third class passengers. Surely the hon. member must have realised that it is a form of travel which is utilised mostly by the poorest people in the country, and if he studies the statistics and returns, he will find that it is an admitted fact that the first and second class travel in this country is subsidised by the third class travel. I prefer to deal, if I may with matters on which I may claim a more expert knowledge and a more personal acquaintance. It is hardly eighty years ago since the Government of the old Cape, in time honoured manner, with a bible in one hand and a bottle in the other, achieved the annexation of the Transkeian Territories. It was a very fertile country inhabited by a very virile people. I have had the distressing experience over the last forty years of watching the gradual destruction of the country, and the gradual deterioration of the people. To the tourist travelling through the country it no doubt still looks beautiful, and the life of the people there seems very appealing. But the truth is that under a very pretty exterior there is a festering sore. A sore which threatens the existence of your labour market and which threatens one day, in my opinion, to engulf everyone in this country. The condition to which I refer, of course, is one of health. I know it has been spoken of so often that possibly people get tired of hearing about it, but I feel it my duty to speak of it as often as I can, and I ask myself what are the causes of this destruction and deterioration. Firstly, I would mention the question of overcrowding. We have the same rigid boundaries of these territories as we had thirty or forty years ago. We have made no allowance for the natural increase of the population. We have failed to take into account that in the past thirty years the population has increased by something like 300,000, and today we find that the density of the population of the Transkei is at least 80 to the square mile as against, if I am not mistaken, 9 to the square mile in the rest of the country, or at any rate in the Cape. That is the situation which has been aggravated by our failure to implement the undertaking given, and which flows from our 1936 Laws, to acquire land, to extend the area of that country, and thereby to lessen the density of the population. I know there are difficulties in the way of carrying out that policy, difficulties of staffing, but unless the members of the staff are engaged in work of first importance in the war effort, they should be brought back to the place from which they came, and they should be allowed to get on with a matter which is of paramount importance to this country. The second matter to which I wish to refer, as a cause of deterioration is that of poverty arising from low wages and resulting in malnutrition and general deterioration. I Suppose at least 70 per cent. or 80 per cent. of the labourers from the Transkei go to the gold mines and they regard the mining area as their principal source of employment. As an indication of their financial position I would quote from the Herbst Report of 1938 which says—

That seems to me a factor which is important to bear in mind because when we speak of health and malnutrition we cannot divorce them from these other economic factors. I would then refer to the question of ignorance. It is a fact that in many parts of the Transkei less than 5 per cent. of the children ever go to school, and one cannot expect that such people will ever have any understanding of hygiene or matters relevant thereto. These things are the result of the impact of our own civilisation upon these people, and are not unconnected with the types of employment in which they are engaged. Mining is their principal employment, and mining is a very hazardous employment affecting the health and the stamina of those engaged in it. I urge, therefore, sir, that in mining the wages that are paid should be on a family basis, and not on an individual basis. We should take into account that ten years is, in my experience, almost the limit during which a man may be engaged in underground work. They have a saying in the Transkei that a man does not go to work more than a certain number of times; in other words, he is unfit for underground labour after he has been at the mine on seven, eight, or nine occasions. It is still maintained that the wages of the native mine worker are subsidised by their arable holdings in the reserves, but, as I have on other occasions pointed out, in fact, there are hundreds of thousands of people who have no land to rely upon. There are anything between 30,000 and 40,000 adult married natives who have no land whatever, and on the family basis, they probably represent anything from 200,000 to 300,000 people. That, sir, is a factor, which, as I say, is not considered when we are dealing with this question as to whether the pay of the mine labourer is adequate for the work that he does. Moreover, he pays up to as much as one-sixth of his earnings on a twelve months’ contract on travelling to and from his home. We must also not lose sight of the fact that this type of employment on the contract system means that when he goes from the reserves up to the mines, a position of long separation from the labourer’s family is brought about, which leads inevitably to irregular unions, to the shebeen, and to venereal disease, and eventually to a general break-up of the family life. Then, sir, there is no effective attempt to trace up people who return from the mines, and who are tubercular suspects. Referring to the Herbst report again, I find that attention was drawn by medical officers to the number of tuberculotics repatriated from the mines to their homes without intimation to the local authority. The report says—

In fact, that is not done, and I contend that it is very essential it should be done if we are to meet the position. The cumulative effect of these evils to which I have referred is that in point of fact today there are few natives who live beyond 50 years of age. We have no old men in the Transkei today, and that is a factor which is tied up with the possibility of the destruction of your labour force in this country. Sir, in the first speech I made in this House I drew attention to these conditions, and the picture I drew was a pretty sombre one. I hope that during the few years I have been here I have not earned the reputation of using extravagant language or exaggerating facts. If I may say so, sir, I am not in any way exaggerating the facts of the case here. At that time I drew attention to the danger of keeping 7,000,000 of your population in the condition in which we find them today. Mr. Speaker, I can see little change in 1943. We still have a part-time district surgeon, resident in the town area of each district, the population of which may vary from 33,000 to 75,000, and in one case I am reliably informed that one doctor serves the needs of 40,000 people. There are one or two medical men who are salaried officials attached to missions. Apart from that, sir, we have a senior medical officer, who, I must say, is doing a good job of work as far as it can be done under almost insuperable difficulties which are increased rather than lessened by the supineness of the Union Health Department. To indicate the position as it is today may I quote, sir, from a statement made no later than last month by the Medical Superintendent of the Umtata Hospital, an experienced and responsible medical officer. I don’t like reading long statements to the House, but I feel I must read a considerable portion of the statement made publicly by Dr. Tonkin. He said—

Further on, Dr. Tonkin says—

This is the particular passage I want to impress upon the House—

Who are you quoting from?

A statement by Dr. Tonkin. The statement goes on—

I want to draw a comparison between the condition of human beings and that of animals. In dealing with this appalling fact, for it is an appalling fact, I ask the House to let me examine for a moment what is being done in the case of animals. Every animal birth and death in the Transkei is registered on the card system and the cause of death ascertained. In the case of the death of a beast, this elaborate system comes into operation, but in the case of the death of a person, no report is made, no register is kept, and no enquiry as to the cause of death is ever undertaken unless there is suspicion of foul play. In agriculture 75 qualified native demonstrators are turned out annually, and there are 166 demonstrators on full time service throughout the country. There are more inspectors and veterinary officers than there are doctors. And in that connection I would just draw your attention to the figures disclosed in the present budget, where we find that on veterinary services alone we are going to spend £417,000, while the amount set aside for native health services and clinics is £12,000.

That is not all that is spent on native health.

I don’t say that it is, sir.

It is an unfair comparison.

That is the amount apart from your hospital services, and what is paid to your district surgeon, and district surgeons are only part-time people who spend very little time in the rural areas. Now what do we really need? If we can have vital statistics and all this machinery for animals, it is not unreasonable to ask for similar statistics relating to human beings. I have here a report of the Tuberculosis Research Committee of 1925. This report draws particular attention to the extraordinary difficulty of undertaking tuberculosis prevalence studies in the absence of a vital registration system. The report says—

It is still more remarkable, sir, that in 1942 it is still unprovided. Secondly, we require immediately a system of medical services and clinics which starts in the country and moves towards the hospitals. We require doctors, native doctors as well, medical aids, and nurses properly organised for this work. Hospitals alone are of no real value, as they are merely part of a system which is required to cope with the situation. Of what use is it to a person in an advanced stage of pneumonia or enteric fever, to know that there is a hospital in the town 25 miles away, without any means of transport? That is the position. We want to try prevention and cure in the early stages; we want to take medical services to the doors of the people who cannot afford to go into the towns. The position today is that if these people want attention and they can manage to get into towns, they have an examination by the local doctor, for which they pay 5s., they get a bottle of medicine, and they go back. If they are in such a state that they cannot go back, they go into hospital. Clinics will meet to a certain degree the immediate needs of these people. It is no answer to our complaint in these matters to tell us that these people don’t wish to attend hospitals. I say that there is a growing desire to make use of hospitals, and that such clinics as do exist are showing increased popularity. But on the present basis they have no proper financial standing; there are no real financial resources upon which we can rely to keep these clinics going on a permanent and ever-increasing basis. If these clinics could be formally established on a permanent basis with a proper financial backing behind them, they would carry the work along until such time as bigger schemes can be brought into being. It will not be an answer to the criticism I have made to tell me that the National Health Commission is in being. I am not for a moment doubting the wisdom of the members of that Commission; I am not doubting that they are going to do a work of great national importance, but I fear that the report of this Commission may suffer the fate that so many of these reports have suffered. Our pigeon-holes are stacked with such reports. If you look up the Blue Books of the last twenty years you can get all the facts we are going to get today. I fear the Government will say: “We have just had a war, and, although we realise the importance of this, we find that we cannot undertake it just now.” I want to ask the Government to take some immediate steps in connection with this matter. If you wish to save these people, who are incidentally citizens of your industrial world, you must act at once. This particular city of Rome is already ablaze, and I am very much afraid that the conflagration will not stay its hand whilst we are building what will no doubt one day be a very beautiful and effective Fire Brigade. We must act now and in no niggardly manner.

I think that this budget is of particularly great interest to the wine farmers and I think it will be known to them as the “penny a tot” budget. The Minister explained that the extra tax which is being imposed on brandy and on spirits, will work out at 1d. per tot. It is impossible to discuss all aspects in the time at our disposal, but I feel it is my duty to inform the Minister of the position in which the wine farmers find themselves and what the Minister is doing to them. I want to say that according to my opinion this increase in taxation is not only wrong, but I reckon that it is entirely unfair and out of all proportion to the increase in regard to all other taxes. I should like to know from the Minister why he is from time to time imposing restrictions on the industry of the wine farmers. Why this discrimination? Why should the excise duty be increased by 66 2/3 per cent. as compared to last year’s. It had already been increased in 1940 and none of the other taxes had been increased in such a manner. Why should there be discrimination against viticulture. The Minister is of course being regarded as a teetotaller and consequently as an enemy of the wine farmer and it seems to me when I look at this increase in excise duty, that he really is one. I do not know whether the Minister realises how many people are dependent on the wine industry and what the capital is which has been invested in the industry and whether he realises that more money has been invested in this industry than in the gold mines. I do not think he realises what the actual position is and how out of all proportion the increase in excise duty is when compared to the other increases. Today whilst hundreds of thousands of soldiers travel through the country with some money in their pockets, part of which they spend on drink, the position may still be passable and is it still possible to make an existence, but does the Minister realise what the position in regard to the excise is? First of all it used to be half a crown, but every time the country was in distress, it was increased. Every time we received the promise that it would be reduced when the time of want had passed, but this was never done. Now the Minister is again imposing a permanent tax which is intended to cover temporary deficit, but the tax will remain. We have had experience of it. First the excise was 2s. 6d., then it was increased to 5s., thereafter to 10s., and when the present Minister came into power it already stood at 12s. 6d., but now the present Minister has brought it up to 25s., an increase of 100 per cent. Does the Minister realise what the position of the farmers is? I do not think that he realises what he is busy doing, and I am afraid that most hon. members also do not know what the position is. Even a newspaper like the Cape Times in a leading article used entirely incorrect figures. They talk about 13s. 4d. or 15s., but it is 25s. I think it is my duty to explain to this House what the position is. There are three kinds of brandy, namely, wine brandy, grape brandy, and other brandy. Last year the tax was 15s. on a gallon wine brandy, 20s. on grape brandy, and 25s. on other brandies. The increase which is now being proposed, means an increase of 66 2/3 per cent., and this makes it 25s., 30s., and £1 15s. respectively per gallon. One gallon equals six bottles. And on that gallon the duty is now 25s. If one reckons it at proof strength, it works out at 4s. 6d. per bottle. That is what has to be paid in taxation. Do hon. members realise what the amount is which is being collected from this duty on brandy? It is not drunk at proof strength, but under proof, and on a bottle of brandy you buy in the bottle store you pay 37.6d., whereas the farmer receives 5.9d. for his brandy. That is the position. If one reckons that a bottle of brandy contains 20 tots, then even if the farmer would give his brandy for nothing, they would not yet be in a position to sell a tot for a farthing less. The merchant receives 12.115d. for it. That is what he pays to the wholesaler. I am not referring now to the retailer as such, but I just want to say that from the excise duty the Minister now wants to impose on brandy he will get £3,400,000, whereas the farmers only get £372,000 for all their brandy, i.e., about one-tenth of the amount. All the wine farmers together received for all the brandy they produced last year only £372,675, and the Minister now proposes to levy on that small amount not less than £3,400,000 in excise. When I speak about it, I get so furious, that I nearly feel like sitting down. That is not all yet. I want to know why the Minister keeps on oppressing and oppressing the people? Does he want to ruin and destroy them? The privileges the people enjoy are taken away systematically year after year. Last year he came along and took away the right of the poor Karoo farmers who could still do so, to produce a few leaguers of distilling wine. They always had the right to distil a small quantity of wine for the use of their family and for their friends and employees, but the Minister interfered with his legislation. He went further and reduced the quantity which a farmer may use for himself without paying excise from 30 gallons to 15 gallons, a decrease of 50 per cent. Why is he treating whisky more leniently? If he wanted to increase the duty on whisky in the same proportion as that on brandy, he would have to put 35s. on whisky. Why is he making that only 30s.? For the benefit of himself and his henchmen who drink that stuff, for a decent person does not drink whisky, but brandy. But the people who drink whisky are being assisted. This is a serious matter, and the wine farmers can no longer afford looking on. The wine farmers are paying for the excise. It is our experience that the wine farmers pay the whole of the excise. The Minister is not a drinker, and he discriminates against the wine farmers. I really cannot understand that there can be still one wine farmer who is prepared to vote for the Government. I cannot understand it. I do not want to suggest that he is the only Minister who does things like that. Other Governments have also done it. He may reply that he has given us the Control Act. He cannot take the credit for that. A previous Government promised it, and I had to worry him day and night to make him give effect to that promise. Then he still demanded that we should deal with the Bill within two hours, and I had to undertake to persuade members not to talk on it. How many teetotallers are sitting over there? I think there must be 39 of them. The hon. member for Kensington (Mr. Blackwell) gets up here and advocates an excise duty on wine. Why does he not plead that there should be a further tax imposed on dog racing, on behalf of which he is now so active? Why is the tax on bioscopes not increased? Why should the poor devil who buys a tot of brandy to enjoy himself, and who does not visit the bioscope have to pay up? Is it perhaps because the big capitalist friends on the other side are interested in the large bioscope companies? The people who drink whisky console themselves with the thought that the duty will afterwards be taken off again. They have a hope. It will remain, and they will have the pleasure of always knowing that out of every shilling they put on the counter for a tot, they pay 9d. in excise. This tax is a discriminating tax. The increase in excise amounts to 66 per cent.; is it the intention to kill the industry? If this industry suffers irreparable damage, the Minister will have to bear the blame for it. He will say that the consumer pays it. We know that we pay it.

Who is we?

The farmer pays it. I am speaking here on behalf of the wine farmer. Fortunately the wine farmer has his co-operative society. If he had not had that, his industry would long ago have been ruined. Because we co-operated 100 per cent., we were able to protect ourselves. When consumption falls off we can only do one thing and that is to pay less to the wine farmers. The Minister of Finance should understand that as soon as normal times return, the price factor will make itself felt. That will play a large part in the consumption and if the consumption decreases by one leaguer we shall have to pay the farmers for a leaguer less. During all these years of co-operation there has been a surplus. The Minister said that the consumption had increased tremendously and that we were consequently able to get more. The consumption has increased by about 20,000 leaguers, but the production has increased by 106,000 leaguers. We are restricting planting, but this is from vines which had already been planted. We need not go into all the figures, but in 1924 we had a sort of appeal court sitting here. The then Secretary for Agriculture was its chairman and the experts then figured out that in 1924 it cost £3 to produce a leaguer of wine. We can safely assume that the production costs have in the meantime gone up by £1 per leaguer. Let us now consider what the prices were which the farmer got. Before the war he received £4 12s. and £4 15s. When war broke out this was reduced to £4 2s. 6d. and thereafter to £3 12s. 6d. Subsequently it was increased to £4 7s. 6d. and this year we were able to pay £5. That means a profit of £1 per leaguer. Approximately 70 per cent. of the wine farmers produce less than 100 leaguers. These are the people who are being taxed now, and it seems as if the Minister does not care whether they starve. I now want to give you the production figures. In 1941 the yield was 290,208 leaguers. In 1942 it amounted to 396,711 leaguers, therefore an increase of 106,000 leaguers. The consumption went up by from 20,000 to 30,000 leaguers, but the production increased by 106,000 leaguers. From the time the co-operative society came into existence, we had to make provision for a surplus of 50 per cent. every year. That means that the farmer is getting half of what the wine merchant pays for the wine. Has the Minister figured out already what the wine farmer is getting for his grapes? Two thousand pounds of grapes yield one leaguer of wine and when the farmer receives £5 for it, it means that he is selling 20 lbs. of grapes for a shilling. It has been said here that grapes are being sold cheaply at 8 lb.s for a shilling. The wine farmer receives a shilling for twenty pounds of grapes, and then he has to press them still, put the wine in casks, has to make timely provision for the capital to be invested in casks; he has to clean the casks, as otherwise the wine turns sour and he will receive less money for it. That is the position the wine farmer finds himself in and I ask whether it is fair to impose such a tax on people who are in that position. The Minister may smile. I should like to see him in a vineyard hoeing and digging. I want the Minister of Finance to understand the position. Let us for a moment compare the position of the wine industry with that of the mines. As much capital has been invested in wine farming as in the gold mines. It has been estimated that from the beginnng until the end of 1941 approximately £80,000,000 have been invested in the gold mines. Those figures were given here in the House and can be looked up in Hansard. In the wine industry more capital than that has been invested. I have the figures for the calendar year. Up till 31st December the yield of the gold mines was £114,455,214. In contrast to that the yield of the distilling wine of the wine industry was £372,000. The gold mines paid out £19,399,645 in dividends. The wine farmers got £372,000 for their entire production of distilling wine. This is not profit, this is what they received. Half of that amount of £19,000,000 in dividends of the mines went overseas, and why cannot the Minister tax them. Why should they escape? The gold mines are to pay 2½ per cent. more on the special levy. The farmer pays 66 2/3 per cent. more. Why should there be this discrimination. There are some mines which pay out in one year as much in dividends as the capital is which has been invested in the mine. The Minister will of course say that there are mines which no longer can pay any taxes. We know that story. There are such mines, but what about those paying dividends of 100 per cent. Those mines can be taxed. But no, nothing is taken off those dividends, but the farmer who has to make his living with his bare hands, he has to help to bring in the necessary taxation money. The reason is quite obvious to me. The Minister has fallen into the clutches of those people, and he dare not tax them, but he enjoys imposing an excise duty. A section of the people sitting behind him wants to kill the industry. All the same, he was rather in a quandary a few weeks ago. He heard that we did not have enough brandy, and then the Excise Department simply suggested that we should fill the bottles with new brandy. He does not care, for he does not drink it. He was not concerned about the wine farmer, but he wants his income from excise. The wine farmers have never asked him nor any previous Minister for a sixpence or a threepence, and they also did not borrow a penny from the Land Bank for their industry. They farmed to get on with their own industry. All they got from the Government were knocks and blows. Only last year the Government took £40,000 from the wine farmers in order to pay it to the deciduous fruit farmers for their grapes; 1d. is added to a tot, but, on the other hand, grapes are being pressed which should never have been pressed, and that is also loaded upon the shoulders of the wine farmers. These were excellent export grapes, and should have been given to the poor people. When a few years ago the wine farmers were stuck with their grapes, they gave away 1,000 tons to the poor people in the country in order to enable them to eat grapes. But the Government makes distilling wine of it, loads this upon the shoulders of the wine farmers, and pays those people a subsidy. I also want to mention the following. The wine farmers have to pay for the administration in connection with good wine. Ten shillings per leaguer are deducted, and of that amount 5s. have to go to the Government. We have to pay £400 per annum to the Department of Excise in order to get statistics and information from them. Tell me about any industry or any branch of farming which has to do that? Is it just to take all that from us? The Minister obtains out of this industry £3,400,000, and why must we then pay for the administration of the Department of Excise? I have pointed out what our taxation is in comparison to that of the mines. It has been said in this House already that the gold mines are a dwindling industry. Tomorrow or the day after we shall have been left with nothing but the holes in the ground. But the wine farmers will have to carry on. They will carry on. You can squeeze them as long as you like, but before they give in and let themselves be ruined, they will rather sweep the Minister away. I just want to tell the Minister that the wine farmers will not forget what he has done to them. I want to invite him to come to my constituency. The Minister may think that as there are only five constituencies representing the wine farmers, he can do without them. I want to tell him however, that the farming community has begun to realise that we have to stand together, the wine farmer with the wool farmer, and the wine farmer plus the wool farmer with the sheep and wheat farmers. They will stand together and force the Government to be fair towards these people. I ask the Minister why he discriminates in this way against the wine farmer? Why must they pay so heavily? Are they thieves and criminals? They work hard, and why should every now and again some of their rights be taken away from them, and why should they be discriminated against?

And on top of that a member, such as the member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge), comes here to say that wine should also be taxed.

I can well understand that that member say things like that because he knows nothing about them, and if he were taxed out of the country, it would be much better. I just want to say this. I have here before me a balance sheet of the South African wine distillers, a combine of a certain Mosenthal in London. This is a combine of four or five companies, and last year they made a profit of £438,000.

Why not tax them?

That friend over there does not know anything about this subject. Why does he not ask the Minister of Finance why those people are getting the right to pay out 20 per cent. and 30 per cent. dividends, whereas we, if we now start with an industry, we are allowed to pay out 8 per cent. only? I think I have quoted enough figures to give a clear picture to the House of what the position actually is, and also to prove that the profit on a leager of wine is only £1, and that whereas the income of the wine farmers is only a few hundred thousand pounds, the State derives ten times that amount from the industry. I spoke about the gold mines and indicated how that industry is treated as compared with the treatment meted out to the wine industry, in spite of the fact that the gold mines make enormous profits and pay enormous dividends. I explained that the Minister could get more from that source, but that whilst he refused to take any more from them, the wine industry has to pay more. I know it will not be of any use to ask the Minister to change this policy, for the friends on the other side will vote in favour of it, although they may feel that they ought not to do so. I just want to tell the Minister that if he continues along the lines he is going now, he will be killing the goose that lays the golden eggs. There is no justification for it. He may say that he himself pays nothing because he does not drink. No, the Minister should rather cast an eye on the dog races, instead of trying to tax wines, as the hon. member suggested. I once went to these races, not to put any money on it, for I have not got any money to put on it, but just to have a look around, and I noticed that thousands and thousands of pounds are spent there in bets. The Minister should get more money there as well as on the race course here at Milnerton. I cannot but voice the strongest protest against this increased taxation on the wine farmer. I am not now going to ask the Minister to change it. When we reach the Committee stage on taxation proposals I am going to demand that it be changed. I am not going to talk nicely, but I am going to demand a change in this taxation. If the Minister does not want to give in, he may go on with his measures and he will see where it will end. I am only sorry that a man like the Minister should be in a position to ruin a whole industry. That is a bitter thought. He cannot realise what he is doing.

The hon. member who just spoke made a bitter attack on the Minister and on this side of the House, and he said that we all were out to attack the wine industry—that we had no sympathy with the wine farmers and their industry.

Well, that’s perfectly true.

Of course the hon. member is quite wrong. There are a large number of people here who regard the welfare of the wine farmers as closely allied to the welfare of the rest of the country.

You have never shown it.

We have great sympathy with the wine farmers and I would have thought that there would have been a word of gratitude from the hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. S. E. Warren) to the Minister for having withstood the demand from other parts of the country to impose a tax on wine.

You know very well that the wine farmer is always being attacked.

I am not in favour of that proposed tax—but I think there is a strong argument in favour of taxing spirits—more so than of taxing wine.

Why should spirits bear a higher tax?

I shall tell you why. You can only take a small amount of spirit. But I have heard it said by many that the tax on wine should be increased, although a good case, I think, has been made out for leaving wine alone. But now the hon. member attacks the Minister, and the Prime Minister, and says that they are out to destroy the wine farmer—surely that is all nonsense.

Their past policy has always proved that.

You cannot argue with such people at all. The hon. member was very much concerned about whisky.

Not in the least.

Well, he took up a great deal of time in talking about whisky. Whisky is very much taxed and at any rate whisky is hardly obtainable at the moment.

Oh, no that’s not so, you can get it here.

I wish hon. members would not take up so much of my time with their interruptions and with their jeering. I have very little time at my disposal and I want to use it to some purpose. Now, I want to say that the criticism of the hon. member who represents the Opposition in this amendment is based entirely on a peace budget. I am not going into details except to say this. The hon. member says that we must ignore the war. The whole foundation for his opposition to this budget falls away by the fact that this is not a peace budget but a war budget, and this money has to be found. I feel that on the whole the country is well satisfied with the way in which the Minister is getting large amounts from taxation. The Minister requires this money and he is getting it in the right way. Of course, there are some points where one feels that one does not like the way in which the Minister is imposing certain items of taxation. One would say that the amount should be obtained by way of gradation rather than by an out and out impost. Take cigarettes. Instead of making a uniform rate, the higher priced cigarettes should have been taxed at a higher rate than the lower priced cigarettes. There is no reason why the luxury cigarette should not be taxed more heavily than the cigarettes which the man in the street buys. Then, in regard to this Railway passenger’s tax, I think criticism is justified again. I would say to the hon. member for George that I think he has perhaps stumbled, unwittingly, on a question of constitutional importance. I should like to have heard his argument on (d), because perhaps there is something in that. There is nothing in the Act of Union giving the Minister of Railways the right to act as a collector of taxes for the Minister of Finance. I think if hon. members will look at Sections 117 and 127 of the Act of Union, it is clear that the use of the Railways as a general taxation machine for the treasury, is something which is in conflict with the declared intention of the Act of Union. Of course, the Minister has given notice that he intends to introduce a Bill, and in that Bill he will no doubt make the provision clear that the Act of Union to that extent will be amended. Then, of course, the point falls away. But I think the hon. member is right that as the Act of Union now stands, this is in conflict with the Act of Union. The Minister of Finance cannot tax the Railways, but now the Railways are being used to collect this tax and pay it to the Treasury. I quite agree with the hon. member, and I shall be glad to know whether the legal adviser has dealt with this point, which it seems to me has some substance. With regard to the other imposts, telephones and so on, there again I don’t know whether it is desirable to have a uniform instead of a graduated surcharge on telephones, which hits the man who uses his telephone as a necessity rather more than the man to whom the telephone is a luxury. That is a matter which can be taken into consideration. Then there is the question of railway fares. If I may give my opinion on that, I think there is grave doubt whether such a method of taxation should be resorted to at all. If such taxation is resorted to, then the second class passengers should have been left out, because to them travelling is not a luxury, but a matter of necessity. I think the taxation should have been on first class passengers alone. In any case, it is a tax of very doubtful value. If the Minister wishes to prevent people from travelling, and the railways cannot do it themselves, then other methods should be examined, such as compelling people to prove to the satisfaction of some tribunal, that it is necessary for them to travel. That I could understand, and that would get rid of people who use the railways to the detriment of the war services, for joy riding. But I do not think a tax of this kind is justified. The Minister has said it is not a matter of raising revenue at all, but in order to prevent people from travelling. If the Minister must get revenue, it should be got in some other way, because I do not think that this is a legitimate method. Then with regard to death duties, I think this would have been a good time to increase death duties, which, compared with other countries, are very small here. They ought to be very much higher. The question has been raised about the war, and some people have said: “Is it worth while?” while one hon. member called it “unproductive expenditure.” But I say, sir, that judged by other standards than £ s. d., it is not unproductive expenditure at all. In the Bible the preacher says: “Cast thy bread upon the waters, for thou shalt find it after many days.” That is perfectly correct, sir. The necessary cost of this war, necessary as we think it, to preserve the freedom of the world, will come back to us after many days. You will find it is only unproductive when it is put in a ledger, but it really is expenditure of the greatest possible value. As a matter of fact, before the war we were in an unusually good position; we were one of the smallest taxed people in the world; with a debt which compared to Australia or any other country, was very small. The debt has increased now, but we will get full value for that increase, and future generations in South Africa will have reason to bless us for this expenditure. The new imposts, sir, as I have said, have not met with any very great opposition. There is a question which I cannot quite understand, and perhaps the Minister would like to tell us when he replies. We are having a tax on tobacco and cigarettes, but why did the Minister leave out cigars? Cigars are really a luxury compared with cigarettes and tobacco, and if a case can be made out for further taxation on tobacco and cigarettes, I think that a much stronger case can be made out for an additional impost on cigars. In regard to the increased postage, there, again, I know it is a hard tax, but we all remember the time in the last war when we had to pay 2d. We are going back again now to the 2d. we paid during the last war, and it does not amount to a very great deal. At one time we had 1d. postage, and then it went up to 1½d. I have no doubt that this will not be a permanent thing, but only for the duration of the war, and probably it will be reduced when normal times come back again. There are some features in the budget speech which have given great satisfaction, and one was the Minister’s reference to the Governor General’s Fund. The Minister will carry the great majority of the people with him in placing the Governor General’s Fund on a firm foundation, and removing any flavour of charity that there might have been about it in the minds of some people. Incidentally, sir, I would remark that it is gratifying to a Capetonian like myself that we have gone back to the old Cape principles of pound for pound in this matter and the C.P.S. and all other matters of this kind. The measure of Justice to the Oudstryders is very welcome. Hon. members will be interested to see that the budget has been welcomed as far away as the City of London. We are all in favour of making the gold mines pay such taxation as they are able to bear, and after all, it is not a small amount of increase, this 2½ per cent. in one year is not a small increase, it is pretty substantial, and those who have to carry on the work of gold mining, as well as those who deal in shares, have felt it not to be an unfair tax. The provision with regard to school children I regard as one of the greatest importance. It is only a beginning, but it is a beginning which shows that the Government is in earnest with regard to the problem of social reconstruction. Incidentally, sir, it shows the breadth of the Government’s outlook when the Minister makes it clear that this is to apply to all children irrespective of race or colour.

[Inaudible],

Why not the coloured child? Is he not a South African citizen, why should he not get his free meal a day? It would be a scandal of the greatest magnitude if this had been limited to white children. I may say that a former high official in the Public Service unfortunately made a statement in an interview on Saturday, that this was not to be given to coloured children. How he could have made that statement I cannot understand, because the Minister’s statement was very clear, and there was never any doubt about it. This shows that when further reconstruction takes place, it is going to embrace not merely the European, but the non-European as well. I was interested in the Minister’s statement about the E.P.D. and also in regard to amendments in the administration of the war. I hope when he replies he will give us a little more information. It would be interesting to know exactly what the amendments will be, and I hope they will not be merely administrative amendments to make it easier to collect the tax, but that some of the anomalies that have been pointed out by hon. members will be met. I hope the Minister has benefited from his consultations with various deputations of accountants that have visited him in Pretoria and also from correspondence with others. I was interested to hear that he was going to make a concession with regard to new undertakings, and there I think the hon. member for Pretoria, West (Mr. Wallach) is entitled to some congratulation because he has constantly brought this matter before the House. There are two matters I would ask the Minister to consider, one in consultation with his colleague, the Minister of Railways and one with the Minister of Posts. The one is the artisans’ request for an increase of pay. I am not going to read the memorandum, because the Minister of Railways has it, but I hope something will come of it. I am glad they have met our request to some extent in regard to the cost of living allowance to pensioners. It is only a limited amount that they have allowed, and it is only going to be given to those who can prove that they are in necessitous circumstances. But while they have not given us all we ask for, they have given us something, and one must be grateful for that, although we would have liked more. With regard to the acting postmen, I would like the Minister, in consultation with the Minister of Posts and Telegraphs, to see that they get a square deal, which they are not getting at the present time. And in regard to soldiers, I would like the Minister to bear in mind representations recently made to him by service organisations, which have put forward some very sound points for amending the 1942 War Pensions Act. I think, on the whole, the Minister can be congratulated on his war time budget. War budgets are never very popular, they are not budgets that appeal to the electors, and they are certainly not budgets that help an Election. But having required large sums of money, the Minister has dealt as kindly with the sheep that he has shorn, as it was possible for a Finance Minister to do. I hope he will agree to certain modifications suggested by hon. members on this side, and will remember that a Finance Minister should be amenable to suggestions and should listen to propositions where justice demands. Having regard to his difficulties and necessities, I think the whole country will agree that he nas made as good a job of it as any Finance Minister could in these dire and gloomy days.

To the criticism that has come from the other side of the House we now have the criticism of the hon. member for Cape Town, Castle (Mr. Alexander), who has just sat down, who said that he expected that the Minister would do something in respect of the plea that came from hon. members on the other side. He said that he hoped that the Minister would soften his heart for the plea of the hon. members on the other side. I just want to come back to the amendment as moved by the hon. member for George (Mr. Werth). Incidentally the only point in the amendment mentioned by the hon. member, and also by other hon. members on the other side was the one in connection with the contravention of the Constitution, where the railways are now to be used as a taxing machine. The hon. member gets up and says that on this point he agrees entirely with the hon. member for George, but of the other points he did not say a word. I just want to come back to those points. In the first place, there is this point in the amendment of the hon. member, that the war expenditure is high out of all proportion and that it is high out of all proportion on the home front. To that accusation we have not yet had an answer from hon. members on the other side. I just want to say how high that expenditure is in respect of the home front. Hon. members who sit on the other side, like the hon. member for Frankfort (Brig.-Gen. Botha), for example, have as a result of South Africa’s participation in the war received up to £2,000 a year extra. One can understand that there are people today who pray that the war should continue. But let us now come to the position of the Oudstryders. I have objected to the meagre pensions that are granted the Oudstryders, and I have objected to the fact that a pension of 10s. a month is granted to a hero of my people. For those people there is a meagre £80,000, but for the Governor General’s Fund there is £600,000. If the amount granted to the Oudstryders is increased by one-third, it will mean that an Oudstryder who gets 10s. will get an increase of one-third on that, and if he gets £3, then it means an increase of £12 a year. If an Oudstryder dies, his widow gets nothing. Does the hon. Minister think that the people can make a living on that? The second point in the amendment of the hon. member is the unequal incidence of the tax. Here a very strong case has been made out. There is a certain class of citizen in the country, the man with an average income of £250 a year—and the vast majority of your citizens fall under that class. Let us see how the burden of taxation has been increased in the case of the man who earns £250 a year. Before the war the person who earned £250 paid nothing. Later he was assessed at £3 a year, and now the tax has been increased to £5 per year, including the savings tax. I just want to compare the position of that man with the position of the native. The natives are now getting more money than they have ever seen before in their lifetime. Notwithstanding this fact, the tax of the natives is exactly the same as it has been for years. But this man who has to provide for his wife and children on an income of £250 a year is taxed to such a tremendous extent. The hon. member for George said in the third place: “I charge the Minister of Finance that in his whole Budget speech he did not bring about one single bit of positive policy.” The question that came from all sides of the House was: “What is the position that is before us? Are there any prospects for better days?” And that question was not asked only in this debate. That question arose in all the motions that have been placed upon the agenda in this House from time to time, all cries of distress that ask: What will become of me, and what will become of my children tomorrow or the day after? In spite of this cry, we got this answer: “Yes, but you must not forget that there is a war on.” Not a single piece of positive policy is held in prospect; there is not a single promise that provision will be made for post-war requirements. Everywhere the cry arose: Hold out some prospect! But nothing came. Every person with common-sense knows that a financial depression will come only when this war is over, and we ask what you intend doing when the war is over and normal times return? And the answer of the Minister is: No, I can do nothing to provide for those times. I now want to put this pertinent question to him: What is there in this Budget that makes provision for that bad time of depression that will come after the war? The answer is: No, nothing. But not only does the hon. Minister say that he can do nothing for social security after this war, but he says that our chances of doing something become less every day. This is his information. He says that for every million pounds that is borrowed for war purposes it means £30,000 less for social security. That is to say, for every million pounds that is borrowed, it means that after the war there will be £30,000 less to provide for the actual requirements of the people. If we assume that so far we have borrowed £138,000,000, and that the Minister will borrow £55,000,000 this year—if we assume that the money borrowed now amounts to £193,000,000, then it means that the possibility of doing something for the people after the war, to do something in respect of social security, has now already been reduced by £5,790,000. The Minister said however that he was going to do something. He said he just wanted to paint that picture; he still wants to do something however, and with great gusto he announced here that one meal a day would now be given to every school child. I want to say that that one meal a day is nothing but a meagre—one almost wants to say an election bait of the Minister of Finance to vote this amount, to hold out this meal in prospect. Let us see how it works out. Let me now take the figures for the number of children at school in 1939. In 1939 there were 417,000 European children in the country at school; there were 453,000 native children at school and 165,000 coloured and Asiatic children, a total of 1,035,000. That was in 1939. Let us now take it at 1,000,000 children. I ask the hon. Minister if he sees his way clear to provide one decent meal a day for less than 1s. a child. There are 200 school days in a year. Let us take it at 1s. a meal. Do you know what it amounts to? It will amount to a yearly expenditure of £10,000,000. The Minister said that perhaps he would spend only £200,000 this year, but that next year it would perhaps increase to £1,000,000. The cost of this plan will not be covered by the Union Treasury only, but a portion of it will be covered by the Provincial Councils. The Provincial Council in the Free State, for example is today not entitled to impose taxes in respect of the natives. Notwithstanding this fact, however, the Provincial Council must meet a portion of the cost. There is a total of 618,000 non-European children at school and it will cost £6,000,000 to provide one meal a day for 200 days to the non-European children but the Provincial Councils have not the right to tax the natives. The total food plan will cost £10,000,000 a year, and if the Minister makes £1,000,000 available next year, he will carry out only one-tenth of the plan. Now I want to say here very clearly that this proposal to take your children and to say that they will get one meal a day free, violates the family life and is unjust towards the family. The Minister will perhaps say: Do you want these children to go hungry? I say: Give the father a proper living and he will provide for his children. It is not I who said that we would flourish if we took part in this war; it was the hon. members on the other side who described in glowing terms how we would flourish if we took part in a war; it was the hon. members on the other side who said that we would live in a land of milk and honey if we took part in the war. What is the position now? I want to tell you now straight out what the result of the application of this measure will be. It will result in a flood of little natives to the schools. When the farmer gets up in the morning and looks for his servants, then he will find that they have all gone to the Minister’s schools to go and get that one meal a day. No farmer in the country, unless he is a bad farmer—and there are not many bad farmers in the country—allows his servants to go hungry. Everywhere there is the complaint that we cannot produce because we have not the necessary labour. But now the labour is being drawn away to the cities and from the cities it is being drawn to the army. This measure will have only one result, and that is an increase in that shortage of labour from which the country is today suffering. What is the Minister’s answer to this question, namely what he proposes for the future. Here his answer is “I give the population who complains of its needs, the following things: In the first place I give them greater and unrestricted expenditure and taxation; a war that knows no limit and the valves will simply be opened until the Exchequer is empty.” In respect of social security he said that he was not concerned with that social security; he is not able to give anything; he is not able to give the population the assurance that it will have social security in the future; that is what he gives to the people, and now he comes eventually with this food plan, and I know what benefit they will derive from that. We have pleaded for years already for a decent existence for the people; we have pleaded for years that there should not be starvation in the country. We ask that the people should be given an opportunity to earn their bread with the labour of their hands, and then it will not be necessary for him to give an extra meal a day to an honourable Afrikaner. If we take the Minister’s budget as a whole, we cannot help seeing in that budget the clear tracks of the Minister’s aim in connection with the non-Europeans in the country. Since the present Minister became Minister of Finance, he has spent money with a lavish hand on all services in connection with the native population of the country. I want to show now how the nonEuropeans are privileged. I have certain figures here in my hand. I take especially the sums that have been spent in connection with native education. There is a basic allowance of £340,000 and to that basic allowance of £340,000 there is a grant of a fraction of the money that is derived from the general native taxation. If I examine these figures, then I find this: In 1936 a total general taxation of £1,122,660 was paid by the natives. The amount that was paid to the Native Trust was £224,532. Apart from the basic allowance of £340,000 there was a grant for education of £109,708. That was in 1926. This one-fifth surcharge rose from year to year. In 1936 it rose to two-fifths; in 1937 it was three-fifths already. From 1926 to 1938, i.e. in twelve years, the grant rose from one-fifth of the total taxation to three-fifths of it in 1939, i.e. a rise of 40 per cent. Where in 1926 one-fifth of the total amount of native tax was paid to the Native Trust, in 1937—’38, three-fifths were paid to the Native Trust, a rise of 40 per cent. And what happened after 1938? In 1939 it was still three-fifths, but immediately this Minister came into power, there was a tremendous rise. In 1940—’41 it rose to two-thirds and in 1942—’43 there was again an increase to five-sixths, and now in 1943—’44, it is increased to six-sixths. Every penny that is now derived from native tax is put into the Development Fund. What are the amounts concerned? Let me by way of comparison mention a few amounts. In 1937—’38 native tax amounted to £1,411,000, in 1942—’43 it was a little less, i.e. £1,380,000. But what was the increased amount paid to the Trust for native purposes, for services for natives? In 1937—’38 £846,000 was paid to the Trust, but in 1942—’43 the amount was £1,150,000—almost double the amount. We take the position in connection with the amounts granted for native education. In 1937—’38 an amount of £564,000 was granted for education, but in 1943—’44, according to the estimate the amount will be £1,104,000, a doubling of the amount in comparison with 1937—’38. These figures show how generous the Minister is, and my point of view is that while he spends money so lavishly on services for natives, there has not been a single penny of increased taxation on the native population since 1925. The native still stands on the basic position of £1 poll tax. That is the position that while the natives are still getting increased services with an increase of taxation, the services for Europeans are restricted and their tax is increased. I do not want to go into the matter of the curtailment that is going on in our services. The hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie) has already referred to that. Services are curtailed, and even the poor Europeans are heavily taxed. The native and coloured population of the country scavenging today as never before, because there never has been a Government that has dished out with such a lavish hand. They need only to enlist and help the Government to prosecute the war. Let me put it briefly like this: There are native and coloured women who were washerwomen before the war. Today they are no longer the washerwomen of the Europeans, but they are in the position to employ washerwomen themselves. The husband has enlisted in the army and gets his allowance, and the native woman gets an allowance, as much money as they have never seen before. “Pots and pots of money” are being made. The dependants of non-Europeans have never before had such a good time. If we see what the amount is that has already been spent in this connection, then we are amazed. It is remarkable to see how the figures agree. The Minister comes along and says that he must increase taxation, and the taxpayer will have to pay an extra £9,000,000. The Minister was asked what the total payments were to coloured soldiers and their dependants, and how much has been paid out to native soldiers and their dependants up to the end of 1942. The answer of the Minister was that in respect of coloured soldiers and their dependants £5,504,000, and in respect of native soldiers and their dependants in the same period £3,617,000 was paid out, altogether approximately £9,000,000 was taken from the Exchequer, from the pocket of the European taxpayer, and the coloureds and the natives, just because they are in the army, have today what they have never had before. For this reason tax must be imposed on the Europeans, and the natives go scot free. The poor Europeans must be taxed, but not the natives. The poor white man who must maintain a European standard of living, who must educate and clothe his children, and must maintain a family life as an entity, he must be taxed to death, but the others get only privileges and are not taxed more. We can understand this of the Minister of Finance. The Minister is no longer giving effect to the decisions of this House, but to the decisions of the Native Representative Council. I just want to quote something from the report of the proceedings during the fourth Session, 1940. A number of decisions were taken, inter alia, this—

This is the decision that the Minister is trying to follow up and carry out gradually. Meals must also be given to non-European children, and gradually every native child must receive education at the expense of the State. The resolutions in the following year again go further. In 1941 there were a number of resolutions and a number of demands were made on the Minister. The Union Government, according to those resolutions, must accept all responsibility for the education, the supply of book learning, of academic knowledge to native children. Here are a few of the demands—

At first they made all kinds of other demands, and then they said that perhaps it would be difficult to carry out everything at once and therefore they merely made the demand that all the tax derived from natives should be made available for native education. That is what the Minister has done. The Minister now gives the total amount to the natives for their purposes—six-sixths, in accordance with the resolution of the Native Representative Council. I want to tell the Minister that throughout his budget we see the inclination to make the utmost concessions to the natives. Now an additional tax is placed on Railway tickets. When the basic Railway tariffs were laid down it was decided that it would be so much for first class, so much for second class and in proportion so much for third class passengers. This has been in force for all these years and there has always been definite proportion maintained between the three classes of passengers. And now the Minister of Finance comes along and takes upon himself the right to say that first and second class passengers must pay 15 per cent. more which will particularly affect those who live a long distance away. But the third class passengers, the natives and the coloureds, are not taxed, only the Europeans, who travel in the other classes must be taxed heavier. There is not the slightest justification for the discrimination. We see here all the signs in the budget which we have never before seen in a budget, and if you take notice, then you cannot do otherwise than charge the Minister that his budget is slowly assuming a coffee colour. Through his budget he is busy placing the non-Europeans in a better position at the cost of the European. I want to ask the Minister if he wants to force the poor man who has so far travelled second class to travel third class among the blacks and the yellows? If that is not the intention, let him at least remove this stigma from his budget and let him announce that he has given up this plan. If action must be taken, then it must be taken without discriminating. There is unfortunately not much time for us to speak. But we have to do here with something serious. If there is trouble in the country one day in connection with the relationship between European and non-European as a result of this measure, the Minister will stand accused as the man who is responsible for these difficulties, and he will be branded as the man who gave our budget more and more a coffee colour.

I should like to add my congratulations to the Minister for the budget which he has placed before the country and I think that he has fairly and equally distributed his taxation proposals. I am glad to note that the Minister heeded the representations made to him, for allowance to Civil Service pensioners. I note that an amount of £50,000 has been set down for that purpose, and I hope that if necessary he will see to it that a larger amount is placed on the Estimates. What I want to speak on more especially, in the short time at my disposal, is a matter which I want to bring to the notice of the Government, which, if carried out, will provide employment and careers for a limited number of returned soldiers. That is one of the big problems before the country. Now, what I have in view is that the various professions in South Africa might be able to absorb a number of these returned soldiers. I have in mind more particularly the survey profession; mine surveying, land surveying and railway surveying. Prior to the war there was a shortage of surveyors, in Natal at any rate. I do not know what the position was in the rest of the country, but I rather imagine it was the same. There was a great shortage, and people who wanted to have estates subdivided had to wait for many months. I think one reason why there was such a shortage is because the examinations are very severe. Well, considering that our soldiers are giving up 3, 4 or perhaps 5 years of their lives, I think it would be unfair to expect them when discharged from the Army to undergo a very lengthy training, a very lengthy study in order to pass a professional examination. The Land Survey examination takes at least five years—that is to pass the theoretical and the practical parts. It would be unjust to expect a returned soldier to spend all that time in extra study, and for that reason I think that the examinations should be modified. I think the Government through the Civil-Re-employment Board should consult the South African Institute of Surveyors, and endeavour to come to an understanding so that the theoretical part of the examination should be eliminated and let the returned soldiers take up the practical part of surveying. I am sure if that was done they would be able to do the work, especially in view of the fact that the work of land surveyors has to be examined and passed by the Surveyor-General. So, if a mistake occurs it will be put right. I would not suggest this without the South African Institute of Surveyors being consulted, because I know one is treading on dangerous ground when interfering with any profession without consulting the authorities. And I strongly recommend that the Government should follow my advice and endeavour to find careers for our boys in the various professions, and that they shall consult those in authority. I would suggest further that the surveyors might be prepared themselves to give instruction to returned soldiers, take them on as apprentices, free of any fee. We all have to make sacrifices in this war and after it, and I am sure the land surveyors of South Africa will be prepared to do their part and possibly take on the soldiers and give them a practical training. I hope this idea will fall on fertile ground and that the Government will see what can be done. There is one other matter which I want to mention to the Minister. It is a subject which I have spoken on in previous years, and that is a Vocational Training School for Natal. The Minister has kindly promised that Natal will in due course have such a school. It is the only Province which has not got one, and I hope preparations will be made. I do not expect the buildings to be erected while the war is on, but at any rate preliminary surveys and plans can be made so that when the time arrives Natal may have its Vocational Training School. I do not wish to detain the House, my time is limited, but I hope the Minister will bear in mind what I have asked him, and that the Government will take into consideration this question of finding employment in professions for our returned soldiers.

My time is very limited, and I propose therefore to confine myself to dealing briefly with certain aspects of taxation, and then, if time permits, with certain aspects of the Control Boards. First of all, I wish to deal with the new tax introduced this year, the tax on railway passenger fares. At first sight it appeared to be quite a sound tax, but the more one thinks about it the more one dislikes it. It is a tax which on second thought becomes undesirable; it is sectional, and unquestionably a loading against the Interior, and I think the Minister would be well advised to reconsider the wisdom of enacting such a tax, especially as it is adding another new tax to the many we have had introduced during the war. I have submitted in previous years that the fundamental basis of any taxation is the normal and the super tax. Those taxes cover the general body of taxpayers, and in all countries—Great Britain, Australia,. New Zealand, Canada—it is the normal and the super taxes which provide the bulk of the country’s revenue. The rates of our normal and super taxes in South Africa, however, are absurdly low when compared with those of other countries. On that point there is no denying the fact, and, despite the 15 per cent. surcharge which the Minister is adding to these taxes, they are still low, and I submit that they are low from the bottom to the top, and they are capable of considerable increase and of producing a substantial amount of revenue which this country requires. I would say this, that I do not think the principle of imposing a surcharge is altogether sound. I think the rates should be recast, because when one has a sliding scale of taxation, such as we have in normal and super tax, 15 per cent. at the bottom, amounts to a bagatelle, whereas at the top it can amount to a very big sum of money. It is unsound to impose a flat rate of 15 per cent., whether the rate be 1d. in the £ or 12s. 6d. in the £. And we must remember that any imposition of normal and super tax carries with it the further obligation to other taxes—the personal and savings levy, and the Provincial income tax. We have had over the three years of war nine additional taxes added, and we now have the tenth tax. This policy of introducing multiple taxes, each one covering a section, I feel, has put us on the wrong road in our war taxation policy. I am sorry the Minister did not from the outset follow the policy of other countries and spread that burden equitably, over the general body of taxpayers. I liken this general body of taxpayers to a camel and these various taxes to straws, and we all know the old fable, that it is the last straw which breaks the camel’s back. It will be very unfortunate, indeed, if this policy is pursued until that back does break, because these new taxes are all more or less confined to one portion of the back, or within the very narrow confines of that portion.

It gives them the hump.

Yes, they create the hump. This policy has a most irritating effect and causes discontent among the sections affected, and we know that we have had experience in the past of the effect of such a policy. I do not wish to be prophetic, but I hate to think how history can repeat itself. We all know what the effects were in years gone by of certain similar types of taxes—the patent medicine tax and the tax on tobacco. The result was disastrous, and if we continue taxing this section and that section it can only result in disaster. It is producing the terrible anomalies to which so much exception is now taken. I support the pleas made in this House for simplification and equity. We want simplification and equity in our taxation, and it is those two features which are worrying this country. It was my main plea last year. It does take time for the country to realise the full implications of taxation. I hope the effect will not be too disastrous, but the portents are not good. I am sorry the Minister has reenacted the Trades Profits Special Levy. It is a tax that is causing strong opposition and it is a tax which is based upon no principle whatever and has produced this effect. I have a case of two people in receipt of the same income of £1,250 a year. Before this tax was enacted each paid Income Tax of £61, which included Normal and Provincial Taxes. The effect of the Trade Levy has been to increase the one person’s taxation from £61 to £387 and the other man’s from £61 to £67 so that his income remains practically scot free of any increase. The one man says the taxation in South Africa is very light, but the other man does not share his view, and he wonders whether in England he would not be better treated. Then I am sorry the Minister has seen fit to increase the rate of the excess profits duty to 15s. I admit that at 13s. 4d. in comparison with other countries the rate is low, but if we want to compare taxation with other countries we must go to the Normal and the Super Tax, where the comparison is the other way. Our Normal and Super Tax Rates are low, but some of our other taxes are very high. We had a debate here recently on this excess profits duty and we tried to show the Minister some of the deleterious effects upon development which this tax is having. The increase in the rates can only aggravate those retarding effects. It is like putting the brake on and I think it is a wrong time for the Minister to put the brake on. It is to produce a further £800,000, but that £800,000 is taken from a small section of the taxpayers. The Minister should rather take it from the general body of taxpayers than just from one particular section. In addition to E.P.D. there is the Undistributed Profits Tax, which is estimated to yield £35,000 in the coming year—a paltry sum for an individual tax.

That shows it’s doing its job.

Yes, it may, but it has more of a nuisance value, because it places the heaviest impost on new industry, on a new company which is struggling to build reserves and a sound financial position. The tax must inevitably fall heaviest on new industries and is a close relative of the E.P.D. with which it pulls in double harness to retard industry. Of that I have no doubt. In the last recess I visited a number of factories on the Rand, where I saw partly erected buildings—those buildings had been left incomplete due solely to the fact that extension schemes had to be abandoned upon the severe effect of taxation becoming known. I have not got the time of elborate upon some of these taxes, so I should like now to come to the taxation on gold mines. I congratulate the Minister on resisting the temptation to increase the taxation on gold mining more than he has done. I have to be very brief, and I shall content myself with saying this, that out of every £ of profit made by the gold mines today between 14s. and 15s. accrues in direct payment to the State. And we all know how widespread the indirect effects of the gold mines are upon this country. Mr. Beatty at the last annual meeting of the Johannesburg Consolidated Investment Company told us that he estimates that 4,000,000 people in South Africa are directly dependent on the gold mines—I should say directly and indirectly, which in a population of 10,000,000 is a very substantial number. I think the Minister was very wise because there is such a thing as killing the goose that lays the golden eggs. When taxation has reached such a high figure, practically 15s. in the £, surely there must be a ceiling somewhere, and the question is whether that ceiling has not already been reached. I think the country does welcome some of the improvements, which the Minister is proposing in the way of social welfare. Unlike the hon. member for Boshof (Mr. Serfontein) I do not share his apprehension with regard to the meal a day for school children. It is going to be one of the steps that will build this nation, and will prove, I feel, one of the best investments this country has made for the future health of the people. It will take some time before it is put into full effect—Rome was not built in a day—yet it is a start in the right direction, and it is a constructive policy. Now there is a matter that I want to have cleared up. The Minister last December addressed a meeting of the Chambers of Commerce and of Industry in Durban and made this statement—

I cannot understand such a statement, because this matter has been raised in Parliament, and I think the answer is forthcoming in a leader in the “Cape Times” on the 14th December, in which referring to this statement by the Minister it reads—

His speech has undoubtedly created quite a wrong impression.

I referred to the method of apportioning profits of private companies. It is not my fault, my speech was perfectly clear.

It was reported throughout the length and breadth of the country, as I have stated, and is misleading to the country. Finally, I just want to say a brief word about control boards, and particulary the Wheat Control Board. We have seen the price of bread reduced upon representations made in this House, and I feel that the price of bread before that reduction took place was too high, and before the increase was made it was also too high. There is no doubt about it that there is a serious and growing opposition in this country to the activities of some of these boards, to their dictatorial, bureaucratic methods and attitude. This policy of allowing one or two individuals to fix prices of commodities like bread is dangerous in the extreme. The question is whether if the price of bread was too high the price of wheat was not too high also. When we see the prices of milling shares, we recognise that the miller is obviously making too much profit, and he can only make that at the expense of the consumer. Then we have the Citrus Board. A year ago one producer of citrus, probably the biggest producer we have, who also controls a big departmental store, found it convenient, when his citrus crop could not be realised, to dispose of it by giving it away as a present to those who made purchases in the store. Representations were made to the Minister of Commerce and Industries to apply the Unlawful Determination of Prices Act, but no action was taken. A friend of mine has a citrus farm, and he has also a direct interest in a big store. They wanted to do the same thing, but he was faced with the order to plough his oranges into the ground and was denied the right to rail his oranges away from the farm, and give away a pocket of oranges to every purchaser of so much value in goods. That was due to the decision of the Citrus Board, because the Board decreed that it could be done, and that he must plough his oranges back into the ground. With a state of affairs like that, there must be something wrong. Lincoln’s famous saying still holds good. You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.

When the Minister of Finance listens to what is said on his side of the House, such as the hon. member who has just spoken, then he must realise that he has made a mess of this budget. The hon. member did not have a single good word to say about the Minister’s budget. No, there was one thing. He thanked the Minister because he did not impose more taxation on the gold mines. That is the only good point he could find in the budget. In every other respect he condemned the budget. We agree with him in his disapproval of all the other points, and it is a pity that he cannot agree with us, or disapprove of the fact that the mines were not taxed still more. I say that a mess has been made of the budget; and I say that just as great a mess as has been made of the budget is also being made of the administration of the whole country. We cannot mention one department, without our feeling that everything is going wrong and that things are happening that are quite unwarranted, things about which the people have every reason to be dissatisfied. It is not only about financial matters that there is dissatisfaction. I briefly want to mention few other departments. Take the Prime Minister’s Department. We have here the foolish declarations of war on practically every country in the world. One day Finland is assisted and the next day war is declared on Finland. His Department of Defence causes dissatisfaction in regard to the wasting of money and the bad treatment of the troops. There is dissatisfaction among the soldiers. By that Department a mess is being made of the whole war position and the position in our country. Take the Department of Lands. The Minister comes along and puts a stop to all normal developments. He does not want to give land to settlers. He tells us beautiful stories about irrigation works, but everything must stand still until after the war. Development is hindered, the country must stand still, and thereby go backwards. The farmers are dissatisfied with the Department of Agriculture and consumers are dissatisfied. The country is faced with starvation; the dairy farmers, the poultry farmers and the pig farmers complain that they cannot get food for their stock.

It is the drought.

Now the hon. member says that it is the drought. We have, however, heard of 100,000 bags of maize that were sent over the border, and we also know of potatoes that are lying and rotting. The Department of Agriculture is powerless and the Minister says he can do nothing. On the other hand the farmers are without advice. In my own constituency at Verkeerdevlei, the people came together to get maize from the Maize Control Board, but for a whole month they have heard nothing from the Maize Control Board. They must slit the throats of their pigs and their fowls and put them on the market. Even the Department of Higher Education practically drives students away; they are compelled to join the army. We find at agricultural schools that agricultural education is retarded because no more students are accepted. We find that the Department of Social Welfare—in spite of the beautiful speeches that are made in this House—that everything has come to a standstill to wait until after the war. It shows that there is something wrong, that everything is wrong in the country and that a mess is being made of things. There is only one Department that has not made a mess of things and about which we do not hear complaints, and that is the Department of Mines. Members come and thank the Minister because he has not imposed higher taxation. The newspapers tell us that after the budget speech the price of shares rose immediately. There was a revival on the share market. In the meantime we hear that our reserves of ore in the gold mines are becoming depleted. We know that there are other parts of the country where there is gold, but nothing is done to develop those parts. And in connection with this, I want to tell the House an interesting thing. Two years ago, when I was candidate in Winburg, a few days before the Election this little newspaper arrived. It is the SAP-newspaper “Die Volk,” the official organ of the Minister of Justice, and it published this article in the constituency—

And then the article continues—

This article was written by a certain A. O. Oosthuizen, now chief organiser of the Party of the Minister of Finance. This was a scandalous attempt at bribery. “Gold is waiting to enrich Winburgers.” “Everything depends on the by-election.” Winburg fortunately did not believe it; it was a scandalous article, and if this articles was true, then there is a lot of gold. Two years ago the United Party said that gold would flow in the district. The Minister of Finance will surely not doubt what appears in this article.

Did gold not flow before the election?

Yes, but it was then already in the form of jingling coins. I am speaking of gold under the ground. I assume that those persons made sure that there was gold. Now I ask the Minister to assist in the developing of that gold. If he does this, then he need not fear a shortage of ore. I quoted this article to show what went on there, but I want to say now in all seriousness that large options were taken there, and that there is strong evidence that there is gold there, and that the Government should not wait until after the war before doing something there. I have shown that in all these departments there are conditions that are deplorable. I want to confine myself to a department I have not yet mentioned. That is the Department of Justice. I have informed the Minister of Justice that I would speak after 4 o’clock on this subject. He told me that he had other work, and that he could not be here. What that work is, I do not know. There is a great deal that can be said on this subject, but in the time at my disposal I want to mention the chief points of what is going on in the Department of Justice. There are conditions under the present regime that amount to the perpetration of the greatest injustice and the prostitution of the laws of the country under the cloak of emergency regulations. There is a contravention and prostitution of recognised legal principles and the principles of justice, that have always been held in honour in our country. These are shamelessly trampled upon, and the Minister walks with spiked boots over the recognised legal principles and the principles of justice in our country. I will prove it. Everything that we in the past have regarded as right and just in our administration of justice, is prostituted and contravened, and it is all done falsely under the cloak of emergency regulations. I will mention one outstanding case among many. In the first place, all kinds of crimes like theft and the injury of property are treated as crimes under the emergency regulations. People are arrested under emergency regulations and put into gaol and deprived of the rights of an ordinary prisoner, whether they have committed the crime, or whether it is assumed that they have committed it, where the Minister has the fullest right under the ordinary laws of the country to have the people tried. No, but this is not done, but emergency regulations are employed, and then those people have not even the rights of an ordinary criminal. I want to say something in connection with the indiscriminate arrests that are going on. At Bloemfontein one day a prominent member of the community, a certain Mr. Kolbe, was arrested and locked up in gaol. For a whole day he was accused of all kinds of things. Towards the evening only it was discovered that they had arrested the wrong person. They admitted that they had arrested a completely wrong man. Then another Kolbe was arrested. He was employed by another large firm. He was held in custody for three weeks. He did not have the right to consult a lawyer or an advocate. Then he was released, and the chief detective told him that they had nothing against him. The first Kolbe who was arrested was fortunately employed by a well-disposed firm, and he retained his job. In the case of the second Kolbe, he had been employed for eighteen years by the firm, but he was told by his employer that he could not get his job back again. He pointed out to his employer that even the chief detective had told him that they had nothing against him, but, in spite of this, he lost his job. That is the kind of thing that is going on, and there are many such cases. A man that is arrested, if he is employed by an unfriendly firm, whether he is guilty or not, is dismissed simply because he was arrested, and because there was suspicion against him. It is a disgrace that people are arrested in this manner. The people are arrested and put into gaol. I have repeatedly said in the House that no right-thinking person can object to the arrest of a person where there is reasonable suspicion against him. But the difficulty is that those people are deprived of all rights, even those that an ordinary criminal has. Whether it is a white man or a native, even if he is an ordinary criminal, or even if he is a thief or a murderer, when he finds himself in gaol, then he has certain rights that are protected by law and regulation. He has, in the first place, the right to take legal advice immediately, no matter what crime he may have committed. He has the right to see his relatives, and also his friends. In the third place, he can receive food and clothing from outside. In many cases the people are charged with ordinary crimes, which means that when they appear before Court, they are charged not under the emergency regulations, but under the ordinary law, for such things as theft and damaging of property. When they are arrested, however, then they are told that they are being arrested under the emergency regulations, and then they are treated worse than an ordinary criminal. I say it is a prostitution of the law of the country. They deprive the people of all their rights, and they sometimes keep them for three weeks in the same clothes, without giving them the chance to put on other clothes, without food from outside, and without allowing them to see anyone. And inside the gaol the treatment is not of the best. I can mention many cases, but I want to mention one outstanding case. It is a case which I have brought before the Minister of Justice, but with very unsatisfactory results. Two people arrived at Rouxville from Johannesburg. They were employed by a farmer. One day they were arrested and taken away to a gaol. They repeatedly asked the reason why, but they were not told. The one brother immediately told the police that his brother was ill, and that they should not let him sleep on the cement floor of the cell. They did not take any notice of this. This was on a Friday. On Saturday the farmer by whom they were employed went to the gaol to see them. He immediately went to the police and told them that the man was seriously ill. I have here a sworn statement in which he says: “I noticed immediately that the man was deadly ill. His hands were wet with perspiration and there was a blue shade around his mouth. I told the sergeant about it.” The police were told that the man could no longer sleep on the cement floor. They were repeatedly told that they had been arrested under the emergency regulations. On Monday morning at eleven o’clock the doctor examined the man. I also have a sworn statement of the doctor in which he says that the lad was ill and should have gone to a hospital immediately for an operation. This did not happen, and a little while later they let him walk 300 yards to the magistrate’s court to be interrogated, and back again. That afternoon the same thing happened. The lad had to walk there and back huddled up. When the doctor arrived he immediately asked them how they could do such a thing because he had told them that the man should not walk and should undergo an operation. They then took the lad to Aliwal-North and he died under operation. And then the police told the other brother that he could go because they had arrested the wrong people. I wrote a nice letter to the Minister of Justice and asked him whether, in view of the circumstances of this case, seeing that the son supported the parents, an ex-gratia payment could not be made to the parents. But no, there was not a penny for them. Now all of a sudden it is said that the lads were not arrested under the emergency regulations, I have the sworn statements here. There was no charge against them, and they were interrogated under the emergency regulations. The Minister of Justice knows it all. Now the parents have to sit there and their child has died in this way.

It is no wonder that the Minister of Justice is not here.

There are many cases, but I mention this one to show what is going on in the country. What must we think of the administration of justice, when such things happen, and it is all under the false guise of emergency regulations. I must hurry and I can only mention a few cases. There is another thing to which we object. We have read a statement in the newspaper of a woman in Pretoria in which she says that she was locked up with coloureds, and that she had to stroll in the same exercise yard with coloureds. She was detained under the emergency regulations. We know that the law lays down that Europeans and coloureds must be kept separate. They must not even see each other. That is the rule in our prisons. But here a European woman is placed with coloureds in the same prison and in the same yard. But it is the emergency regulations, and therefore the Minister can do what he pleases. I come now to the position when people are imprisoned. In the first place, they are interrogated, and I want to say that this system of interrogation, according to the evidence of people who have gone through it, is simply a scandal. At the beginning of the Session I gave notice of a motion that this matter should be investigated. Unfortunately we have not had the opportunity of coming to that discussion, and therefore I had it removed from the Agenda, so that I would get the opportunity to discuss it during the Budget debate. I asked for an investigation. I do not know whether all the things that we read in our newspapers are correct. I cannot test them. What we ask is that there should be a proper investigation into it. I have talked with numerous people who have come out, and they tell me that it is nothing other than the American “third degree”. They are placed in a cell; they are hardly asleep when they are aroused and taken to another cell, where they are interrogated. Then they are taken back to the cell, and so it goes on. They are addressed in threats and bad language. Bad language is used towards them. There are very nice exceptions of detectives who are strict, but who treat the people decently. The others swear and threaten. One method that is employed is to tell the people that they need not speak, but if they do not speak they will be sent to an internment camp. The result is that the people afterwards make statements against their friends. In this manner people are, compelled to make statements which they later regret bitterly. I have read of numerous cases in the Press. I want to mention a few of them. There is the instance of the famous case of Visser and Van Blerk. Visser made a statement which was not afterwards taken into consideration, as a result of the methods that were employed. I do not know whether Visser’s statement was correct. He made it in court. Traps were set for him in all kinds of ways. He was told that the best thing for him to do was to make a statement, and a bloodstained jacket was even shown to him by a certain captain who said: “The rope is already around your neck, and still you lie.” He asked to be allowed to get a lawyer, but he could not get a lawyer. Eventually, after he had been deprived of his senses, when he was practically off his mind, they said to him: If you will make another statement, things will be easy for you.” Then he eventually made a statement which he later withdrew, and the court decided to reject the statement and not to accept it. I have personally invesigated many of the cases, and everywhere they carry on in this manner. Here I have a case that was reported in the Press of a 14-year-old-boy. Eight detectives arrived at the house of the parents when the boy was alone with his little sister, and in the absence of the parents the detectives took the child into a room and asked him a series of questions, and even threatened him with imprisonment. The boy became frightened by the threats, and he says that the one detective pretended to aim a revolver at him. His resistance broke and he made a statement, and told certain things which he later admitted that he did not know anything about. Is it not scandalous? In this way I can mention numerous cases. There is the case of a woman in Durban. She was visited by a few detectives and they put questions to her about two lodgers who had lodgings with her. When she refused, they took her to prison, and there she had to lie on a cement floor with a small blanket and a little mat. She had a weak heart and became unconscious. Eventually she returned home. Later she was again interrogated, and she was told that if she did not supply all the information, there would be more trouble for her. Is this the way to carry on? We know that the law clearly lays down that no statement whatever from a person who is arrested that is made under pressure or a promise of any benefit or by the exercise of any influence will be valid. Any statement must be made freely and voluntarily, but here the Minister prostitutes the whole law simply by saying that it is not the ordinary law but the emergency regulations. And then later the Minister comes along and says: “Well, wrong action was taken and the matter will come before the ordinary court.” But all the information and evidence is obtained by “third degree” methods, contrary to our whole conception of the law. There is for example the case of two young boys of a good family, who were arrested and later found guilty. I have no objection against their being arrested, but the parents, one of whom is a clerygyman, asked me to go and see the boys in prison and to do what I could to help them in the trouble. I went to the gaol, but the gaoler told me that he was very sorry but he could not admit me. I then said that I wanted to see them professionally. “I am very sorry,” he said, “but I cannot admit you, because the Minister has prohibited it.” I then wrote a letter to the Minister and said: “The position is such and such, give me an opportunity to see the boys.” To this very day I have not even received a reply from him. He did not even have the decency to reply.

Is that the Minister of Justice.

Of Justice! And then I come further to another point, and that is that persons who are detained for months and months without a hearing, and that after the detectives have all the evidence in their hands. I myself have been concerned in such cases, quite a number, where within a few days, within a week after the person has been arrested, the Department has had all the statements, all the evidence on which they could eventually find the person guilty. No new evidence was obtained later. Eventually after two months the young fellow was tried. It was not a Supreme Court case, but he was tried before a magistrate, and the evidence was in the possession of the detective department all the time. I gave my personal attention to the matter, but you can do nothing. Here in Cape Town a number of students sat for almost a year without a hearing. I have no objection to their being tried and punished, but why should people be detained for eight months or a year without knowing what the charge is against them? There is also a provision in the law that after a person has been taken into custody he should be informed as soon as possible what the charge is against him, and he must be brought before an officer of justice as soon as possible to hear the charge against him, and after this, if needs be, the hearing can be adjourned in order to get further evidence. In these cases of which I am speaking no fresh evidence was obtained later; they were tried under the ordinary law in many cases, after they had been detained for six to twelve months, without hearing the charge. I am thinking now of one particular case, where a person was detained for three months without knowing what the charge was, while the Minister’s Department had all the evidence. Why this torture? Why the prostitution of all the conceptions of law? I can go on and mention a whole series of cases. They are many, but I have only mentioned a few outstanding cases. It is a pity that the Minister, whom I am charging, is not here to listen, although I warned him that I was going to bring up the matter. These things I have mentioned are revolting to every right-thinking person. They cannot be tolerated. And the Minister must be held responsible for the position, because he knows about most of those things. He stands condemned in the eyes of all people who still believe in right and justice. There are legal men in the House, advocates and others, and I appeal to them, but also to those who have a feeling for right and justice, to see that it comes to an end, that the responsible persons are called upon to give account for the prostitution of everything we hold dear in the rights of the individual, for the prostitution of all our conceptions and principles of right and justice. In the Department of Juctice under the present Minister there is very little justice, and towards these people I have mentioned there has been no justice, but only mediaeval proseuction, torment and torture.

The hon. member in his criticism, like so many hon. members, had completely lost sight of the fact that this is a war budget, and not a peace budget, and should extend their sympathy to the Minister. I am one of those who want to congratulate the Minister on his budget, because I feel that the Minister has realised that he has to budget for war conditions. A great deal has been said about social security and about arranging conditions so that our returned soldiers will be able to find employment when the war is over, or even when they come back before the end of the war.