I move —

In regard to the alteration of the Act of 1924, I should like to make a request to the Minister of Finance. I do not think it will be necessary to make use of this provision, for we have sufficient three year old brandy. However, if there should not be sufficient of it and 2½ year old brandy has to be used, then we should like that brandy to bear a special mark. The idea was that it might be marked “War Emergency Brandy”. The Minister knows that the purpose of this stipulation was to improve the quality of our brandy. The farmers are most anxious to improve the quality of the brandy, and as we are continually applying ourselves to this task, we are afraid that it might create a wrong impression if the people were to receive brandy which is not quite as good as the old type. It might possibly be done by way of regulation. It will be for a period of six months only. Our fear is that if something of his kind would take place, it might harm the wine industry.

We shall watch the position in consultation with the K.W.V.

This is the last opportunity I have to protest against this tax, and it is my duty to tell the Minister that we are dissatisfied. During the weekend I visited my constituency and I noticed that the people are very sore about this tax. What they feel most as a hardship, is that they cannot get a promise that the increase in excise will again be taken away, when conditions become less flourishing. They have a feeling that other measures exist by which the amount of this tax could have been collected. An industry which has done well, which has a fine reputation, is now being taxed in this manner, and in our opinion placing the burden on this particular industry savours of discrimination. Having voiced this protest I shall sit down, but the Minister of Finance should understand that we shall not easily forgive him for this taxation.

Motion put, and the House divided:

Ayes—57:

Abbott, C. B. M.

Abrahamson, H.

Acutt, F. H.

Alexander, M.

Allen, F. B.

Ballinger, V. M. L.

Bawden, W.

Bell, R. E.

Botha, H. N. W.

Bowker, T. B.

Carinus, J. G.

Clark, C. W.

Collins, W. R.

Conradie, J. M.

Davis, A.

Deane, W. A.

De Wet, H. C.

Dolley, G.

Du Toit, R. J.

Fourie, J. P.

Friedlander, A.

Gilson, L. D.

Goldberg, A.

Hayward, G. N.

Hemming, G. K.

Henderson, R. H.

Heyns, G. C. S.

Higgerty, J. W.

Hirsch, J. G.

Hofmeyr, J. H.

Jackson, D.

Kentridge, M.

Lindhorst, B. H,

Long, B. K.

Marwick, J. S.

Molteno, D. B.

Mushet J. W.

Neate, C.

Pocock, P. V.

Raubenheimer, L. J.

Robertson, R. B.

Rood, K.

Solomon, B.

Solomon, V. G. F.

Steyn, C. F.

Steytler, L. J.

Sturrock, F. C.

Sutter, G. J.

Trollip, A. E.

Van Coller, C. M.

Van der Byl, P. V. G.

Wallach, I.

Wares, A. P. J.

Warren, C. M.

Waterson, S. F.

Tellers: G. A. Friend and W. B. Humphreys.

Noes—39:

Bekker, S.

Bezuidenhout, J. T.

Boltman, F. H.

Booysen, W. A.

Bosman, P. J.

Bremer, K.

Brits, G. P.

Conradie, J. H.

De Bruyn, D. A. S.

Du Plessis, P. J.

Fouché, J. J.

Haywood, J. J.

Hugo, P. J.

Le Roux, P. M. K.

Liebenberg, J. L. V.

Loubser, S. M.

Louw, E. H.

Malan, D. F.

Olivier, P. J.

Oost, H.

Pieterse, P. W. A,

Schoeman, B.

Steyn, G. P.

Strauss, E. R.

Strydom, G. H. F.

Strydom, J. G.

Swart, A. P.

Swart, C. R.

Van der Merwe,

R. A. T.

Venter, J. A. P.

Verster, J. D. H.

Viljoen, J. H.

Vosloo, L. J.

Warren, S. E.

Wentzel, J. J.

Wilkens, Jacob.

Wilkens, Jan.

Tellers: J. F. T. Naudé and P. O. Sauer.

Motion accordingly agreed to.

Bill read a third time.

The hon. member for Albert-Colesberg (Mr. Boltman) has moved an amendment which I asked him to move, because I think that an injustice is being done to a certain class of persons in particular areas. The position is that we have in the Union a few small railway lines, in the most cases 2. ft. and 2 ft. 6 in gauges where there are only first-class and third-class coaches attached to the train; there are no second-class coaches. Many of the poorer class people are even now compelled to travel third-class because they cannot afford a first-class ticket. They are obliged to travel in mixed third-class compartments together with non-Europeans, which is very unsatisfactory. If this tax is now imposed, still more Europeans will be obliged to travel third-class. I do not think that the Minister would like to see these people compelled to travel third-class. He may perhaps say that the people in the second-class can still pay the 15 per cent., and that those who cannot afford to travel first-class can travel second-class, but where there is no second-class and the people cannot pay for first-class tickets there they are forced to travel third-class, and there the Minister can make some concession. It will not involve any big amount, and I have not moved my motion in any spirit of causing the Minister any difficulties. The comforts upon those small lines are very scanty, and the Minister ought to assist these people.

I dealt with all the other amendments on Saturday, but not with this one, because I wanted to go further into the matter. My difficulty is that one has to deal not only with trips on those lines, but also with trips from other lines to those lines. There may perhaps be someone taking out a ticket from Graaff-Reinet to Humansdorp. If the amendment can be limited to those particular lines where there is no second-class, I would be prepared to concede.

That will also be a concession.

I am glad that the hon. member is satisfied.

I do not say that I am satisfied, but in the circumstance I take what I can get. I shall be glad if the Minister will introduce the amendment at the report stage.

I moved an amendment in which I asked the Minister to grant exemption to men and women teachers, and in his reply the Minister asked: “Why do you not also ask exemption for public servants and bank clerks?” I must put that question to the Minister. Why does he not exempt them? He has evidently forgotten that the request has come from this side to exempt also those people from the tax. But their position is different from that of the teachers. Public servants and bank clerks get leave only once a year, and we on this side pleaded that people should be able to travel once a year free from the tax. It hardly behoves the Minister to put the question to me. I must put it to him. But he refuses. The teachers, however, have more than one holiday a year. Does the Minister now expect that the teachers should remain sitting in the places where they give tuition for the quarter? Is it fair to tax them additionally when they are commencing their holidays? They make no war profits. They have a fixed salary. On that account I think that this request is particularly fair. Then I want to protest again against the whole tax of 15 per cent. The public today do not in any way get the facilities which they enjoyed in normal circumstances. The compartments are crammed full and there is no comfort. Now the Minister is taxing the people 15 per cent. higher. This 15 per cent. tax is not a fair tax but evidently a compulsory measure of the Minister to squeeze money for the war from the people of the platteland. The Minister seeks everywhere for sources he can tax, and he has gone so far now as to poach on a preserve that is not his sphere, namely the Railways. The public will square accounts with the Minister of Finance at the very first opportunity.

The Minister of Finance was very much to the fore when he pleaded that we should try and avoid a increase in the cost of living, because it can ultimately result in inflation. Now the Minister, on behalf of the Government, comes along and singles out one matter, namely the travelling comfort of the public which is essential to the community, and he makes it 15 per cent. more expensive. The Minister thus virtually goes against the policy of his own Government. The Government wants to try to keep the rise in cost of living down, because otherwise a vicious circle would be created, but when the Minister now increases the price of railway tickets, I want to ask if he would be fair enough to increase the allowances of all the officials who will now have to pay more. The increased price of railway tickets will involve increased living costs. Consequently he must increase the cost of living allowances so as to make up for the increased expenditure. I hope the Minister will consider this and will realise that it is in the interests of his own financial policy not to proceed with the tax.

I have listened attentively to the debate on the surcharge on railway tickets, or rather the tax on railway passengers. I have certainly the greatest sympathy with the teachers and the Oudstryders. But I know also that the Minister has framed his Budget and that he expects certain revenue. Now I want to suggest that the Minister may perhaps meet the Oudstryders and the teachers, but then he must make up the amount which he sacrifices by taxing the members of Parliament.

You do not mind, because you know that you will not come back again.

I would like to say a few words in support of the hon. member for Malmesbury (Mr. Loubser). He has just spoken about men teachers, but I take it he also means women teachers. Does the Minister not realise that there are a large number of men and women teachers who teach in small platteland towns in which they are not resident, but where they are accommodated in hotels or boarding houses. Now the Minister evidently expects that the men and women teachers should remain in the hotels or boarding houses during their holidays. It is no comparison to say that if he does this for the teachers then he must also do it for the bank clerks. The bank clerks get a holiday only once a year, but teachers get holidays four times a year. I want to be reasonable: If the Minister still wants to exclude the short holidays, well and good, but in the December holidays the teachers, particularly the unmarried teachers, must get away from those places, from the hotels and the boarding houses in which they have stayed all the time—some even stay on farms. I feel that we are directing a very fair request to the Minister here. Let him refrain, at any rate so far as the long holidays are concerned, from taxing these teachers when they go home. I am pleading particularly for the unmarried ones. They will otherwise have to remain in the hotels. I hope the Minister will consider this reasonable request.

The more we think about this Bill the more we fell its unfairness.

I want to focus the attention of the Minister of Finance on the fact that this Bill does not effect one-third of the population, that is to say the cities, particularly in consequence of the provision in Clause 5 that railway tickets costing less than 10s. are not affected by the Bill. Johannesburg has 23 constituencies, Cape Town 13, Pretoria 7, and with Port Elizabeth, Durban, East London and Bloemfontein, there are 50 urban constituencies that are hardly affected by this Bill. This shows that one-third of the population miss the tax. In the cities and their environments live mainly the rich people of the country. The capitalists live in those parts, and therefore the tax does not affect the wealthy and the capitalists in the 50 constituencies. Is that fair towards the other two-thirds of the population? Is it fair that the poor people should be taxed? What is the Minister’s object? What is his motive in not taxing the wealthy, and enabling the monied classes to get away scott free? Apart from this the soldiers are exempted, the workers are exempted in respect of their concession tickets, and the coloureds are exempted, because the coloureds travel third-class. But the less well-to-do people on the platteland are affected by the tax. I cannot see the motive why the Minister should impose this unjust tax on a section of the European population. We have tried to bring to the understanding of the Minister that we are not opposed to a fair tax, that we do not want to thwart him, but then it must be a tax that will press evenly and not a tax that the poor man must bear, and that enables the wealthy and the coloureds, and particularly the urban people, to go free. If a tobacco tax is imposed and a tax on cigarettes, then it is a tax that weighs on all; but why this tax on only one class of the population? Why should the wealthy be exempted? What sense is there in the proposal? I am surprised that hon. members on the other side, who represent platteland constituencies, remain quiet. It concerns also the poor people in their constituencies. The hon. member for Frankfort (Brig.-Gen. Botha) has made a gesture, but what does it come down to: He wants to tax the salaries of members of Parliament. Hon. members on the other side who receive a military allowance will of course be satisfied with that. The hon. member himself gets a salary that is higher than the salary of the Minister of Finance, he gets £3,000 extra, he can talk easily, but his friends next to him who have not these golden appointments, will they be satisfied with such a tax? It is ridiculous to make such a gesture. He should protest jointly with us against this unfair tax on a poor section of our population. I have again met various persons during the week-end, presons who are prominent supporters of the other side of the House, and who feel embittered about this unfair tax on the one section of the population. The Minister may proceed with it, but he will be poking his head into a hornet’s nest. It almost seems as though he wants to injure his party deliberately. That is his concern, but he will hear more about this matter. He should accept the friendly advice of the Opposition to drop this Bill, to drop it into the wastepaper basket, where it belongs, because it is an unfair, impracticable and unjust measure.

The exemptions from the tax under this clause are most peculiar. The Minister exempts State officials. That I can understand, for the State pays the officials, and usually also for their conveyance, and thus it is no use taxing them. The Minister also exempts the Railway officials. I understand that also, for the same reason. But on what grounds is he exempting officials of the Governments of other countries, of allied countries?

Any country.

The troops of allied countries who travel on our Railways are not being taxed. Has the Minister seen the report in this morning’s papers of how sailors damage the trains, how they smash in doors, how they break in and remove things? Did the Minister see the state the train arrived in at Cape Town as a result of the behaviour of troops of other Governments? And those are the people the Minister wants to exempt from the tax. But the people who have to pay for the damage, they are being taxed. Where is the fairness in that? The subjects of foreign countries do great damage, without a word of protest from the Government, without our property being properly safeguarded, and the Minister goes along and exempts them from the tax. Where is the fairness in that? Compare with that our amendment at least to exempt the veterans (Oudstryders) and the people drawing old age pensions. They do not travel for luxury, but on account of necessity and compulsion. These people have to be taxed, but sailors and soldiers who destroy our trains and do great damage, are exempted. It really does seem as if our Government is more concerned about the interests of the citizens of other countries than those of our own country. It is a scandalous state of affairs. Why does he not accept the reasonable amendments from our side? Why this discrimination between the countryside and the cities, by exempting tickets under 10s.? There are very few farmers at the present time who can use motors and they have to travel by train, but they are taxed. But the people who go to the race course and the dog races are exempted. Has the Minister seen that more than £200,000 is spent in Johannesburg on bets in one week? But the people are exempted. The poor and needy men and women of the countryside are being taxed. The Minister imposes this unfair burden on people who cannot afford it and who are powerless to resist. The Minister is doing those people an injustice. I would almost say he commits a breach of faith against them, for it certainly is his duty to look after the interest of those people. The Minister imposes this tax on those people whom he himself limits to an income of £6 per month. He should know that that class of persons find it extremely difficult to make use of the trains, and why does he refuse to accept an amendment to exempt those needy people—the poorest section of our population, people who often have to suffer hunger, and who do not have the wherewithal every day to buy what they need—why does he refuse to exempt those people from this tax? We know the Minister depends upon the majority behind him to put this tax through. Well, let him put it through, but let him at the same time realise that these people who are the poorest section of our people, should be exempted. He exempts people who go to the race course; he exempts the coloureds and the natives; why cannot he exempt this section of the population? The Minister has to explain to us why he exempts the sailors, who cause hundreds and thousands of pounds damage to the trains, as they have done now again, from this tax, while he refuses to exempt his own needy fellow South Africans.

I am glad that the Minister has virtually accepted my amendment and that he is going to propose an amendment to that effect.

I cannot propose it in that form, but I shall move it in an amended form.

If the Minister will do that, I shall withdraw my amendment. Then I should like to support the amendment of the hon. member for Bloemfontein, District (Mr. Haywood). As the Bill stands at present, members of the allied forces travelling by our trains, need not pay the tax. I take it that it is not only he soldiers who are being exempted, but also the sailors of allied forces?

Yes, that is so.

Where the Defence Forces of the Union are excluded from the taxation, I could understand it, although I do not approve of it. I can understand the Minister’s argument; I can understand him being logical, for why should he let the people pay the tax on the tickets if the Government again has to pay the fare? I can understand it, although I do not support it. But what I fail to understand is why the military forces and the sailors of the allied countries are being exempted. I take it that when the British troops are here in South Africa, and they travel on our trains, the British Government is responsible for the fare on our trains. I think that is correct. We on this side take it that that is the position, and we wish to take the strongest exception to this measure, that the British Government, the Australian Government, the Canadian Government or the Government of New Zealand, when their troops come to South Africa, and here travel on our trains at the expense of those Governments, that they should then be exempted from this tax of 15 per cent. which has to be paid by our own people. If the Minister has read this morning’s paper, he would have seen what has happened on the train from Durban to Cape Town. I do not think the Minister will see it in the English Press, but if he reads the “Die Burger” of this morning, he will see how seamen carried on on the train from Durban to Cape Town. They were conveyed there by sea, but I believe they behaved so outrageously on the voyage, that they were brought back by train. On the train their behaviour was so unrestrained, that the police had to be summoned at Beaufort West, and police were sent here from Cape Town to Paarl to escort the train to Cape Town. On the train they simply smashed down all the doors between them and the dining saloon. They broke open the dining saloon and helped themselves to all the liquor they wanted. It resulted in a wild orgy. The doors were smashed and the train personnel were in danger of their lives. They could not sleep that whole night. We have to remember that those people are unarmed. Those are the people to whom the Minister is according this exemption from taxation. It is so unfortunate that the Minister of Railways himself cannot handle this Bill. Where those sailors are going to get a rebate of 15 per cent. on their train tickets, we should like to know whether they will in any case be held liable for the doors and windows they smashed. These are the things that come to mind when we think that our own people are being heavily taxed when they travel on the Railways, while those people who damage our Railway material, are exempted from the tax. They simply smash up the Railway saloons; they drink all the liquor on the train, and yet they are the people who get this rebate of 15 per cent., while the people in our own country, who are in needy circumstances, are being compelled to pay this burdensome tax. The Minister says he cannot permit them to receive this 15 per cent. rebate. We on this side have our misgivings about the British Empire, but the Minister of Finance surely will not accept the position that the British Empire is not able to pay this 15 per cent. on the train tickets of those people. No, the Minister ought to consider this amendment by the hon. member favourably. Even though they are allies, they ought to pay this tax. It is unlikely, but not impossible, that Russian soldiers will come here. And when they come here, and come along to plead for Communism and equality between white and coloured, when they come along and preach the abolition of God, then they will be the people who receive this 15 per cent. rebate on their train tickets in contrast to our own people. They are people who are responsible for breaches of the peace in our country; they are people who are inciting the natives, and they are now to travel more cheaply than our own people.

And there are Chinese also among the Allies.

Yes, the hon. member for Moorreesburg (mr. Erasmus) reminds me that there are Chinese also among the Allied Nations. I do not know whether they will travel first or second-class when they come here. I must say, once one begins with the Allies, one later finds oneself in very great difficulties. It makes no difference whether it is Russia or China, or whoever the Allies may be. For us on this side it means that they are foreign nations, and why should they be privileged as against our own people, and more particularly as against those people who have a conscientious objection to the war. The Minister should remember that we on this side have conscientious objections to the war. It is very hard for us and for those who support us, to pay for something we do not believe in, and then still to see that soldiers from other countries may travel 15 per cent. cheaper than we ourselves can travel, and in addition to have to see what damage those soldiers do to our State property. The Minister has made a few concessions. We are thankful for it, but before the Minister finally decides to accept this section in this form, we should like very much to have a reply to these amendments and to the matters we have brought to his notice.

I understand the hon. member desires to withdraw his amendment.

Yes, I want to withdraw my amendment in favour of the amendment the Minister is going to propose.

I can only propose my amendment at the Report Stage. I cannot do so now, but it will be done.

I hope that the Minister of Finance will give his attention to this clause before we finally vote on it. To me it seems to be very inconsistent to meet the students and the school children—which, of course, we heartily applaud—and not to exclude teachers from this taxation. The teachers are away from their homes in the same way as the student and the school child. They have to travel and make use of the railways only a few times a year. The Minister is now excluding ministers of religion, schoolchildren and students. I again wish to appeal to him to give serious consideration to the proposal of also excluding our teachers. They are performing important work and they need their holidays, and I think the Minister is making a serious mistake by applying this tax to them as well. It is an unfair taxation as far as the teachers are concerned. The Government should give consideration to the feelings of our own people and should try to create satisfaction as far as possible. To confront the people suddenly with a tax of this nature, to trample down those people, with a military boot so to say, simply does not pay. The people in the country look about them and notice that the R.A.F. and other members of the allied forces which the Minister loves so much; they notice that especially the R.A.F. men are travelling through the country, from Cape Town to Johannesburg, from Johannesburg to Durban, from Durban to Cape Town, all over the place. The whole world knows that the R.A.F. does nothing. Our sons here and also in other places have to bear the brunt of the battle whilst the R.A.F. is loafing about on our trains.

Rommel does not agree with you.

I do not know when the hon. member for Klip River (Mr. Friend) last saw Rommel. I doubt whether Rommel would want to see him. The people are entitled to feel dissatisfied, especially in view of the fact that the Minister is meeting the soldiers of the allied nations. It is an injustice to grant the soldiers concessions and to tell the teachers that they have to pay this taxation. The Minister should give his attention to this matter before he has the clause passed as it is at present. It is not fair to let the railways be used by all sorts of people who abuse it, whilst the people who make a proper use of the railways and who need the railways, are being taxed in this way. It is not right. I should very much like to support the amendment of the hon. member for Malmesbury (Mr. Loubser) and I want to ask the Minister to consider the matter once more, and also to exclude the teachers, seeing that he is excluding ministers of religion, students and school children, and particularly in view of the fact that he is so generous towards the allied troops. The allied troops do not consist of Englishmen only. They come from all parts of the world and include Russians and Chinese and others, and they can all come here and make use of our railways without paying this tax. It is most unfair towards the people of South Africa to act in this manner. When one looks at our railway traffic it really appears as if the great rush on the railways is caused by the travelling to and fro of these troops, the troops of our own country and also those of the allied countries. These people receive consideration. The teachers and others, people who have a difficult time, have to pay the full price, but those foreign troops are getting the concessions. If our people, when travelling by train want something to eat, they have to pay the full price whereas the troops and also the allied troops receive concessions. They receive meals on the trains at very cheap rates, and seeing that the Minister is so generous towards those people he ought, whilst he still has the opportunity, also to grant this concession to the people we are pleading for this morning, viz. the teachers.

In regard to this question of the teachers I want to ask the Minister to reconsider this matter finally. The teachers are the people who have to be away from their home towns and I want to ask the Minister whether, if he is not prepared to exclude them altogether, he will not be prepared to grant them this concession once or twice a year when the schools close for a long vacation.

If I do it for them, I have to do it for the others, too.

I really think that the teachers are an exception. They are people who have to perform their work away from their home towns; usually they are, young people, and married people are also forced to take a holiday. In the case of teachers, the matter on which they spend most, is the four holidays per year they get. Some of them told me that these are the times when they have to spend their money. Their work forces them so to say to spend this money on their holidays, and for that reason I want to ask the Minister to consider whether he cannot grant them exemption from this tax twice a year.

No need to say that I support this measure but in regard to the concession to school children, may I ask the Minister whether he intends making provision for these children attending special schools which are centralised.

Yes, they are all covered.

With leave of the Committee, the amendment proposed by Mr. Boltman was withdrawn.

Question put: That the words “or the Government of any other State”, proposed to be omitted, stand part of the Clause.

Upon which the Committee divided:

Ayes—61:

Abbott, C. B. M.

Abrahamson, H.

Acutt, F. H.

Alexander, M.

Allen, F. B.

Ballinger, V. M. L.

Bawden, W.

Bell, R. E.

Botha, H. N. W.

Bowen, R. W.

Bowker, T. B.

Carinus, J. G.

Clark, C. W.

Collins, W. R.

Conradie, J. M.

Davis, A.

Deane, W. A.

Derbyshire, J. G.

De Wet, H. C.

Dolley, G.

Du Toit, R. J.

Fourie, J. P.

Friedlander, A.

Gilson, L. D.

Goldberg, A.

Hayward, G. N.

Hemming, G. K.

Henderson, R. H.

Heyns, G. C. S.

Higgerty, J. W.

Hirsch, J. G.

Hofmeyr, J. H.

Hooper, E. C.

Howarth, F. T.

Jackson, D.

Johnson, H. A.

Kentridge, M.

Long, B. K.

Mushet, J. W.

Neate, C.

Payn, A. O. B.

Pocock, P. V.

Raubenheimer, L. J.

Rood, K.

Shearer, V. L.

Solomon, B.

Solomon, V. G. F.

Steyn, C. F.

Steytler, L. J.

Sturrock, F. C.

Sutter, G. J.

Tothill, H. A.

Trollip, A. E.

Van Coller, C. M.

Van der Byl, P. V. G.

Wallach, I.

Wares, A. P. J.

Warren, C. M.

Waterson, S. F.

Tellers: G. A. Friend and W. B. Humphreys.

Noes—36:

Bekker, S.

Bezuidenhout, J. T.

Boltman, F. H.

Booysen, W. A.

Bosman, P. J.

Bremer, K.

Brits, G. P.

Conradie, J. H.

De Bruyn, D. A. S.

De Wet, J. C.

Erasmus, F. C.

Fouché, J. J.

Fullard, G. J.

Haywood, J. J.

Hugo, P. J.

Le Roux, P. M. K.

Le Roux, S. P.

Loubser, S. M.

Malan, D. F.

Pieterse, P. W. A.

Schoeman, B. J.

Serfontein, J. J.

Strauss, E. R.

Strydom, J. G.

Swart, C. R.

Van der Merwe, R. A. T.

Van Zyl, J. J. M.

Verster, J. D. H.

Viljoen, J. H.

Vosloo, L. J.

Warren, S. E.

Wentzel, J. J.

Wilkens, Jacob.

Wilkens, Jan.

Tellers: J. F. T. Naudé and P. O. Sauer.

Question accordingly affirmed and the first amendment proposed by Mr. Haywood negatived.

The amendment proposed by Mr. J. H. Conradie was put and negatived.

Question put: That the words “or of the forces of any ally of the Union”, proposed to be omitted, stand part of the Clause.

Upon which the Committee divided:

Ayes—59:

Abbott, C. B. M.

Abrahamson, H.

Acutt, F. H.

Alexander, M.

Allen. F. B.

Ballinger, V. M. L.

Bawden, W.

Bell, R. E.

Botha, H. N. W.

Bowen, R. W.

Bowker, T. B.

Carinus, J. G.

Clark, C. W.

Collins, W. R.

Conradie, J. M.

Davis, A.

Deane, W. A.

Derbyshire, J. G.

De Wet, H. C.

Dolley, G.

Du Toit, R. J.

Fourie, J. P.

Friedlander, A.

Gilson, L. D.

Goldberg, A.

Hayward, G. N.

Hemming, G. K.

Henderson, R. H.

Heyns, G. C. S.

Higgerty, J. W.

Hirsch, J. G.

Hofmeyr, J. H.

Hooper, E. C.

Howarth, F. T.

Jackson, D.

Johnson, H. A.

Kentridge. M.

Long, B. K.

Mushet, J. W.

Neate, C.

Payn, A. O. B.

Pocock, P. V.

Raubenheimer, L. J.

Robertson, R. B.

Shearer, V. L.

Solomon, V. G. F.

Sonnenberg, M.

Steytler, L. J.

Sutter G. J.

Tothill, H. A.

Trollip, A. E.

Van Coller, C. M.

Van der Byl, P. V. G.

Wallach, I.

Wares, A. P. J.

Warren, C. M.

Waterson, S. F.

Tellers: G. A. Friend and W. B. Humphreys.

Noes—30:

Bekker, S.

Bezuidenhout, J. T.

Boltman, F. H.

Booysen, W. A.

Bremer, K.

Brits, G. P.

Conradie, J. H.

De Bruyn, D. A. S.

Erasmus, F. C.

Fouché, J. J.

Haywood, J. J.

Hugo, P. J.

Le Roux, P. M. K.

Le Roux, S. P.

Loubser, S. M.

Malan, D. F.

Oost, H.

Schoeman, B. J.

Serfontein, J. J.

Strauss, E. R.

Strydom, G. H. F.

Strydom, J. G.

Swart, C. R.

Van der Merwe,

R. A. T.

Van Zyl, J. J. M.

Vosloo, L. J.

Wilkens, Jacob.

Wilkens, Jan.

Tellers: J. F. T. Naudé and P. O. Sauer.

Question accordingly affirmed and the second amendment proposed by Mr. Haywood negatived.

Remaining amendment proposed by Mr. Haywood put and the Committee divided:

Ayes—31:

Bekker, S.

Bezuidenhout, J. T.

Boltman, F. H.

Booysen, W. A.

Bremer, K.

Conradie, J. H.

De Bruyn, D. A. S.

Erasmus, F. C.

Fouché, J. J.

Haywood, J. J.

Hugo, P. J.

Le Roux, P. M. K.

Le Roux, S. P.

Loubser, S. M.

Louw, E. H.

Malan, D. F.

Olivier, P. J.

Schoeman, B. J.

Serfontein, J. J.

Strauss, E. R.

Strydom, G. H. F.

Strydom, J. G.

Swart, C. R.

Van der Merwe, R. A. T.

Van Zyl, J. J. M.

Vosloo, L. J.

Wentzel, J. J.

Wilkens, Jacob.

Wilkens, Jan.

Tellers: J. F. T. Naudé and P. O. Sauer.

Noes—56:

Abbott, C. B. M.

Abrahamson, H.

Acutt, F. H.

Alexander, M.

Allen, F. B.

Ballinger, V. M. L.

Bawden, W.

Bell, R. E.

Botha, H. N. W.

Bowen, R. W.

Bowker, T. B.

Carinus, J. G.

Clark, C. W.

Collins, W. R.

Conradie, J. M.

Davis, A.

Deane, W. A.

Derbyshire, J. G.

De Wet, H. C.

Dolley, G.

Du Toit, R. J.

Fourie, J. P.

Friedlander. A.

Gilson, L. D.

Goldberg, A.

Hayward, G. N.

Hemming, G. K.

Henderson, R. H.

Higgerty, J. W.

Hirsch, J. G.

Hofmeyr, J. H.

Hooper, E. C.

Howarth, F. T.

Johnson, H. A.

Kentridge, M.

Long, B. K.

Mushet, J. W.

Neate, C.

Payn, A. O. B.

Pocock, P. V.

Raubenheimer, L. J.

Robertson, R. B.

Shearer, V. L.

Solomon, V. G. F.

Sonnenberg, M.

Steytler, L. J.

Sutter, G. J.

Trollip, A. E.

Van Coller, C. M.

Van der Byl, P. V. G.

Wallach, I.

Wares, A. P. J.

Warren, C. M.

Waterson, S. F.

Tellers: G. A. Friend and W. B. Humphreys.

Amendment accordingly negatived.

Amendment proposed by Mr. Loubser put and the Committee divided:

Ayes—31:

Bekker, S.

Bezuidenhout, J. T.

Boltman, F. H.

Booysen, W. A.

Bremer, K.

Conradie, J. H.

De Bruyn, D. A. S.

Erasmus, F. C.

Fouché, J. J.

Haywood, J. J.

Hugo, P. J.

Le Roux, P. M. K.

Le Roux, S. P.

Loubser, S. M.

Louw, E. H.

Malan, D. F.

Olivier, P. J.

Schoeman, B. J.

Serfontein, J. J.

Strauss, E. R.

Strydom, G. H. F.

Strydom, J. G.

Swart, C. R.

Van der Merwe, R. A. T.

Van Zyl, J. J. M.

Vosloo, L. J.

Wentzel, J. J.

Wilkens, Jacob.

Wilkens, Jan.

Tellers: J. F. T. Naudé and P. O. Sauer.

Noes—57:

Abbott, C. B. M.

Abrahamson, H.

Acutt, F. H.

Alexander, M.

Allen, F. B.

Ballinger, V. M. L.

Bawden, W.

Bell, R. E.

Botha, H. N. W.

Bowen, R. W.

Bowker, T. B.

Carinus J. G.

Clark, C. W.

Collins, W. R.

Conradie, J. M.

Davis, A.

Deane, W. A.

Derbyshire, J. G.

De Wet, H. C.

Dolley, G.

Du Toit, R. J.

Fourie, J. P.

Friedlander, A.

Gilson, L. D.

Goldberg, A.

Hayward, G. N.

Hemming, G. K.

Henderson, R. H.

Higgerty, J. W. Hirsch, J. G.

Hofmeyr, J. H.

Hooper, E. C.

Howarth, F. T.

Jackson, D.

Johnson, H. A.

Kentridge, M.

Long, B. K.

Mushet, J. W.

Neate, C.

Payn, A, O. B.

Pocock, P. V.

Raubenheimer, L. J.

Robertson, R. B.

Shearer, V. L.

Solomon, V. G. F.

Sonnenberg, M.

Steytler, L. J.

Sutter, G. J.

Trollip, A. E.

Van Coller, C. M.

Van der Byl, P. V. G.

Wallach, I.

Wares, A. P. J.

Warren, C. M.

Waterson, S. F.

Tellers: G. A. Friend and W. B. Humphreys.

Amendment accordingly negatived.

Amendment proposed by Mr. Werth put and negatived.

Clause, as printed, put and agreed to.

On Clause 6,

I undertook to move an amendment to this clause and I should like to do so now. I read out the amendment last Saturday already, and I now want to move as follows—

1. (2) The Commissioner for Inland Revenue may, if he is satisfied that any fare has been paid in respect of a journey which was undertaken solely for the purpose of obtaining medical treatment in a hospital or of returning home after such treatment, refund the whole or any portion of the tax paid in respect of such fare: Provided that written application for such refund shall be made within thirty days after such journey was completed, on the form prescribed by the said Commissioner.

In regard to Clause 5 I did not call for a division on my amendment, because the Minister had given the undertaking to move this amendment. I believe, however, that the way he has drafted his proposal will mean a waste of money and time. Why should the person concerned, and how should he, apply to the Commissioner of Inland Revenue in Cape Town?

He can do so in writing.

Why should he not be able to submit his application to the magistrate or the stationmaster? I suggested that he should simply submit a certificate of his physician to the stationmaster, and I cannot understand why the Minister cannot allow that to be done. In terms of this amendment of the Minister, a lengthy correspondence with Cape Town will result. I shall be very glad if the Minister will reconsider this matter. He met us to some extent, but still I think that the procedure he suggests is impracticable. He ought to make it easier to apply, so that these applications can be submitted to the magistrate or the stationmaster, and I want to suggest that the Minister alter his amendment to that effect.

I want to support the hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie). I can assure the Minister that endless trouble and difficulties will result from this application for the refund once the journey has been completed. The Minister can make sufficient provision which will prevent an evasion of the proposal. Why is it not possible that we arrange for a certificate issued by the magistrate being shown to the stationmaster, whereafter a ticket can be issued free of tax. On the production of such certificate the reduction could come into force. There can be no evasion of the intention of the proposal, and it will greatly simplify the procedure. Once the people have taken out their tickets and have paid the tax they have to go a roundabout way in asking for the special reduction, and this may lead to some of them not making use of the reduction. Surely the Minister does not want that, for he wants to exempt from the tax bona fide cases of people going to another place for medical treatment. We therefore believe that it would be best to grant the exemption ab initio.

I went into this matter with the Railway Administration and they consider it will be impossible in practice to arrange matters in such a way that the stationmaster will have to decide as to the bona fides of a case or not.

But surely he can do so on a certificate by the magistrate.

The application has to be made to the Receiver of Revenue, and it can be done locally, for the local Receiver of Revenue is the magistrate. The procedure will be simple enough But it cannot be done at the time of issuing the ticket. It has to be done by means of a refund.

Amendment put and agreed to.

Clause, as amended, put and agreed to.

On Clause 8,

I would like to move the motion standing on the Order Paper in the name of the hon. member for Bloemfontein, District (Mr. Haywood). The amendment reads as follows—

The Minister of Finance expects half a million pounds in revenue from this tax from the Railways. Of that 1 per cent. is allotted to the Railway Administration for the collection of the tax. The hon. member for Bloemfontein, District, is desirous that the 1 per cent. should be altered to 5 per cent. I hope the Minister will accept 5 per cent. and if he does not want to accept 5 per cent., then I hope that he will at least put it higher than 1 per cent. The collection of this tax will cause a great deal of additional work to the railway staff. As it is these people are working a lot of overtime now. Many of them sit there night after night, and we can understand that when this additional work is apportioned to the Railway Administration additional clerks will have to be appointed. If the Minister of Finance thinks that, then I want to say to him that he is in a dream. The Minister of Railways will not appoint additional clerks, but the work will have to be done. Nor do I think that the Railway Administration will pay those clerks additionally. The amount for which provision is made here will go towards stationery and such things, and the position is therefore that the Minister of Finance is going to use the railway staff to collect these taxes for him for war purposes, without those people being paid anything extra. It is for that reason that we are moving this amendment, and I want to express the hope that the Minister will accept the amendment, and if he does not want to accept the 5 per cent. then he should at least put it higher than 1 per cent. I mentioned this morning the damage that was caused by sailors en route from Durban to Cape Town. I would like to know from the Minister—it is a pity that the Minister of Railways is not here—whether the Governments whose sailors were transported here will compensate for the damage, because they are transported here without having to pay the 15 per cent. tax. I think that the Minister in these circumstances can accede to our request to increase the 1 per cent. to 5 per cent., or in any case to more than 1 per cent.

This provision was inserted in the Bill as a result of discussions on this matter between me and the Minister of Railways. The Minister of Railways was quite satisfied with it. He considers it fair remuneration for the work. The collection of taxes by the Treasury costs us, according to our calculation, something less than ½ per cent. But of course we collect taxes on a very wide scale. Here only one tax is being collected by the railways, and thus we put it higher than the average cost to the Treasury. As I have said, the Minister of Railways is satisfied. My hon. friend has said that it will entail much more work for the trains staff. I do not think so, for according to the provision the amount of the tax will be printed on the ticket. No additional document is issued, and the tax is thus collected by the staff in the same way as the fare. There will, however, be additional work at the calculation of the amount. For that additional staff will have to be found. In any event, the Minister of Railways is satisfied that this is a reasonable arrangement, and I hope the House will accept it as such.

Agreed to.

Question put: That the word “one”, proposed to be omitted, stand part of the Clause.

Upon which the Committee divided:

Ayes—56:

Abbott, C. B. M.

Abrahamson, H.

Acutt, F. H.

Alexander, M.

Allen, F. B.

Bawden, W.

Bell, R. E.

Botha, H. N. W.

Bowen, R. W.

Bowker, T. B.

Clark, C. W.

Collins, W. R.

Conradie, J. M.

Davis, A.

Deane, W. A.

Derbyshire, J. G.

De Wet, H. C.

Dolley, G.

Du Toit, R. J.

Fourie, J. P.

Friedlander, A.

Gilson, L. D.

Goldberg, A.

Hayward, G. N.

Hemming, G. K.

Henderson, R. H.

Higgerty, J. W.

Hirsch, J. G.

Hofmeyr, J. H.

Hooper, E. C.

Howarth, F. T.

Jackson, D.

Johnson, H. A.

Kentridge, M.

Long, B. K.

Mushet, J. W.

Neate, C.

Payn, A. O. B.

Pocock, P. V.

Raubenheimer, L. J.

Robertson, R. B.

Shearer, V. L.

Solomon, V. G. F.

Sonnenberg, M.

Steytler, L. J.

Sturrock, F. C.

Sutter, G. J.

Tothill, H. A.

Trollip, A. E.

Van Coller C. M.

Van der Byl, P. V. G.

Wallach, I.

Wares, A. P. J.

Warren, C. M.

Tellers: G. A. Friend and W. B. Humphreys.

Noes—34:

Bekker, S.

Bezuidenhout, J. T.

Boltman, F. H.

Booysen, W. A.

Bremer, K.

Conradie, J. H.

Erasmus, F. C.

Haywood, J. J.

Hugo, P. J.

Le Roux, P. M. K.

Le Roux, S. P.

Liebenberg, J. L. V.

Loubser, S. M.

Louw, E. H.

Malan, D. F.

Olivier, P. J.

Pieterse, P. W. A.

Schoeman, B. J.

Serfontein, J. J.

Strauss, E. R.

Strydom, J. G.

Swart, C. R.

Van der Merwe, R. A. T.

Van Zyl, J. J. M.

Venter. J. A. P.

Verster, J. D. H.

Viljoen, J. H.

Vosloo, L. J.

Warren, S. E.

Wentzel, J. J.

Wilkens, Jacob.

Wilkens, Jan

Tellers: J. F. T. Naudé and P. O. Sauer.

Question accordingly affirmed and the amendment dropped.

Clause, as printed, put and agreed to.

The remaining Clauses and the Title having been agreed to.

House Resumed:

The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN reported the Bill with amendments; amendments to be considered on 13th April.

I move as an unopposed motion—

Agreed to.

In accordance with paragraph (1) of the resolution of the House adopted on the 11th March, the Estimates of Expenditure to be defrayed from Loan Funds during the year ending 31st March, 1944, stand referred to the Committee.

May I have the privilege of having half an hour. This vote is one of the most important votes on the Estimates, and we have a Minister who always treats us here in this House on a description of his plans for the future. And when he goes to the platteland, we always hear of everything his Department has done or is going to do. On the platteland he has repeatedly regaled the public with what he is going to do in future; he has also done it here in this House, but so far he has given birth to nothing. There is only one Minister, and it is the Minister of Finance, who comes every year with consolidating legislation, legislation that is essential for the difficult times that are imminent. And if there is one Minister in the country who should draft a planned scheme for land settlement in the Union, then it is the Minister of Lands. He has, however done nothing in that direction. He always comes forward with patchwork. He has again tried this session to come forward with an amending Bill, but it seems as if he no longer has the courage to launch that Bill in the House. We have repeatedly brought it to the attention of the Minister of Lands that the time has come for him to introduce a consolidating measure. Legislation in connection with our land settlement, as it stands on our Statutes today, is very involved. There has been a series of amending laws. The general law is Act No. 12 of 1912. That Act has so far been amended by the following laws: By Act No. 23 of 1917; Act No. 28 of 1920; Act No. 21 of 1922; Act No. 38 of 1924; Act No. 25 of 1925; Act No. 6 of 1928; Act No. 25 of 1931; Act No. 57 of 1934; Act No. 47 of 1935 and Act No. 45 of 1937. I wonder if the Minister knows how difficult it is for the ordinary man who has to deal with this sort of legislation to find out precisely what his rights are. When the Minister goes about the country he tells us of his great plans, and he also does that in the House. According to the Hansard report he told us last year what he is going to do in connection with the purchase of land, particularly in those areas where the rainfall is better. I went into the matter to ascertain what the Minister has done in that respect, and so far as I can find out he has done precious little. According to Volume 44, Column 6,061 of the Hansard report, the Minister last year said—

When the Minister of Lands rises in this House, he pictures all those beautiful things, and then we think: Well, here we now have a Minister! But can the Minister now tell us what he has done; how much land has he bought in Natal and along the coast of the Union to find the best holdings for the people? If he has done anything, then we know nothing about it.

Shortly before an election he indicates that he is going to purchase the whole Karoo.

The hon. member for Albert-Colesberg (Mr. Boltman) reminds me of the fact that the Minister is an outstanding election agent. I just want to say to the Minister what his policy ought to be, and that is also the policy of this side of the House, namely that the greatest possible provision should be made for land settlement for our people. Adequate provision should be made on reasonable conditions to place landless persons, principally those who have a knowledge of agriculture and who are suited to it, on the land so that they may become independent farmers under the provisions of the Land Settlement Act, and with that end in view a consolidating Bill should be introduced. To that end the State must throw open, by alienation and otherwise, the company land and other big lands that are not beneficially occupied by Europeans and that are being kept for speculation purposes for settlements. That the Minister has not yet done. If he has, we know nothing about it. If we peruse the annual report of the Department we find that it is not going so well with the land settlements. If we go into the rent and the interest that these people must pay we find that there has been an increase in the arrear rental in comparison with last year. At 31st March, 1942, the arrear rent was £36,472, as compared with £27,946 in March, 1941. Then we go further and see what the report says in connection with the cancellation and surrender of hire contracts. We find that also in this respect there has been an increase. Thirty-two holdings were cancelled. Then we find another interesting matter in respect of the Department, and that is the large number of cessions that are taking place. I understand that the cessions take place particularly in cases where people cannot farm economically on their holdings. The holdings are perhaps too small. There is a rearrangement of holdings, with the result that there is a cession of holdings. Last year there were 127 such cessions. Notwithstanding the fact that the Minister of Lands has painted the position so rosily, we find that there is a big arrear rental. Then there is a fair number of holdings that have been cancelled, and a large number of cessions. I want to say to the Minister: Is it not due to the fact that he has not the courage to grapple with the whole matter and to ensure that where the holdings are too small, the people shall receive bigger holdings so that they can make a more economic livelihood? We find today that some of the people, particularly in my constituency, have to make a living on small irrigation holdings from six to seven morgen, and they cannot do it. The policy of the Government should be to put a man on a holding on which he can make a proper living, which will enable him to support his family properly. The Minister must ensure that the holdings are remunerative. As I have said, this can also be brought about through rearrangement of holdings. Where new holdings are allotted we must ensure that they are bigger and better. We must amend the provisions of the Land Settlement Act so as to ensure that land settlement will take place on a good and sound economic basis, and that the settlers will be provided with such holdings. The principle of subsidised settlements should, as in the case of irrigation settlements, be adopted as a state policy. We must help the man when he is put on the holding to develop that holding. We must assist him with implements and animals; we must help him level the land and we must help him remain on the holding until it reaches the production stage. There should be a general revaluation to bring the land to an economic level where land has already been allotted to settlers, and that should be such an important condition of the Department that people should be immediately appointed to commence with the revaluation. Where we have such settlers, and where the settlements are being developed, there the state must ensure that the settlers are protected against the unscrupulous action of speculators. If the Minister would only give his attention to these few points he will find that there is an enormous field that is lying fallow for doing something for the people who have to make a living on the holdings. Last year we spoke about the inspectors and I specially mentioned the inspector in my area, and then the Minister gave the House the assurance that he would review the whole matter of inspectors and that he would in future ensure that men with agricultural diplomas are appointed as inspectors of lands. He said that would be the type of inspectors we would get in the future and that we would get rid of the sort of inspectors of whom we had so many in the past. We would now get men who would go about not only to inspect but to serve the farmers with advice. We have heard nothing further about that. On the contrary, the matter has now developed in such a way that the college where these people should be trained, namely the agricultural colleges, no longer provide any facilities for the training of such people. The Minister has therefore given an assurance with which he cannot comply. What is he going to do to get inspectors of lands who will be able to serve the farmers with advice in the agricultural sphere? Then there is another matter of great importance and that is the policy of the Minister to forbid people on settlements to have their sons who are of age on the holding. As soon as a boy becomes of age, he must leave the holding. That is an administrative measure of the Minister. He assumes the right to apply such a measure, but I do not know where he gets the right from. Every agriculturist on a settlement has certain rights. We have for instance Clause 28 of Act No. 12 of 1912 that deals with the occupation of holdings. It provides that the holdings must be used as ordinary residential areas at least eight months of the year. The holdings must be occupied personally within six months after the allotment. This clause has been amended by Clause 7 of Act 26 of 1925, which provides that the holdings must be beneficially occupied. How a person must occupy his holding beneficially is provided in the Act as follows—

1. (a) The proper care and maintenance of improvements thereon;
2. (b) The maintenance and improvement of the fertility of the soil and the prevention of soil erosion;
3. (c) The eradication of noxious and other weeds in accordance with the terms of any law requiring such eradication.

Nothing is said that the Minister should have the right to instruct a man to send away his son who works for him on the holding. In fact, if the matter is tested in the court, the Minister will lose, because the onus of proof is on the Minister to show that the man does not occupy his holding beneficially, and if the man goes to court and proves that the son is his only help and that the son works for him and will ultimately be his successor, and if he can show that the son is of benefit on the holding, then the Minister will lose. I cannot see under what regulation the Minister can take the right today to act as he is acting. What power has the Minister to stipulate that children may not remain on the holdings if they assist the father? I think that the Minister is busy alienating the sympathy of the settlers, and that ought not to be so. He should be the father of the settlers. One does not only find settlers who have small irrigable plots or holdings, but one finds in the North-West also many other farmers who have small holdings, or comparatively small farms. On a previous occasion when I pleaded for more boreholes, the Minister said that he knows about a farm in respect of which I asked for a borehole, and he gave it. But that is not the point. It is a matter of general principle. Where farms are allotted the Minister should ensure that there are adequate facilities for grazing on the people’s whole land, and not only a portion thereof. The Minister was in his constituency and made big promises. His own supporters said that they would shortly get 17 water drills in those parts. The Minister shakes his head, but his own supporters have said so and they have even sent telegrams to ask where the drills are.

I know it is not so.

Then the Minister’s own friends have misunderstood him. But I revert to the point that where farms are too big for one man to work, and where they must have assistance, there the best help they can get is often one or two sons who can help them to develop the holdings, and the Minister should not proceed with that policy of his. In any event he should prove that the persons are idle and that colonies are being formed, as the Minister has alleged, before he takes action. If there are one or two sons on a holding and they work hard every day, what right has the Minister to drive them away, because that holding is being beneficially occupied. Then there is another matter that interests me, and it is the perpetual promises which the Minister makes to coloured people who have holdings. Last year the Minister pictured here a very beautiful scene of what he is going to do for the coloureds. He said that he had acquired more than 100,000 morgen in my area. He told the coloureds in the district of Gordonia what he is going to do, and he said that the Department was going to proclaim 300,000 morgen of land for settlements for coloureds. It is not he who did it, but the old Nationalist Party Government. The land is undeveloped, it is true. Water is very scarce, but the Minister said that the Government was now helping the people and that the land would ultimately be cut up into farms. But before I go further I just want to point out what help the Minister has provided there for the people. I put a question to him in connection with the help, and it appears that there is £500 on this year’s Estimates for the beautiful development which the Minister has pictured. I asked the Minister—

1. (1) How many (a) wells were dug and (b) dams were made for coloured settlers at Mier, Gordonia, and what amount was spent for the purpose during each of the years from 1940 to 1942; and
2. (2) how many settlers have benefited therefrom.

The Minister of Native affairs replied:

1. (1)
   1. (a) 9, of which 8 have been completed;
   2. (b) 9, of which 8 have not been completed; 1939/40—Nil; 1940/41—Nil; 1941/42—Nil; 1942/43—£50.
2. (2) Twenty-seven families.

That now is the assistance that the Minister has granted. When he gets up and speaks about 300,000 morgen being made available for coloureds, then the members on the other side say: “Hear, hear!”—now this is what is being done to help those who support the Government’s war policy. The Minister comes to my constituency and makes great promises to the coloureds. He would buy a certain island belonging to a syndicate and give it to the coloureds who go to fight. They would get holdings there. Has the island been purchased? Not a single holding has been given to the coloureds. The coloureds believe him, because he gives them his hand and he is photographed with them. We must not play with the people. The Minister told us last year how the people got there. The old Nationalist Party Government viewed it as its task to create a settlement for these people. The Minister comes and tells his friends, the coloureds, that he will help them to obtain holdings and to find a livelihood. And now we find on the estimates the sum of £500 for the coloureds. Can the Minister look those coloureds in the North-West in the face and say: “Look, that is what I have done for you?” Fortunately as soon as the Minister pays attention to my constituency his side loses supporters, because he makes promises and disappoints the people.

It seems as if you are now very concerned about the coloureds.

The settlement was established there. It was always our policy to segregate them. We do not want to mix, as the hon. member for Kimberley, District, describes. We want to put them apart, but then they must have a proper livelihood. The Minister, however, makes promises, and then sets aside £500 for the year.

Are you in favour of it that coloured soldiers who return should be provided for?

I am in favour of it that the settlements should be developed, that provision should be made for more water and facilities. That is our policy. The Minister should concentrate his policy on creating a sound new settlement population. The Minister is not inclined to provide holdings at the moment. He wants to wait until the war is over. But in the meantime there is an urgent need for land. That reserve area must be unlocked and developed. It is essential that at this stage land should be made available to settlers. Things cannot go on like this any longer, because there are numbers and numbers of people who hunger for a bit of land. Let us help the people now. I also want to warn the Minister not to follow in the footsteps of other Ministers of Lands in the past. They also kept their eye only on the war and allotted land to people who were in the war and who knew nothing about farming. How many of those settlers are still on the land today? Numbers of those people have the best facilities, but they were not born with a love for the land and they drifted away to the cities. I want to say to the Minister that before he settles people there they should have proper training in agriculture. Otherwise it is going to be a total failure. I want to conclude by saying again that it is of the utmost importance to place land settlement on a sound economic basis. The Minister has failed. Therefore I move—

It is not often that I worry the hon. Minister of Lands, but this is a matter of some importance. It concerns the abuse practised by certain land companies within the magisterial district of Germiston, and generally on the Witwatersrand, in regard to the conversion of leasehold into freehold title. A motion was introduced in this House by the hon. member for Germiston, South (Mr. J. G. N. Strauss), that a commission be appointed to enquire into these matters. The motion was widened in the House to include the Witwatersrand. The committee recommended—

A committee was then promised by the present Minister of Lands. This committee duly reported as follows—

I am informed by the hon. member for Germiston, South, that the hon. Minister did promise to appoint this commission. Indeed, he was good enough to consult the hon. member for Germiston, South, as to its personnel, but for some reason or other nothing was done. During the last Session of Parliament the hon. member for Germiston, South, raised this question, and he was then told by the Minister of Lands that this matter had been taken over by the Provincial Council. Nothing has been done further.

It rests with the Provincial Council.

Whether or not it does rest with the Provincial Council, I am asked to say that in view of the fact that this House ordered the appointment of a commission, in view of the fact that the Minister of Lands promised to appoint that commission, there must be some reason, if the matter was handed over to the Provincial Council, why the Council has not done anything during all this time. I am asked to say that the position in the magisterial district of Germiston, in so far as these licences and stands are concerned, has got considerably worse, and I am also able to say that the position in Johannesburg with regard to the conversion of leaseholds into freehold title has also got considerably worse. The prices have gone up very much. During the last Session of Parliament a land tax of 13s. 6d. was imposed. It appears that in one or two of these towns the freehold land was sold to a company. The company is selling this out, and according to my information the cost of the tax which has been put on by the Minister has been added to the price, so that the whole position is as bad as one can put it. I have other information here with regard to the various rises, after this motion was introduced in the House. I do not think I need give them to the House, but. I think I am justified in saying that something should have been done before this in this very important matter. I should like the Minister to tell the House what has been done. But whatever is done must be done quickly if it is to put a stop to this very bad state of affairs.

I want to move a further amendment—

I move the amendment for reasons that I shall mention to the Committee just now. When I have imparted what takes place in the Department of this Minister, hon. members will agree that I am fully justified in moving the amendment, namely to give the Minister no remuneration whatever. I would like to avail myself of the half-hour rule. I have given the Minister notice that I want to raise certain matters, and I shall require a little more time than the usual 10 minutes to discuss these matters.

Business suspended at 12.45 p.m. and resumed at 2.20 p.m.

When business was suspended I was busy giving reasons for moving this amendment to delete the whole salary of the hon. Minister. The hon. Minister is here in a dual capacity. He is here as Minister and as a member of the Other Place. I want to prove just now that in his capacity of Minister he does not in any sense deserve that salary of £2,500 which is granted him, because he is busy committing a shameful injustice against those whom he ought to protect and see that they receive their rights under the Act. Under this Minister the settlers get no rights in terms of the Act, and that is one reason why I move that his total salary be deleted. As a member of the Other Place he gets a salary of £700 per year. He abuses his position to run up and down the country hawking politics which is inappropriate to his position as Minister, instead of taking care of the interests of the taxpayers and the electors of this country. These are briefly my reasons for proposing that the whole salary of the Minister be deleted. The charges that I want to lay at the door of the hon. Minister is firstly that under his policy—I do not know if one can call an injustice a policy—he is busy withholding title deeds from settlers who are justly entitled to these in terms of the Act of 1912 as amended. Among these we find people who became settlers under the Act of 1912 as far back as 27 years ago. I am not speaking now about the ordinary settlement land under the Irrigation Scheme. I am going to mention the names just now of certain persons who have been settlers under the settlement Act for 27 years. Under the Act these people are entitled to receive their title deeds five years after they have exercised their option and have become settlers. The Minister has the power to grant title deeds to these people subject to certain conditions. He can do so if they comply with certain conditions. Under a further provision of the Act the people have the right, after they have occupied the land for ten years, to demand that the title deeds shall be granted them. Here the Minister is busy withholding these rights from those people. He does not want to use the power vested in him under the Act. A responsibility rests upon him to grant title deeds to these people after ten years, and he does not comply with that responsibility. These people are needy people; they are people who have spent all their money by putting it into their farming. They have no money to play with, if I may put it that way. We all know how it is with the ordinary farmer. He puts all his capital in his farming, and consequently there is no question of liquid capital. If he wants to purchase stock then he must either contract a loan or approach the Land Bank for the necessary capital. That is common knowledge so far as agriculture is concerned. These people, as I have said, are needy people in this respect. They are not in a position to take the Minister to court. I want to give the Minister the assurance that if he goes to court with these people the judgment will go against him. I think his Department will also tell him that the law is against him in this respect. He is employing his power to withhold rights from these people. He is not here on behalf of the taxpayers and the electors of the country; he is here by virtue of the fact that he is a member of the Other Place. After these people had been on the holdings for ten years they are entitled to demand that the title deeds be granted them. If you ask the Minister why he refuses to grant the people these rights, his reply is that it is not necessary for him to give any reason. Have you ever heard of such a thing that a Minister can say that it is not necessary for him to give reasons. But we know the reason. This morning the hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie) gave one reason why the Minister does not want to give the title deeds to these people. The position is this, that the Minister wants to send these boys, who are 21 years of age and who live on the holdings of their parents and who are busy helping their parents to improve those holdings, to the war. He wants them to go to the war. For that reason he does not want to give the parents title deeds, for he wants to compel those boys to go to the war. That is the whole reason. He will not admit it here today, but I challenge him to give me any other reason why he refuses.

It is a mean allegation you are making.

The Minister now accuses me of meanness. He is again busy roaring out of that great hole above his neck. This is the sort of allegation that he makes throughout the country, and has resulted in the Minister being pictured as one with a great hole above his neck, from which he roars and fumes against other people.

Why do you not give those boys work?

It must be forgiven us in this House if we fall into the temptation to get beside ourselves when we have to do with this Minister. He is a Minister of such a standard that he tempts us to do it; he is an exception to the other Ministers. The Minister of Mines is a person who has his own political conviction and who is the leader of a Party in the country, but we never hear about him going round like the Minister of Lands screaming and going on against all political parties except his own. The Minister of Mines never does this, and we respect him although we differ from him politically. I want to point out to the Minister of Lands that he ought to follow the good example of the Minister of Mines, who is a person for whom we have the greatest respect as a Minister, although politically we disagree with him absolutely. This injustice is being committed against those people by the Minister of Lands because he refuses in that manner to grant them their title deeds. I want to mention to the House the case of a certain Swanepoel, of the holding Kingswood in the district of Mafeking, the case of Mr. Viljoen, who is the tenant on the holding Diamanthoring in the district of Mafeking; then also the cases of Mr. Vorster, Mr. Saunders, etc. These are only certain examples I am mentioning from among many others I can mention. These people have complied with all the conditions in their contract. They have contracted an agreement with the Department. They have fulfilled the conditions of that agreement, and now they apply—not after ten to fifteen years as provided in the Act—but after 27 years, for their title deeds to be granted them. They apply in the ordinary way and they get the usual reply from the Department that the matter is receiving attention. Subsequently they get the reply that the matter is being submitted to the Land Board, and still later that the matter is being submitted to the Minister. And then ultimately comes the reply that the Minister has refused the request. They then ask what the reason is why the request should be refused, and then they are simply and curtly told that the Department of Lands does not have to give any reasons. In the case of Swanepoel, of Kingswood, I tried for a long time to get a reply from the Minister as to the reason for the refusal. I might mention that these three or four cases I have mentioned are more or less on all fours. They were settlers under the Settlement Act for an equal period. After a long interval I asked the Minister why he refuses to give these people title deeds. On 11th June, 1942, I wrote the following letter to the Minister—

I did not receive a reply to this letter until I wrote a letter to the Secretary for Lands and pointed out to him that I had written this personal letter to the Minister and that I had received no reply to it. Then I got a reply from the private secretary of the Minister. My letter was written on 11th June, 1942, and I did not get a reply until 29th July, 1942. Here is the reply of the Minister—

Just imagine. He speaks of my argument in the letter which I wrote on behalf of my client. Of the questions which I put he takes no notice. I asked him, if their is still something that these people must do in terms of the Act, and if he alleges that they have not done it, then say it to these people so that they can comply with it. To that the Minister did not reply. He simply says that he has gone into my arguments carefully and that he cannot grant the requests. Under the guidance of the Department of Lands these people have improved their holdings in such a way that they can now contract loans with the Land Bank. As I have already explained to the House, those people have no cash in their pockets. They have put everything they have made by way of improvements into their farms, as generally happens with a farmer. These people, in order to obtain their title deeds, want to pay off the rest of the purchase price, and they went to the Land Bank. The Land Bank was good enough to grant a loan in each of the cases I have mentioned that would be sufficient to pay off the balance to the Minister of Lands, and then there would still have been something over to have enabled them to buy stock and bring about improvements. But the Minister even refuses to allow that institution to grant these people a loan. I shall quote one of the letters, which is applicable to them all, which these people received from the Land Bank. Mr. Vorster could get a loan of £400 from the Land Bank to pay off the debt to the Minister of Lands. This applies also to Swanepoel, Saunders and others.

At what rate of interest?

That now is the last straw at which the Minister has to clutch. The Minister of course is now going to say that the people have to pay a higher rate of interest with the Land Bank. The Minister can tell that to the House himself.

I want you to tell it.

That now will be the only excuse that the Minister will be able to adduce. But he will not mention a real reason; he will not tell us that he refused because he wants to drive those boys from the farms in order to compel them to join the army. I want to quote the reply which these people received from the Land Bank. The Minister invokes the Act of 1937. That is an Act that was introduced by the Minister’s predecessor, the hon. member for Wolmaransstad (Gen. Kemp), when he was Minister of Lands. Its object was to empower the Minister to prohibit certain bonds for fear that the people would get into the hands of unscrupulous persons who might give bonds on the land so as to get hold of those people’s land in that way. That was the object of the Act of 1937. Now this Minister uses that Act to commit this injustice against the people, where they can obtain loans from the Land Bank. Here is the letter which the Land Bank wrote to Vorster—

Was it an unscrupulous person with whom this man wanted to bond his land? No, it was a genuine and worthy state institution such as the Land Bank; but no, the Minister would not grant his consent for the Land Bank to grant a loan. Where is it going to end? From the question which the Minister has put me I know what his excuse is going to be. It is going to be that the people must pay more interest with the Land Bank than they pay with him. In terms of the law he has the right to take the bond of these people himself for the balance. He has that right, but he does not want to do it. He wants to make it appear to these people that they will have to pay more interest with him and with the Land Bank. This is an injustice that is being done the people, and an injustice which I hope this House and the country will not tolerate, and I hope that it will not be continued. It is nothing more than a business proposition. It is true that there are some of these people who pay 1 per cent. interest. I admit that. I want to say at the same time that this should never have been done. This concession should have been general in those areas. That, however, is not the fault of this Minister, but the fault of a predecessor. This 1 per cent. is granted in areas which are just as good as other areas in which 3½ per cent. have to be paid. But where the people want to pay it, it is simply a business proposition. They come and say that they are prepared to pay more to another institution, provided they can obtain the right to do as they like with the assets which they have put into their land, to be free from the unjust treatment from the Minister of Lands. To prove that my allegation is correct as regards the reasons which the Minister adduces—he now wants this House to accept a settlement Bill in which is incorporated the condition that the sons of settlers shall be compelled to leave the holdings when they become 21 years of age. There he has definitely admitted in this Bill what the real reason is why he does not want to give these people the right to obtain their title deeds. He wants to make that clause in the Bill retrospective. I want to point out again that these people have complied with all their conditions; they have carried out the agreement, and now the Minister wants to have a law adopted that will be of retrospective operation to compel those families to drive the boys from the farms so that they can go to the war. I repeat that the Minister of Lands is busy committing an injustice towards the settlers by withholding their legal rights in contravention of the law. He is actually busy misleading the people by letting them go to the Land Bank to obtain loans and incurring expense in obtaining Land Bank loans, and then ultimately saying no, he is not going to allow it. I have moved that the Minister’s salary be reduced by the amount appearing on the estimates. Do you know what I would like to do if the rules of the House permitted it? I would not only have deprived the Minister of the £2,500, but I would have moved that the House should in addition have imposed a fine upon him.

The salary which we vote the Minister in this House we vote him for the work he does in connection with the country’s administration, and in this instance we are voting the Minister’s salary for his administration of the Department of Lands and Irrigation. Now, we have been informed by the Minister that so far as lands are concerned he does not intend proceeding with any scheme of land settlement, which constitutes the principal work of the Department of Lands. In regard to irrigation he has also told us that it is the Government’s policy not to start on any large irrigation scheme during the war. As we have a Minister who has to administer those two Departments, namely, the Department of Lands Settlement and Irrigation, and as we are informed by the Minister himself that so far as both administrations are concerned he has no policy and cannot proceed with the administration of those departments, he must not take it amiss if this House refuses to vote him his salary. What is the Minister doing now? Instead of administering these departments in the way the country wants them administered he travels all through the country, agitating people, stirring them up against the Church, and against political parties, except his own. I want to assure him that the country is tired of his actions in matters political. We would have thought that the Minister would have been a better Administrator than a politician. He has been a poor politician, and now he tells us that he is unable to show us his ability in regard to administering those departments, because while the war is on it is the Government’s policy not to proceed in regard to the administration of those two departments. That sort of thing is unfair. So far as settlement is concerned, I want to ask the Minister to review that decision of the Government’s, and I want to ask him to continue land settlement and not to stop it completely while the war is on. He should take into account the fact that not all of us have the same sentiments in regard to the war as hon. members opposite have. When the resolution in favour of our participation in the war was taken in this House, more than half the people of this country were opposed to our taking part, and even some of those in this House voted in favour of the war motion for our participation in the war did so under the impression that we were not going to take any active part but that all we were going to do was to break off diplomatic relations with Germany, and that South Africa would follow its ordinary course. South Africa, however, went further, and we now find that these very necessary services have to be neglected although we have thousands of deserving people who have no land, who are anxious to become settlers, and who are qualified to become settlers. At the moment these people have no prospects at all of getting settled anywhere, and I want to know from the Minister whether that sort of thing is fair to the people of this country, and I want to ask him to take his resolution into review. If the Minister is not prepared to issue all the available settlement land at the moment, then surely he can still issue portion of the land to some of the people who are not taking any part in the war, and who are qualified to be settled on the land. Let him hold back part of the land for those people who may be considered for settlement when they return from the war. The Minister knows that we have learnt in the past—and we have not only learnt it in this country but it has also been the experience of other countries, that soldiers do not always make the best type of settler. The time which these people have spent as soldiers in the war has tended to unsettle them, and to remove them from the steady routine of farming. If they are placed on farms many of them will make a failure of it. That was the experience after the last war in other countries and also here in South Africa, and now all the facilities for settlement are being held back on behalf of those people and the Minister knows that many of these returned soldiers will not make a success as settlers. The very least we can ask the Minister is to take part of the land and issue it to the people who need that land now, and if he wants to, let him keep back a part for the returned soldiers. There is another class of people on whose behalf I want to plead, and those are the semi-fit or unfit people who cannot take part in the war. The Minister knows what his predecessor’s policy was, and it should also be his policy, namely to make provision for that class of people to be placed as settlers on Irrigation schemes. Why does not the Minister continue putting these people on the land? In my constituency I can think of any number of men who are semi-fit, but who would be able to make a living if they were placed on Government schemes as settlers. They would make a success of such schemes. I want to ask the Minister to bear those people in mind and to see whether he cannot make provision for them on settlement schemes. Now, there is another matter I wish to refer to. The Minister must not only make available land which is not yet occupied, but he must go further than that, he is expected also to prevent non-beneficial occupation of land. Provision has been made so that where farms have become too small land can be expropriated and the holdings can be increased in size. What is the Minister doing in that connection? As Minister of Lands he is in a position to give plot holders the opportunity of obtaining larger plots by a re-division of the land or by the purchase of adjoining land for the enlargement of existing plots. In my own constituency I can point out instances of people along the Olifants River and the Gamka River whose land is not beneficially occupied. When the ostrich feather industry was at its height the land was divided in such a manner that the plots became so small that people find today they are unable to make a decent living under prevailing conditions. I want to ask the Minister to give those people the opportunity, by the purchase of other land, to secure larger holdings, or otherwise to have them placed on other suitable land as settlers. The Minister has the opportunity of doing something useful now. These people are suitable for settlements. We are very disappointed at the Minister of Lands not having done anything of that kind so far. We are particularly disappointed at his having failed to do anything to enable the landless people to obtain land. So far as irrigation is concerned he earns his salary even less. When we approach the Minister with any proposal for the building of a dam like that at Meirings Poort for instance he simply says that there is no money for irrigation at the moment. As Minister of Irrigation the Minister cannot blame us for our wanting to deprive him of his salary. We notice how plentiful money is today. The Minister of Finance can issue a loan at 2½ per cent. and when he does so he gets more money than he needs. Why should he not borrow a few million pounds more for the purpose of building the necessary irrigation schemes?

I want to suggest that the hon. member should not discuss irrigation at this stage, but that he should wait until the next vote.

We are now discussing the Minister’s salary and he is also Minister of Irrigation. For that reason I thought I should mention it here, but I am quite prepared to wait until the next vote. There is another matter which I also wanted to refer to, but it also comes under Irrigation. I want to make an earnest appeal to the Minister not to neglect his duties as Minister of Lands and Irrigation, but to step in and do something.

I think that the principal indictment against my department and against me for neglect of duty, not only in connection with settlements but also in connection with irrigation, has already been lodged, and I think it is time for me to reply to the indictment.

Oh, no, we have not finished by any means.

You will have to hear a lot more.

Yes, but I suppose the hon. member will bungle things again just as badly as he did last year. The hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie) accused me of travelling through the country like an election agent and of making promises which I failed to carry out. He says that I have been telling the people about my great schemes but that so far I have achieved nothing. All I can do is patchwork, he says. That is the first charge he made against me. He also said that I had promised to introduce a consolidating Land Settlement Bill. I wanted to introduce such a consolidating measure and I was ready to do so this Session, but there are important amendments to be made in the Bill, and under Mr. Speaker’s ruling no consolidating Bill can be introduced unless no amendments are contained in it. It must be purely a consolidating Bill and it must not contain any amendments. Certain amendments are necessary, and I had intended introducing those amendments this Session, but in the circumstances I have been compelled to leave the Bill over. I hope, however, to make the amendments next year because they are absolutely essential in order to make a success of the administration of the Land Settlement Act, and I propose after that to introduce a consolidating measure.

But you will not be here next year.

I hope you will have got a seat by then.

I must say that I am pleased at the conversion which the hon. member for Gordonia has undergone between last Session and this Session. Last year he was not concerned with the settlers in his district. No, he was not in the slightest concerned with their fate. Let me tell hon. members why. Last year, when we dealt with this vote, he was under the impression that there was no need to plead the cause of those people. At that time he expected that Germany would very shortly win the war. In those days he was much more concerned with the Ossewa-Brandwag than with our settlers. Germany and Hitler were going to give them everything and whatever I might say was of no importance. I am glad to see that he comes here today and wants to prescribe a policy for me to follow. His policy is that we should give every settler a holding, and every holding should at least be an economic unit.

Quite right.

The hon. member for Gordonia is a member of the Select Committee on Crown Lands. Does he not know how much we have written off, even in his own constituency? Does he not know anything about the large amount which we have written off for trees where the people had been charged £200 for trees which were not worth 2s.? Does he not know of the amounts which we have written off in connection with medical treatment? Does he not know of the enquiry which we made into the question of how to make the holdings economic units? The hon. member now says that 7 morgen are inadequate as a holding, and then he warns me that it is my duty to see to it that the people on these holdings are safeguarded against unscrupulous exploitation by traders and speculators. I am glad that he has now come to the conclusion that 7 morgen holdings are too small. But in putting up a case he should not only plead on behalf of the settlers who come under the Government, he should also speak on behalf of the settlers at Kakamas who are also in his constituency. Does not the hon. member know that the plots there are 6 morgen in extent? Does he not know that there are also business sites there? I have long since told the House what our intentions are, and I am going to give effect to the plan we have in mind—do not let hon. members say that I merely make promises and do nothing. But we cannot do everything as if by magic — it is our intention wherever possible to establish co-operative concerns in order to save those people from the unscrupulous traders who are exploiting them and ruining them. We are doing our utmost to get these people on their feet again, but while we are doing that they are being exploited by unscrupulous traders. Even on the Settlement at Karos-Buchuberg in the hon. member’s constituency that sort of thing will happen. But at Kakamas there are also business concerns. Does the hon. member know anything about the huge profits they are making there?

Profits made by the Church?

Yes, the Church. I don’t hestitate to say it, and I have said before that Kakamas as a labour colony has long since deteriorated, and today the only interest which the Church has in it is the profits which are being made on the business concerns which are being run there. Those are the interests which they have there today. Hon. members over there force me to say it, but if the hon. member for Gordonia wants to prescribe the policy I should follow at Karos-Buchuberg then he should apply that same policy to Kakamas which also falls in his constituency. Does he know that when the war broke out the stores at Kakamas were the first to raise their prices, even before there was any question of increased prices? Is he aware of that? I am prepared to protect the people on the Government Settlements against unscrupulous exploiters, traders and speculators, but let the hon. member apply the same thing to all the members of his constituency.

Another attack on the Church.

The Department is responsible for these setters, and the Church is responsible for the settlers, at Kakamas. My department can be attacked freely, but I am not allowed to say that the Church is making money at Kakamas. I have said it repeatedly, and I want to repeat that we are engaged in putting the settlers on an economic basis. The hon. member for Vryburg (Mr. Du Plessis) has urged that bywoners and sons of settlers should be allowed to remain on the allotments. On the one hand hon. members declared that the holdings must be placed on an economic basis, and on the other hand they talk about bywoners and sons of settlers being allowed to live on the place. On the one hand they say that the holdings must be economic units. They must be economic units for the settler and his family alone, and on the other hand they want to allow bywoners and young men to live on the holding, so that there can be no economic existence for the people living there.

Who is going to inherit the holding when the father dies? Is not the son going to get it?

Yes, the son will get it; there is no question about that. Then the hon. member for Gordonia spoke about my promises to the coloured people, and he said that. I had promised to buy them an island on which they could go and live. The Land Board tried to buy an island. The intention was, after it had been bought, to use it for coloured settlers, but the transaction did not go through. It was not a promise. I cannot make any promises before such a transaction has gone through. In regard to the “Mier Settlement” the hon. member states that I travel all through the country making election speeches. The hon. member may call this an election speech, but I am going to repeat what. I have been doing. I have already said what we have been doing at Karos-Buchuberg, of which the hon. member apparently knows nothing.

What have you done?

I have told the House what I have done. Now let me come back to this question of economic holdings. For the past three years my department has been engaged on making investigations in regard to hundreds of cases of settlers, on farms and holdings, whose position was not economic, and in hundreds of cases those holdings have already been enlarged. That., also, is my reply to the hon. member for Oudtshoorn (Mr. S. P. le Roux). In some cases the size of the holdings has been doubled, and we are still buying additional land where we come across cases of a farm or a holding being too small, or if there is any adjoining Crown Land we add some of the Crown Land with a view to rendering those holdings economic units. Back of the Soutpansberg there is a huge settlement area. That area has been completely revolutionised in the past two years and I believe that the number of settlers, in consequence of the increase of the size of the holdings, has been reduced by half. As a result of our having converted three holdings into two, and two holdings into one, in order to make them economic units, we only have about half of the settlers left who were there originally. We enlarge the holdings and the people who are uprooted there are transferred elsewhere and sent to economic holdings. We have been doing this all the time. The hon. member states that I am only spending £50 in connection with the coloured people. He says that my promises have only been made for election purposes. The hon. member does not know, or does not want to know, what is being done on Loan Account. An amount of £2,500 is on the Loan Estimates for Mier. He should know about that as the representative of that constituency. Is he not aware of the fact that there is an amount of £15,000 on the Estimates to build a dam there?

Where are the Loan Estimates?

They made their appearance this morning. You should withdraw your remarks.

There is an amount of £15,000 for the Mier Settlement for the purpose of constructing a dam. I admit that £50 is a small amount, but we cannot do in this desert area what we are able to do in other parts of the country. One cannot go miles and miles into the country and sink boreholes there. Boreholes are not suitable to that part of the country. That is why my department is helping those people to make proper wells. We only started with that in 1942, and that is why the amount is still very small, but I am only mentioning what we have put on the Loan Estimates. Then the hon. member spoke about 17 boring machines which he said we had secured to send to those areas. That statement is untrue. Let me just say what we intend doing. Hon. members can say that these are only promises, but despite their representatives those parts of the country are going to be given these benefits.

More promises.

The hon. member for Kuruman (Mr. Olivier) is also going to be told something about the way he has been doing his duty.

“Die Burger” will have another caricature of you.

I have been to Namaqualand and I know Gordonia, and let me say this as a practical man who knows the conditions in those areas, in Namaqualand, Gordonia, Kuruman and Vryburg …

And Kimberley District.

In these parts of the country the rainfall is very small—they are dry areas, and there are no opportunities of establishing irrigation works on a large scale in the same way as in the rest of the Union. They have to depend on boreholes there and one has to bore very deep, but if one has water in those areas the country is just as good for sheep and cattle as the best parts of the Union.

Now you are saying something that is true.

The hon. member has suddenly woke up. These are excellent districts for sheep and cattle but one has to have water there. In the past the farmers who had gone there had to be assisted by means of water bores, of which the Government had sent a small number. Those boring machines go there and they drill one dry hole after another. There is nobody there to superintend and to show where they should drill for water. Consequently the cost has been very heavy, so much so that it has not paid the farmers to have those machines, and these machines are so heavy that it requires a span of nine or ten oxen to move them. Many farmers in the Vryburg area have gone bankrupt and have been ruined by this sort of thing. They have had to pack up their chattels and leave their farms. I have come to the conclusion that those parts of the country must be dealt with in a totally different way from the rest of the Union so far as these boring machines are concerned. I made a statement some time ago that we would start from the Namaqualand side, and I have given instructions to my department to have an investigation made and to ascertain what are the most advantageous terms on which boring machines can be sent there, and what can be done to enable the people to use these machines. It is our intention to carry on in that way.

When?

When those boring machines are back from Abyssinia.

It is still our intention to do so. Recently I instructed the Irrigation Commission to make a survey of those districts as soon as possible. They have made a start at Vryburg, and let me tell hon. members why this has been done. When I was in Namaqualand where the land could carry twice as many head of cattle and stock as it is doing today, if it only had water, I asked for a report about the position prevailing there, I asked for a report in regard to the number of farmers requiring boreholes. My idea is that one requires at least two boreholes on 4,000 morgen. That is the very least one can get along with there. It was my idea that plans should be worked out for special conditions to assist the farmers there. After three months we had received twenty-five applications for boring machines. I may say that I asked the magistrate there to find out from the farmers how many boreholes were wanted.

He must have been a very poor type of magistrate.

After that I left Namaqualand, and I have now given the Irrigation Commission instructions to start at Vryburg and to make a survey there, we are going to send an expert there too for a Geophysical survey and to indicate where boring should take place. That method has proved very successful elsewhere. I have now given instructions for a survey to be made at Vryburg and for plans to be prepared. These parts of the country, Vryburg, Kuruman, Namaqualand and Gordonia, have not got the advantages which other parts have—one cannot spend millions of pounds there on irrigation works as one can do in other parts of the Union, and my idea is that in order to open up those areas we have to deal with them in a different way. The only way to help those parts is by supplying them with boreholes. The plan I have is to have these areas declared as drought stricken areas, and while we are spending millions of pounds on irrigation in the rest of the Union we shall have to spend at least hundreds of thousands of pounds in providing water at reasonable prices against a fair rate of interest and on long terms of repayment to these other parts of the country. It is necessary in those parts to supply windmills or small engines, and to build concrete dams. That is the best way to help those areas. I am not going to give them any help if they insist on ordinary dams. I know what will be the result of that. The Irrigation Commission will do its work and if it presents a favourable report in accordance with the ideas I have in mind, it is our intention to start the work as soon as possible.

When?

These things will not be done until the war has been won.

By that time you will no longer be there.

In the first place we have not got the men to do the work because all the men are at the front fighting, and in the second place we have not got the boring machines. I have already stated that these are terrifically heavy boring machines which are very out of date, and they cannot be used there, and the Irrigation Department is already preparing plans for post-war efforts. We are preparing everything and it is our intention to manufacture our own boring machines in our own workshops. These machines will be of the latest and most up-to-date kind, and they will be able to proceed to those areas under their own power, or otherwise we shall take them there by means of tractors. Hon. members may say that this is election talk, but I want to say this to the electors of Kuruman, Vryburg and Gordonia, that these are the plans which we are working out, and if I have the privilege of remaining at the head of the Department for another few years we shall open up those parts of the country and make it possible for the farmers to obtain sufficient water by means of boreholes, which we shall supply at a reasonable price and on reasonable terms and against long-term repayment, in spite of the three representatives who have made all these allegations against me. It has also been alleged that I have made a promise in regard to inspectors of land, and that these inspectors are to have agricultural degrees. Yes, that promise still holds good, but I again want to say this to hon. members, that apparently I shall have to recall some of our soldiers, some of our young men, because the inspectors we are going to appoint are going to be young men. As soon as the war is over I hope we shall have double the number of inspectors, because we shall have large numbers of settlers when the war is over, and those settlers will need guidance and advice, and that guidance and advice will be given by inspectors with agricultural degrees, by men who will not merely act as inspectors, but who will also have the ability to give advice and guidance in regard to farming. Hon. members over there want all these things to happen today, but the type of man I need is at the front today. When these men return I shall bring about a change and we shall then introduce this new system of inspectors. I hope we are going to have many more inspectors, and I hope we will have men who have agricultural degrees. The hon. members for Gordonia and Oudtshoorn have told the Committee that the Government should provide land for settlers, and the hon. member for Oudtshoorn asked that we should establish settlements for semi-fit people. We cannot do that. That does not come within the scope of the provisions of the Settlement Act—it does not come within the scope of that Act to establish settlements for semi-fit people. Semi-fit and unfit people and aged people come under the Department of Social Welfare, and as the hon. member knows we have already from time to time spent huge amounts for that purpose. It does not, however, come within the scope of my department. I again want to repeat that when the war broke out the Government made a promise that as there were thousands of young men who had joined up we were going to put a stop to the issue of land until they return. I fail to understand how any reasonable person can contend that that is a wrong policy. Here we have young men who have gone to the front, young men who are fighting for South Africa today, and now hon. members want us to issue the land behind their backs, so that there will be no land left for them when they return.

Are you going to give all the land to soldiers?

Let me finish what I want to say. We are not going to issue the land behind the backs of these men who have gone to the front, to men who have stayed behind, to men who have tried to interfere with our war effort, and who have done everything possible to impede the Government in its war effort. The Government has given an undertaking that it is going to wait with the issue of land, and I do not want the Government to be accused of having given away one inch of land while these men are at the front. We are going to hold on to the land until the war is over, and when the soldiers are back we shall advertise the land in accordance with the laws of this country. People will be able to apply, so that soldiers will have an equal chance with those who have remained behind. Let me say that under Section 11 we have never yet turned down an application, whoever the applicant may have been. Under Section 11 we do not turn down anyone. The Land Board does not turn down applicants if everything is in order, and if the applicant complies with all the regulations. The hon. member for Oudtshoorn wants a dam to be constructed in the Oudtshoorn district.

I think that that can better be discussed under the Irrigation Vote.

The hon. member said that I always replied that there was no money. I have never yet given that answer, but I shall deal with that point on the next vote. The hon. member for Oudtshoorn also said that the returned soldiers were the poorest settlers one could get. The hon. member probably bases his statement on the experience we had after the last great war, when returned soldiers were given land, when they were put on land as settlers; but one cannot compare those people with the soldiers of today. 70 per cent. to 80 per cent. of the soldiers of today are Afrikaners, Afrikaans-speaking or English-speaking, and most of them are the sons of farmers.

Are the rest of them Jews and Englishmen?

Our experience has been that a large number of those people after the last war were put on land which was bought at a time when the price of land was higher than it had ever been before; uneconomic and exorbitant prices were paid for land, and these men did not get the type of assistance which it is our intention to give our settlers after this war. Many of those men kept going for years and years but eventually they were forced to give up. It is our intention not to repeat the mistakes which were made in 1918. It is not our intention to leave these men to their own devices; and furthermore, we are going to select the men who are suitable for farming. They are going to be given advice and help by inspectors with agricultural degrees. And now let me say a word or two to the hon. member for Vryburg (Mr. du Plessis), who cannot find language strong enough to describe my evil deeds. Let me say that when he says that people who for twenty-seven years have occupied a holding have been refused title deeds, he is not stating facts. In not one single instance has a title deed been refused to a man after he has been on a farm or a holding for ten years as a settler, if he has paid his debts out of his own pocket. There may be cases where a man should have paid a higher rate of interest.

I mentioned that.

There has not been one single instance where a man has paid his debt and where we have refused him. We cannot refuse him

He had to sell his cattle.

You turned him down.

There was no need for him to sell his cattle. These are people who pay my Department 1 per cent. interest. The hon. member’s complaint is that we have refused to give these people title deeds. Why? Because they wanted to borrow money from other institutions at 5 per cent. and even 8 per cent. or 9 percent.

You could give it at 4½ per cent.

Am I to allow a man who has convinced me that he cannot pay more than 1 per cent. to give up that 1 per cent. and let him pay a rate of interest of 4½ per cent. and more? Am I to allow that sort of thing? Is that sort of thing in the interest of the settler? I want to ask hon. members opposite who have told me what my policy should be whether that sort of thing would be in the interest of the farmer? Would it be economically sound to allow him to surrender the rate of interest of 1 per cent. and to substitute it by a rate of interest of 8 per cent., 9 per cent. or 10 per cent.? We do not call up the money. If he wants to effect improvements on his farm, if he wants to put up a windmill, if he wants to buy cattle, we assist him. Hon. members cannot point to one single instance where such an application has been turned down if the request was reasonable. There is no need for a man like that to go and borrow money at that high rate of interest. In the interest of the settler himself I refuse to allow a man, when he is paying 1 per cent., to go and borrow from a commercial bank at a rate of 8 per cent. or 9 per cent. We helped these people a few years ago, and are we now to allow them to go and borrow money at a rate of interest which is totally uneconomic? Within a few years time that man would be back to where he started. So far I have refused to allow tenants to take up title deeds if they had to pay the purchase price with money which they wanted to borrow on first bond on their land. The reason for that is quite obvious, namely that the tenant wants to give up the fair and reasonable conditions which he enjoys under the Land Settlement Act, and wants to take up a loan under conditions which would constitute a great hardship. In the cases which the hon. member has mentioned the tenants wanted to give up, wanted to abandon the rate of interest of 1 per cent. in order to take up loans at 4½ per cent. and more. Surely it was in their own interest that I refused to allow such a transaction?

The Land Bank was prepared to give them the money at 4½ per cent.

We have a settlement policy under which the settlers can borrow money at 1 per cent. in some cases, and at 3¾ per cent. in other cases. Does the House approve of a settler who is able to get those facilities going to another Department and borrowing at a rate of 4½ per cent. He goes from one Department of State to another, and borrows money here and there. Is that a sound economic policy? I again say to the hon. member that although the Land Bank was prepared to give his friend the money at a time when they were paying 1 per cent. I refused to allow it. I shall never allow it, and what is more, it is my intention to bring the matter to the notice of the Treasury, and if necessary legislation will have to be introduced. I have warned the Land Bank and I have told them that it ill becomes them to lend money to these settlers at this rate of interest. I say that it is time for a change to be made in the law so that the Land Bank in no circumstances will be able to lend money to a settler of the Lands Department, and that is what my hon. friend is pleading for! Let me refer the hon. member to the case of Mr. Visser of the White House Holding, Mafeking District. He wanted to substitute a bond of £750 which he had with the Land Bank at a rate of 4½ per cent., by a bond of £1,500 with a commercial bank at a higher rate of interest.

I did not mention that case.

That is one of the cases about which the hon. member approached me.

But he is not complaining about that.

That is one of the cases which the hon. member brought to my notice. Mr. Visser wanted to substitute a bond of £750 with the Land Bank by one of £1,500 with a Commercial Bank. I have already said how much interest the Commercial Bank was charging. The rate of interest of the Commercial Banks in some cases goes up to 10 per cent.

Why don’t you pass a law to stop the Commercial Banks?

To continue with this case of Mr. Visser …

You are putting up your own skittles to knock them down yourself.

Mr. Visser could not adduce any satisfactory reasons why the requisite permission should be given, and so his request was turned down. And that was the only sensible thing to do. Now let me deal with the cases of Messrs. Swanepoel of Kingswood, and Voster of Cromer. These were the cases mentioned by the hon. member. He very carefully refrained from mentioning Mr. Visser’s case. In the first instance they made application for permission to keep bywoners on their holding. When that request was turned down they made application for title deeds. They were only paying 1 per cent. per year on the purchase price of their farms and it was clearly not in their interest that they should be allowed to undertake heavier burdens. In the case of Mr. Viljoen of Diamantedoorns, the granting of a title deed was approved of in August, 1941, but the tenant failed to comply with the requirements in spite of warnings that the approval would lapse if he did not comply with the requirements before March, 1942. After the approval had lapsed he wanted to take up a bond with the Land Bank but that was refused because he would have had to pay a higher rate of interest, and because evidently it would not be to his benefit to burden the land with a bond. That is the reply to that case. It may be an extreme case, but that was the type of case brought to my notice. A man comes to my office and says that he wants to pay off his debts. My Department says: “Very well, how are you going to pay them?” His answer is that he is going to give a cheque. One man told us that he still owed £730. He immediately wrote out a cheque for £730 and we gave him a title deed. A short while afterwards the same man made an application through the Land Bank to borrow £730 from the Land Bank at 4½ per cent. interest. We asked for further details, because we wanted to know what he intended doing with the £730. His reply was that the £730 which he paid us in the first instance was money which he had borrowed from a Commercial Bank at a higher rate of interest—he had borrowed it from Die Volkskas—and he wanted to repay that money to the Volkskas.

That’s an Afrikaans Institution.

Yes, an Afrikaans Institution can do just as it likes.

They do not do just as they like.

Are we to allow conditions like that? If we allow that sort of thing the unfortunate settler will never find himself on a sound footing. In a few years he will find himself back in the same position as he started from. The hon. member mentioned another case too, that of Mr. Sanders, of Mirfeldt. In Mr. Sanders’ case the application for a title deed was approved as the tenant was able to pay the purchase price without borrowing money. The title deed has been registered, and I am not quite clear what the complaint in this particular instance is. The man convinced us that it was his own money, and he therefore got this title deed. I believe I have now dealt with all of the points that have been raised. I thought I had better do so as soon as possible. The hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Henderson) is not here just now, but I shall answer his question later on.

I also wish to bring a few points to the Minister’s notice. I don’t want to go into the question whether the Minister’s policy should or should not be condemned. The Minister is not going to take much notice of our criticism. A short while ago I made representations to his department in regard to certain settlers in my constituency — people who had been settled there for several years, and who had asked the Department to pass them out. I am referring to the settlers at Wolvekraal. I discussed the matter recently with the Minister’s secretary and he promised me that he would go into the matter. He said that the matter was receiving the attention of the Department, and I shall be glad if the Minister can tell me whether anything is being done in regard to this matter.

What is the settler’s name?

I am referring to all the settlers at Wolvekraal. I also want to say a few words about the sons of the settlers on the various holdings. You will not allow me, Mr. Chairman, to go into details, because there is a motion on the Order Paper on this subject. I only want to point out that the Minister stated some time ago that he was using his discretion in regard to such cases and that the Department’s policy did not mean that every one of these young men had to be removed from the holdings. I accept the Minister’s word that that is the position. But I only want to tell the Minister that I mentioned no fewer than three cases where either the Minister or the Department definitely did not use their discretion. I mentioned these instances here to show that such cases can happen. This is a matter which can cause a lot of trouble and a lot of dissatisfaction among the settlers. If the Minister uses his discretion and gives his approval to these young men being allowed to remain on the holdings where they are needed to assist their parents in the development of the holdings, they will be very grateful to him. I want to assure the Minister that nobody on this side of the House wants to urge or wants to advocate a condition of affairs under which those holdings would become overcrowded. The Minister in his reply stated that there were a whole lot of holdings which were overcrowded. I told the Minister then, in the short time at my disposal, that he was putting up skittles in order to knock them down, because we have never yet favoured the overcrowding of these holdings, or of these plots. On the contrary, we want the Minister to interfere and see to it that there shall be no overcrowding. I want to emphasise that we are definitely not in favour of overcrowding; we don’t want it to be allowed; all we want to ask for is that where these young men can assist their fathers the Minister should allow them to remain on the holdings to help in the cultivation and development of these places. The Minister is a practical man; he knows how difficult it is today to get labour. He knows that nowadays it is almost impossible in certain parts of the Transvaal to secure native labour, even if one is willing to pay them £2 10s. or £3 per month one cannot get labour. In those circumstances I hope the Minister will deal very carefully with this whole position, and that he will allow these young men to remain on the holdings wherever it is clear that the parents need them, and that they are helping their parents in working the farms. There is another matter which I also wish to touch upon, namely, the stopping of the allocation of Crown Lands during the war. The Minister has repeatedly stated that the Government is not prepared to depart from this policy, that is to say it is not prepared during the war to issue any Crown Land. I therefore realise that it would be hopeless to advocate such a course at this stage. Nor do I want to waste the time of the House by advocating this. The Minister, however, stated here that he would see to it that when the war was over and the soldiers were back in this country they would be able to apply on a basis of equality with the others. I only want to ask the Minister to give us the assurance that the Department will not go out of its way to give preference to the men who have joined up. The Minister himself will admit that it would not be fair or just to give preference to returned soldiers and to discriminate against people who have not joined up. I am not saying that that is going to happen. I only want the Minister to make a statement to reassure us on that score and to say that he will see to it that it will not happen. It is the easiest thing in the world for the Minister to have this question put in the application form: “Were you in the army or not?”

Did you wear a red tab or not?

If such a question is put then I am afraid that people who have not joined up will definitely be discriminated against. I want to say this to the Minister: If he expects us to respect his opinion, if he wants us to respect the opinion of those who joined the army, then he should also respect the opinion of those who do not support the war, and he should not discriminate against them on that ground.

I have been listening to the speech of the hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie), and I wondered while he was talking what had happened in Gordonia since the last elections as this was the first time he had got up here to speak on behalf of the coloured people. It seems to me that there has been a great conversion on the hon. member’s part.

I have always pleaded the cause of those people.

Well, I am not going to take up the time of the House by dealing with the speeches of hon. members opposite. The Minister has already replied to all the points raised by hon. members over there. I have the honour today to be the member of Parliament representing that magnificent settlement, named Vaal-Hartz.

Since when?

I travelled through that part recently and I met the people there. The scheme is a monument. I well remember, however, that when we put that settlement scheme through Parliament—I believe it was in 1933—we met with opposition from those people, the Keerom clique. They opposed the scheme. I admit that my friends of the Afrikaner Party and of the New Order assisted us. But those hon. members who are so scared of the war today, they were afraid that this settlement was going to be a failure. I feel that this Vaal-Hartz scheme stands there as a monument to racial co-operation. In all the years that I have taken part in politics we have been pleading for the Vaal-Hartz scheme, but the Government of the time did not have the courage to tackle it. It was the Fusion Government which tackled it, and it stands there today as a monument. I want to congratulate everyone who took part in it, to make a success of that scheme, and it stands there as an example of what we in South Africa can achieve if only we will co-operate and develop our country and rehabilitate our less privileged fellow Afrikaners. Now I want to make a request to the Minister. Some-time ago 150 of the probationary tenants were passed out and they have now become settlers, and I understand that the Surveyor-General is now engaged on preparing maps of the holdings of these settlers, and one of these days when the maps and plans of their holdings are complete they will be passed out, and they will then have to enter into a proper contract as settlers. The hon. the Minister is one of our practical Ministers; he is conversant with the conditions prevailing on the platteland, and he knows the conditions prevailing among the people as a whole. One of the main reasons for the failure of settlement schemes in the past was that the settlers had to pay too much for their land. Now I want to put up a plea with the Minister when defining and laying out those lands, to make the terms as cheap and reasonable as possible for these less privileged Afrikaners so that they and their descendants will not have to carry on as slaves for the rest of their lives, but may be given the opportunity to pay off their debts in respect of that land as speedily as possible, and thus again become independent farmers in this country. The whole success of the scheme depends on that. We hope it will not be necessary in days to come again to have to write off debts in respect of these schemes. Let us fix the price on such a basis as to enable these people to pay for their land and to become the owners of their land. I hope the Minister will go to Vaal-Hartz as soon as he can manage to do so, and I hope he will take the settlers into his confidence and tell them what the position is, and what they will have to pay for their land. I have been there, and being their member these people brought many of their complaints to me.

Since when have you been their member?

I am their member under the new delimitation.

You will never get there again.

Just let me say this to the hon. member for Kuruman (Mr. Olivier). The settlers there tell me that he is a complete stranger there. Another complaint which was brought to my notice is that those settlers have to pay part of the yield of their products into a Trust Fund, and I believe that they have about £60,000 today. I don’t know whether the hon. member for Kuruman knows anything about that.

He is their member.

Herman Becker is their member, is he not?

I am not going to take any notice of the interjections of hon. members over there. So far these settlers have not received any interest in respect of the money they have paid into the Trust Fund, and I now want to make an appeal to the Minister. It creates a feeling of injustice among those people. They are the poorest section of the community and we should not do anything to give them the impression that they are being unfairly treated. Surely those few pennies by way of interest, don’t mean much to the Government, but to those people they mean a lot, and I want to appeal to the Minister to see to it that they get interest on the money they have paid in. Now, there is another matter which these people have brought to my notice. All the time they have been probationary tenants there they have been allowed to have their machinery repaired and put in order, in the Government’s workshops, but now that they are being passed out they can no longer go there. There are too few of them as yet to start their own workshops. I want to ask the Government to allow those people to have their machinery put right and repaired in the Government’s workshops. They also have difficulties to get fertilisers. Now there is another complaint which I should like the Minister to look into. A number of people have complained to me that thousands of bags of wheat have been lost in those parts because the crop has not been gathered early enough. I want to convey these complaints to the Minister in the way they have been put to me. I am their member …

You are the member for Dover.

Do you think you will get in there?

Hon. members opposite should not interrupt me when I am talking about my constituents.

Oh, don’t keep on talking about the White Cliffs.

At the moment I am thinking more of Lord White Feathers of Calvinia.

What about Lord White Feathers of Burgersdorp?

I should like the Minister to look into those complaints. I don’t want to accuse anyone, but the complaint is that thousands of bags of wheat have been lost owing to the fact that, acting on the advice of the Government’s officials, the crop was not harvested early enough. I feel that the officials have done wonderful work there, but these complaints have been conveyed to me and I should like the Minister to go into them. Now, there is a regulation in regard to the settlers. I have the regulation here, and this is how it reads—it says that these settlers or probationary, tenants are not allowed to write to the Minister or to a member of Parliament. [Time limit.]

The experience which we have had in this House this afternoon must surely be unique—that of an hon. member getting up here and pretending that he is in future going to be the member of another constituency.

He does so in anticipation.

He speaks of his constituents, and then again he speaks of his friends. The hon. member for Kimberley, District (Mr. Steytler) has put certain information before the House, but he himself says that he does not know whether that information is correct. Just let me say this to the hon. member, that if he were present in this House more often and if he were to do less jaunting about the constituencies, making Election propaganda in advance to get people to vote for him at some future time, he would be better informed and he would know what has happened in this House. If he would still take the trouble to look up the Hansard Report he would see that these things which he has been talking about, which he has been putting forward as the grievances of the people whom he says he represents, have been raised here years ago, but on account of the fact that we have a Government here which only sees one thing, and only can see one thing, and that is the war—because of that, these things have not yet been rectified. A second phenomenon which we beheld in this House this afternoon, and this must have surprised you, Mr. Chairman, is that the Minister of Lands should have displayed his ire against the hon. member for Kuruman in the way he did. Although the hon. member for Kuruman had not yet spoken a word in this debate the Minister attacked most bitterly the hon. member for Kuruman. Let me tell you why he did so. He did so because he has a guilty conscience. Let me take the Minister of Lands back a few years in his mind. Let me take him back to the days when he was chasing about the plains of Kuruman in order to prevent the present member for Kuruman from being elected. Eventually he addressed a meeting in Kuruman itself. There were a few young men present at that meeting, and the Minister spoke a lot about water. He spoke so eloquently on that occasion that these young men afterwards remarked that they could almost see the water flowing over the lands. He made a promise there and he told the people that if only the people would vote for the other candidate—of course, he said in his usual astute manner—which we know so well—if they would only vote for the candidate opposing me, everything would fall into their laps.

Well, you are putting it very crudely now.

Well, that is how the Minister put it. Afterwards we raised these self same matters in this House and the Minister on that occasion declared that the North-West, and all those areas, needed one thing, and that was water. Now, let me remind the Minister of what he said three years ago—he used exactly the same words as he used here today, namely—

Is that the speech which the Minister made here today?

No, that is where the hon. member is mistaken. That is the speech which the Minister made three years ago, and he makes the same speech year after year. And he went further …

And it is still the same Minister.

Next year it will no longer be the same Minister. He went on and said this—

On the 10th May, 1940, the Minister said that in this House. He told the House that that was his policy. The Minister knows that I, as the representative of those areas, came to him, and it is recorded in Hansard that I asked him to provide more boring machines for those people. He said that he was going to have boring machinery manufactured for these people. He has gone a step further now, and he says that there are seven old boring machines which are out of commission and he is going to have them repaired. He admits that in those parts of the country the need for water is the greatest need of all, and he told us that he was going to have those bores put right. Have those seven machines ever been repaired? No, we have less machines in the country than ever before. The Minister has made progress very, very slowly. No, the Minister only made those statements to try and induce the farmers to vote for his candidate. We have had two election speeches here today. The one came from the hon. member for Kimberley, District (Mr. Steytler). He tried to make an election speech here with the object of catching the votes of the people at Vaal-Hartz. Let me just tell him that he will never have the honour of being the representative of the people at Vaal-Hartz. Eighty per cent. of those people are opposed to him. The second election speech which was made here was that of the Minister himself. He comes to tell us about the beautiful paradise which we may expect—just as he did three years ago—but we have to wait for it until after the war. Does not the Minister realise what a bad election agent he is, when he comes along with stories of that kind? If what he tells us here is true then the people in the North-West can do only one thing to save themselves, and that is to vote against the Government, and to push the Minister out, because if they do that we shall get peace in this country, and only then will all their problems be solved. This sort of talk which they are spreading through the country and which the hon. member for Kimberley, District, is spreading in the constituencies instead of doing his duty in this House, and which the Minister proclaims in this House—that everything will happen after the war—when he will no longer be a Minister—that sort of thing no longer carries any weight here, nor does it carry any weight with the electorate in the country.

I must say that I can really very disappointed that the Minister has chosen to make his attack on the Church in connection with Kakamas. We will remember that the Minister began here with the unscrupulous exploitation by traders, and then referred to the hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie) who made the interjection in connection with Kakamas, whereupon the Minister replied that it was the Church. We must infer from that that the Minister accuses the Church in connection with Kakamas of trading unscrupulously. Is that what the Minister meant?

The hon. member for Gordonia made use of the expression “unscrupulous traders and speculators” and I wish to know whether he was also referring to Kakamas.

It did not arise quite like that.

I said that he should also plead for Kakamas.

The Minister said that he must remember that Kakamas is also in his constituency.

He spoke of the tremendous profits.

It is very clear what the Minister’s attitude was. We shall see in the Hansard report what the Minister actually said, and we want to ask the Minister to leave that speech to Hansard, and not to alter it. After this attack by the Minister. I want to ask him this question: If that is the position as regards the Church, has the Minister been in communication with the Church in connection with the position in Kakamas? If the Minister has not been in communication with the Church, then I can only say that it is a scandalous attack which the Minister has made against the Church in this House. It is a scandalous attack on the Church if he is aware of the position at Kakamas, if he was not satisfied with it, and he comes here and makes an accusation of that nature, without having first got into communication with the Church.

It seems almost as if you are an elder.

If the position was such that it was, according to the Minister’s view, unsatisfactory, then the Minister had a duty to get into contact with the Church, since the Church is not represented in this House. If that is the way the Minister acts, then I want to tell him here that his conduct is nothing less than scandalous. Before I go any further, I want to ask the Minister a few questions in connection with the probationer-lessees at Vaal-Hartz. It is now a considerable time that a number of those probationerlessees have stayed on as settlers. What I should like to know from the Minister is whether probationer-lessees have already been passed out as settlers, and if they have not yet been passed out, when he intends to carry out those recommendations that have been made. In the second place, I should like to know from the Minister whether the price of the plots at Vaal-Hartz has been fixed, and what that price is. I presume that before the Minister goes on to make the probationer-lessees settlers those people will be told what they must pay. Another question which I should like to develop further is based on the Minister’s own testimony on what his attitude is in connection with land settlement in general, and in connection with the rents that are paid. The Minister spoke here of 3¾ per cent. But it is 3½ per cent. Then he says that these people come and apply for title deeds, and that they are thus prepared to pay higher rates. The Minister should not seek that difficulty, or at least the reason for it, in this House. He must look for it within himself. He must immediately realise that where that is the case there must be something radically wrong with his policy. If the people struggle so much to come out under him and the control of his Department, then it must be clear to him that there is something wrong with his administration. They are willing to pay a per cent. more. Why? It is clear. The Minister said plainly in his speech outside and in one case also to me that I am in favour of a new order, and that he will in the future also stand for a new order in connection with the land settlers. He is ready to accept that the disparity between the rich people and the poor people in our country has become too great, and that the Government intends to uplift the Europeans and coloureds. What is the policy of the Minister in connection with the land settlements? Is is very clear to us. It is none other than a Communist policy. It amounts to this, that all land bought in the past by the State and which still has to be bought for land settlement purposes will remain the possession and property of the State, and it will not be able to become the possession of those to whom it is given under the Land Settlement Act. That is the policy which the Minister is now going to follow. That is the policy which he has announced from time to time, and what is it other than a Communist policy that the State must remain the owner of the land? If the State sells ground to a settler and the man pays off his debt it should become his land. But the Minister wants to follow the policy that he shall always exercise control over it. He is doing it. He wants to say who must live on it. The Minister is already busy carrying out fully that Communist policy with reference to land settlement. The settler does not become the owner of the land. The Minister takes full authority to be able to say who is going to remain on the land, whether a son may remain there or whether he must leave. He goes so far as to say that the man may not sell the land in the future, and even if the land belongs to the man, then the Minister still wants to retain control as regards his children in the future. It is so clearly a Communist policy which the Minister is carrying out in South Africa. For this reason the settlers are so anxious that they do not care what they do, even if they pay more interest to get away from that policy of the Minister. I can tell the Minister that with that policy he is busy killing land settlement in the future. With the experience which the settlers are having of this policy of the Minister they will think ten times in the future before they go in for land settlement under the Land Settlements Act and under the policy which the Minister is busy carrying out. They will have to be forced by necessity before they go and buy land under that policy. The Minister is busy impeding our whole development in connection with land settlement by the policy which he has announced. I want to mention an example in connection with Vaal-Hartz. Hundreds of houses have already been built. The whole scheme has been developed and the water is there. The land lies there without rent being paid for it, just for this simple reason, that the Minister says to the people who apply that they must wait till after the war. [Time limit.]

I can quite understand that the hon. members on the other side are very anxious that plots should be given out now, because they have no feeling for the boys who have gone North.

Why did you not first hear what I wanted to say about that?

We know how in the past they abused those boys. It is a justifiable policy that the Government is now pursuing not to give the settlements out today and to wait till after the war, so that those men who have offered up their blood and who have defended their country will get an equal chance when the war is over. I hope the Minister will stand by that policy. I know that the friends on the other side are not actually in sympathy with that. Their standpoint is that the people who sit on their farms today are the Afrikaners and that the others are a kind of half-castes.

Now you are talking nonsense.

No, that is the standpoint which they adopted. I just want to continue with what I was saying. I was talking about Regulation No. 38. On the land settlements at Vaal-Hartz Regulation No. 38 applies, and it prohibits them from writing to their member of Parliament. The friends on the other side can laugh if they wish—the settlers regard me as their member of Parliament. When the Election takes place they can throw me out if they wish, but at the moment I am their member of Parliament.

Why the doubt?

I do not copy the hon. member for Waterberg (Mr. J. G. Strydom) in coming here to boast. The regulation concerns a big principle. We have a democratic form of government. Those people are not officials and are also not Railway servants, but people who fend for themselves, and they should have the same rights of citizenship as any other man. They should have the right to approach their member of Parliament, and he should have the right to put forward their grievances on the floor of this House, just as in the case of any other citizen. This is the place where their grievances must be discussed. I want the Minister of Lands to let those people know that this regulation will no longer be carried out, and he must withdraw the regulation as soon as possible. I viewed it thus, that we on this side are fighting for democracy. The members on the other side welcome National Socialism. The Keerom Street clique also welcomed it once. Fortunately they are now turning about and I am happy about their conversion. We are fighting for democracy and this question is something that touches the principle of democracy, and I want those settlers to have the right to approach their member for Parliament and bring their grievances to his attention. I should like the Minister to explain to those people that they have that right. The settlers are under the impression that they are not allowed to belong to a political party. I do not know where they got the idea, as it is not contained in this regulation. I have read through the regulation and I do not find it there. The Minister has said that party political meetings may not be held on the settlements. On that we can congratulate him and I understand that the hon. member for Kuruman (Mr. Olivier) supports him in that respect. I want the Minister to explain to the settlers, and he can make a statement in this House in connection with that, that they have the right to belong to a political party, whichever one they wish to belong to. I do not just want them to be able to belong to mine. If they want to belong to the Opposition party, give them the right. It is democracy for which we are fighing, and we want that democratic principle carried out. I wanted to say something about boring and other matters in connection with irrigation, but you have ruled, Mr. Chairman, that we must do it on the next Vote and I will abide by that. I just want to make an observation on what the hon. member for Vryburg (Mr. du Plessis) said here. He played off the example of the Minister of Mines against the Minister of Lands. The Minister of Lands ought to follow the example of the Minister of Mines, because he does not go about the country addressing political meetings as the Minister of Lands does. I can well understand why the members on the other side find fault with the Minister of Lands. The Minister of Mines confines himself to the big towns and Natal, to those people whom he represents, and the Minister of Lands’ duty is to go about the platteland to explain the policy of the Government. He does it in a proper and able manner, and I want to congratulate him on it. I can well understand that the members on the other side become a bit nervous when they come up against him. The Minister of Lands will continue in this and we will support him, and we will continue to make plain the policy of the Opposition, and when the Ejection is past one of these days, we shall see what politics and policy the people outside are going to support—ours or theirs. I am sorry that the hon. member for Oudtshoorn (Mr. S. P. le Roux) is not here. He made insinuations against our soldiers. Why did he make those insinuations? The best men who are in the North today are the boys from the platteland. They have already made a success of farming and they know everything about the platteland. Why did the member make that insinuation? I do not want to say that the men who sit on their farms today are not qualified to become settlers. I am not going to slander a section of my people, but the hon. member has no right to say that they are the best settlers, and those who are in the North are not qualified to become settlers. That is the fruit we are picking as a result of the policy of the members on the other side. From the beginning they have given the country the impression that the men who went to the North and who bore red flashes are inferior people.

Who said that?

It was said throughout the country. And in this House, too, there was talk of “Khaki pest”. I have now finished with this question in connection with Vaal-Hartz, and whatever the friends on the other side may say, those voters at Vaal-Hartz regard me as their member, and as long as I have the honour to represent them, I will do what I can to have their grievances removed and to see that they get the land as cheaply as possible, because they are my fellow-Afrikaners for whom I feel sorry and for whom I have the greatest sympathy.

I should like to know from the Minister what use the Department is making of the unoccupied Government farms. In my constituency there is a block known as New Belgium. Is the Government making use of those farms; and if it is using them, for what purpose are they being used; and if it is not using them, why it is not using them? I put this question to the Minister because a large number of those farms are very suitable for the cultivation of various products, including wheat. There is at the moment a great shortage of wheat, and if that land were given out temporarily to farmers wheat production could be expanded to a great extent. The lands are mostly lying unoccupied and I want to know whether the Department is making use of them, and whether it cannot give those lands out temporarily to farmers till the Minister makes allotments one day. Perhaps the war will go on for another five years. The Minister says that he wants to give the returned soldiers a proper chance to make application. But if we pay attention to the statement that is made—I am not speaking of the Minister of Lands, because if we paid attention to his statements the war would have been over last year.

And according to you Hitler should have been here already.

That is another matter. According to the statements of the Prime Minister the war may last a number of years yet, and then those lands will lie unused all those years, while they could now be allotted per month or per year to farmers who can make the necessary use of the land.

The Minister of Lands told us that he knows the Gordonia constituency. I had the opportunity last October to drive through that constituency, and I can say in my turn that the voters of Gordonia know the Minister. They know him as a man Who can make promises, and unfortunately also as a man who never fulfils those promises. I can tell him that they also told me of the 17 boring machines which the Minister promised, and they showed me a telegram that they had approached the Minister and the Department. But at that time the Minister was ill. I trust that the Minister is well now. I should just like to know from the Minister whether those 17 boring machines are already in Gordonia. The real reason why I rose is that when I was in that constituency I encountered a migration one night. I did not know much about the plots, but I heard that the Minister was busy persecuting Afrikaners to get them to join the army. I feel that in his enthusiasm for the Empire the Minister has lost all his love for his own people. Late one night I met such a migration of people who had been thrown off a settlement by the actions of the Minister.

Mention one case.

The Minister must not be in such a hurry. Late one night I met on the road an old car pulled by six donkeys, and a small cart with four donkeys. In the front of the car sat the man’s wife with her two-month-old baby, and in the other vehicle sat an old mother with a three-year-old child. All the earthly belongings of these people were loaded on the motor car and the small cart. I then opened a conversation and said: “Old friend, where are you going?” Then he said: “I come from the farm of Mr. Hendrik Coetzee”.

What is the man’s name.

The Minister must not be in such haste. Why does he become so nervous?

Don’t repeat gossip, give facts.

I am busy giving the names and everything. The Minister is terribly nervous. Ever since the beginning of the discussion on his vote he has been nervous. When we had spoken for hardly half an hour he talked for an hour and expressed himself bitterly. This shows that he has a bad case. Now he is again nervous. I will give the names. I asked him where he came from, and he said that he had been on the farm of Mr. Hendrik Coetzee, and that his name was Steenkamp. I asked him where he was going and he said that Mr. Coetzee was quite prepared to keep him on the farm, but that Mr. Coetzee had received notice to make him leave. At this time they had splendid rains in Gordonia, that is to say, in October, and there was an abundance of grazing, but Mr. Coetzee had received instructions that he must get rid of Steenkamp, and then the man was on the road with his family and his 200 merino sheep. That was 100 miles outside Upington, on the main road. He then told me that he was going to the Kalahari. The same day I happened to be on the farm. The incident made a special impression on me. There a fellow-Afrikaner had been chased off a farm where he could have remained, and he had to trek with his 200 sheep to the Kalahari. I may not know the Kalahari so well, but I shall predict that in 12 months the sheep will also disappear. I want to give further particulars. The following day I was at Upington, and I want to say that I was somewhat angry with the Minister. I did not mince matters. I met a man and who was he? Mr. Hendrik Coetzee. Then he told me the same story. He told me that the Minister did not want to allow Steenkamp, who could assist him, to remain there. All that I want to say to the Minister is this: He is busy oppressing his fellow-Afrikaners in the country in the interests of the British Empire. I hope that one of the Minister’s children never lands in the position into which he forces the people. It is remarkable that when a man breaks away from his people in politics he wanders away sometimes completely. He regarded it as his duty once again this afternoon to make an attack on the Church such as I have never yet heard. I thought that he had a greater sense of responsibility than to make such an attack on the Church. The hon. member for Gordonia is not here, but the Minister says he knows Gordonia. I want to say to the Minister that Gordonia’s voters know him. Let him resign as a Senator and stand for Gordonia, if he has the courage.

That is cheap talk.

It is not cheap talk, but the Minister will come cheaply out of it. The Minister will be sent home with his tail between his legs because they can get no weaker candidate for the United Party in Gordonia than the Minister of Lands. The Minister expressed himself bitterly here this afternoon. He also said something strange and I want him to explain it. He said that 80 per cent. of the men in the North are Afrikaners. He says the English-speaking person is also an Afrikaner to him. Very well. What are the other 20 per cent. then? I shall be glad if he will tell us. But I just want to say that the Minister is not busy doing his Government a service when he runs amok as he did this afternoon.

The hon. member for Malmesbury (Mr. Loubser) has gone off at a tangent for 10 minutes but I feel that it was much ado about nothing. He spoke about someone who was removed from the farm of a certain Mr. Coetzee, but the Minister will be able to reply to that. The Government and the Minister are being accused that they are carrying out a Communist policy and the Minister is being accused of attacking the church. In that quarrel also I do not want to take part, but I just want to say that if the Minister and the Government are accused of adopting a Communist policy then I want to emphasise that no greater Communist policy was ever carried out than that at Kakamas, where the farmers have never received title deeds.

What do you know about that.

I was there. There were teachers there who were allowed to build their own homes at their own expense, but they could never get title deeds. I merely mention this as an example. If they go away there then it is left to the discretion of the Commission as to what compensation they receive. I hope that the Minister will in course of time honour his promise and will go thoroughly into the matter to see that justice is done to the farmers at Kakamas. Sneering reference is made here to returned soldiers who would be bad settlers, and reference was made to the Setllers of 1918.

But you only know the Settlers of 1820.

I am very proud of being a decendant of the 1820 Settlers. Sneering reference was made to the Settlers of 1918. Well there were some of them who were a failure, but many farmers whose families were on farms for generations were driven from their land at that time as a result of the bad policy of the Nationalist Government in connection with the gold standard. Go to Elgin, Grabouw, Barberton, the Sundaysriver and there you will find returned soldiers who made an outstanding success of their undertakings and many farmers can learn from them. As regards farming I am glad that the Minister is going to follow a new policy of making drills in our country that will be easily transportable. The old drills were so heavy that one required haf a dozen spans of draught animals to transfer the drills and it was often impossible on that account to make use of the drills. Then the Minister mentioned the inspectors who would be well-trained, but hon. members on the other side spoke sneeringly of the old inspectors who rendered such excellent services, and I think one ought to express a word of appreciation of the work that they have done and are doing. I think of a man such as Piet Mof, inspector at Upington, a man to whom those areas owe a great deal, and I hope that when he leaves the service the Minister will compensate him properly.

I would like to draw the attention of the Minister to the position of the Vaaldam Settlement. I have already had an interview with the Minister and the Minister knows of course of the damage that has been caused there by poisoning. Already some 200 cattle have died, and there is a kind of panic among the people. I understand that the people had a big fright, for the water is the cause of the poisoning. Now there are various farms along the river which have no other drinking places, and the danger exists, even though the Department proposes to take action sooner or later, that the vegetation there will develop further and continue to poison the water. The people are afraid that the water would become more poisonous and that they will lose not only their animals but also human lives. I understand that when the water is boiled it is even more poisonous. I want to ask the Minister to give his attention to the matter and to set to work in one or two ways, namely to bore for water—if there is not a Government drill then with local drills—to help the people with permanent water supplies, so that they need no longer be dependent on the poisonous water from the river, and secondly I want to ask the Minister to make available windmills. Windmills will also be necessary. I think the Department will have to consider providing these people with windmills and if necessary liberal subsidies for erecting windmills. But the other way in which the Government must set to work is to combat the danger of poison. The poisoning can recur at any time. Would it not be a good idea to fence off the boundaries of the water which is subject to poisoning by barbed wire, to prevent future danger? In this event I view that the duty of the Government to bear the expense of the fencing material. Then I want to ask the Minister if consideration will be given to helping the farmers with long-term credit where they have lost essential stock such as milch cows so that they may be able to acquire other stock. Finally I would like to know what became of the conference. I understand that there would be a conference between the various departments, and the Rand Water Board would also have been present because it has interests in the dam, and there the position would have been discussed. I would like to know what became of the conference. We have had discussions on the matter, but I would like to know from the Minister what is being done to expedite the matter. It is a matter that cannot be postponed.

I notice that the Department of Lands spent the sum of £38,000 on departmental farming last year. This year I see an amount of £169,000 on the Estimates. That means an increase of £131,000. We know what happened last year when the Minister competed with the farmers by producing potatoes, with the result that there was an over-production of potatoes and that the market was overloaded. Now we would like to know what the Minister is going to do with this money. What does he intend producing and how much more or less of each product? I also notice that they have imported 7,000 boxes of potatoes from overseas. We have in our constituency seed potato growers’ associations. We have also applied for imported seed potatoes and we have been alloted only 30 per cent. of the quantity we asked. We were encouraged by the Department of Agriculture to establish such seed growers’ associations, which would then be able to provide the country with good seed potatoes. We heeded the request and established such associations, but last year we could not even sell all our “A” certificate potatoes. Now I understand that the Department of Lands, together with the Department of Agriculture, intend producing seed potatoes and providing cheap seed potatoes to the farmers. This may be a sound policy, but I think it would have been fairer if the Minister had told the seed potato associations that the policy is not to let the seed potato associations obtain more boxes of sweet-potatoes, but to produce this class of seed potatoes departmentally. We cannot compete with the Minister who farms with state money. I do not think it is fair. Last year we paid 39s. for a box of seed potatoes weighing 100 lbs., which works out at £3 per bag without railway rate. Now the Minister intends offering cheap seed potatoes, first from imported. What chance will the associations then have of getting their A and B certificate potatoes sold? They are being placed in a difficult position. The farmers cannot compete if the Government is going to produce. In addition the imported seed potatoes are infected with scurf. The Department of Lands gets all the dipping material. “Aratan” they call it. We cannot get it. The Departmental potatoes are all dipped. There too we are handicapped in competing with the Department of Lands, which receives preference. Then there is the further difficulty regarding the shortage of fertiliser. Will the Department of Lands receive preference aso as regards the provision of fertiliser? The Department of Lands is now busy producing on a big scale, and this example has already been followed by the Department of Mines which is buying its own farms to produce on a big scale and to provide in the requirements of the mines, so that they would have to buy less from the farmers. They will deprive the farmers of the market. Then I want to associate myself with hon. members on this side who complain about the removal of major sons who live with their parents on holdings. I agree that there are cases where boys are of no assistance to their parents, and in such circumstances I can understand that they should not have permission to remain there. But there are also cases where the boys help their parents and are indispensable. We know of cases where they have paid off the land within five or six years. Why should such boys be removed? There is a great scarcity of labour and the parents in many instances cannot do without one or two sons on the farm. I can only come to the conclusion—the Minister has virtually admitted it—that they require the boys in the North. They are fighting for such high ideals and for that reason they now want to compel the boys to go and fight and for that reason they are letting the land lie idle until the soldiers return. But we heard from the Minister of Labour the other day that it is very difficult to get the people who return to fit into employment—to get them to work again. They have acquired peculiar habits and the Minister says that it is difficult to fit them in. What will the result be if the Minister places a lot of returned soldiers on settlements where they have to sweat from morning till night? It may be reasonable to set aside a portion of the land, but I want to plead with the Minister to throw open one-third of the half of the available land in the meantime for boys who apply for it. I want to appeal to him to reveal his policy.

In reply to the accusation I levelled at the Minister in connection with the issuing of title deeds to settlers, the Minister had only one excuse. That one excuse was that he is so concerned about these people now paying interest at 1 per cent. but having to pay 3½ per cent. if they take up a bond after having obtained their title deeds.

Three and three quarter per cent.

Still more. And if they obtain a loan from the Land Bank they will have to pay 4½ per cent. That was the Minister’s excuse. I should like to give some further information to the House in regard to this matter, as otherwise the hon. members will leave here with a wrong impression in their mind. These people who submit applications for title deeds, live on holdings behind the line which is known as the “swartstreep”. They are supposed to be living in parts where the rainfall is less than on farms on the other side of the “swartstreep”. The Minister knows or ought to know, that his Department is no longer taking notice of this so-called “swartstreep” that they agree with the Land Bank that the “swartstreep” should never have been established and that the people behind the “swartstreep” are in a more favourable position as far as rainfall is concerned than the people this side of the demarcation line. That is a well-known fact.

What do you recommend?

I am not busy electioneering. The hon. member for Kimberley, District (Mr. Steytler) put some questions to the Minister in view of the coming election. The Minister now has to reply to that in view of the election and make a statement as to his intentions in regard to the Vaal-Hartz. Fine promises will again be made, which will never be kept. I do not do the same. We should not split hairs. The Minister knows what the position in regard to the “swartstreep” is. It is generally recognised that the rainfall on the other side of the “swartstreep” is just as heavy as on this side. The Minister is now gravely concerned about the increased rent those people have to pay. If he is so worried about those few people, why does he not rather meet the people this side of the “streep” by making them pay 1 per cent., those people who are today paying three and three quarter per cent. I really want to ask the Minister to bring down the interest and to abolish the “swartstreep”. Why did he put these people in the position that they have to pay the higher rent? Why did he do it?

If you can give me a specific instance, I shall go into the matter.

I can quote scores of cases were Crown grants were made and the bond was accepted at 3¾ per cent.

At whose advice was it done?

Will the hon. Minister also tell us please why, in replying to the applications of these people who asked for the issuing of their title deeds, he never mentioned that question of the interest? I challenge him to go through his files. He will not find a single letter there in which he draws the attention of the people to the fact that they would act unwisely by paying more than 1 per cent. interest. I again want to point out that the Minister is using this so-called excuse only in order to prohibit the sons of the settlers to remain on those holdings. They must be forced to join up. That is what it amounts to. I have here a letter from the Minister’s Department, which is a reply to an application for the issuing of title deeds. The Minister’s Department states here: “With reference to your application for a Government bond, I have the honour to inform you that after careful consideration it has been decided that your application cannot be granted.” Now listen what comes after that. This man is supposed to be in poor circumstances. Just listen what suggestion they make to him: “And you will therefore have to let me know whether the amount of £14 7s. 3d. which you deposited for stamp duty and bond charges should be refunded to you or whether it should be deducted from the balance of the purchase price.” I ask you, is that the type of treatment one would expect from the Minister’s Department?

What is wrong with it?

If the Minister is unable to see that, then I do not know why he occupies his present position. Here we have a poor man who has paid up all his instalments. This reasonable request on his part to be given his title deeds is refused and on top of that they ask him whether the amount he has deposited is to be deducted from the balance of the purchase price.

Surely he can choose.

I just want to say that after the treatment the settlers have received, they will not in future have confidence in any promise given by the Minister of Lands, and I believe that the sooner we get rid of him the better it will be for the country.

I have been somewhat disillusioned today. The hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie) pleaded for his coloured settlers. I do not think there were settlements for coloureds in Gordonia. The hon. member pleaded for those settlers and the Minister then came along and said how well he treats these settlers. But I want to tell the Minister that the hon. member for Gordonia is not the only one who has coloured people in his constituency. We in Ceres also have coloured people and a very good class of coloureds, but unfortunately the area is not suitable for settlements. But I understand that the country around Gordonia is very suitable for the settlement of coloureds. There are at least 500 or 600 good, willing, hard-working coloureds in the Ceres constituency which would be an asset to Gordonia. These people are all registered voters too; they are progressive people, and I now want to ask the Minister whether he cannot give a place to those coloureds in Gordonia? Then there is another matter which I should like to bring to the notice of the Minister; it concerns his policy in regard to Crown lands. I am more in particular concerned about the mountains. I notice that the Minister is protecting the mountains in our district. He appoints inspectors and he engages people to make fire breaks.

I think that comes under the Department of Agriculture. Those fire breaks fall under Agriculture.

But surely those parts are Crown land and that comes under Lands. The Minister is in control of it. Agriculture there also comes under him. The Minister is in control of those Crown lands. I now want to ask the Minister whether it is his intention to continue with that policy. To my mind it is a sound policy. These mountain fires cause destruction there. Our water supply gives in. Unfortunately there are irresponsible people continually causing fires. I now want to ask the Minister whether he is not prepared to put a substantial amount on the Estimates for next year for the purchase of those mountains from the people who have become the owners of those mountains. Our country is deteriorating on account of these fires. We know that the water supply at, Ceres, Riversdale and even Oudtshoorn is becoming less on account of those fires. When the rains come, the water runs away in torrents and I want to ask the Minister to purchase that land from the owners so that those mountain fires may be stopped. The work that is being done there is most successful and I do hope that the Minister will continue with his policy of constructing fire breaks. Then there is another matter I want to bring to the notice of the Minister, viz.: in connection with boring. The Minister was good enough to send a boring machine to Ladismith last year. We had been trying to get it for years and ultimately we obtained it. It is surprising to notice how much water the people are getting there now that we have this boring machine. I hope the Minister will not take it away again and I want to ask him whether he cannot also make a boring machine available for Laingsburg. If he cannot do that then I want to ask whether he will allow the boring machine to just pass the border near Ladismith in order to assist the farmers there. Every time the Minister talks about Churches, he is violently attacked. I think the Minister is the best propagandist one can get for the Church. As this is so I want to tell the Minister that we had a fine Church built some time ago. That Church cost us about £15,000 and of course there is still some debt on it. We are shortly going to hold a Church bazaar there and I want the Minister to come to that bazaar. I shall give the Minister 14 days notice in advance.

But I understand that the Ossewa-Brandwag is going to make speeches there and that they are going to pay for them.

A fortnight before we hold that fair, I am going to ask the Minister to attend. I am now already inviting him to come. We should like to pay off the debt on that Church. I cannot understand why the people are so dissatisfied when the Minister speaks about the Church. As soon as he talks the Churches make money. That being the case, I want to invite him to come to Ladismith. We should like to pay off that small debt.

This afternoon I was surprised at the speech made by the hon. member for Vryburg (Mr. du Plessis) I thought he was a very responsible man. I was wrong. He told the House this afternoon that the policy of the Minister is to expel the sons from the holdings so that they have to join up. The hon. member knows that under the Settlement Act the holding is given to one man only and not to two or three. He knows quite well that that is the policy laid down in the law and that it has to be adhered to.

What is the law?

The law lays down that the holding will be given to one person only and not to two or three.

That has nothing to do with the price of eggs.

I do not sell eggs like the hon. member sells nonsense. I am also sorry that the statement was made here this afternoon that the soldiers are the worst settlers one can get. I understand that the hon. member for Oudtshoorn (Mr. S. P. le Roux) said so.

Where did you get that?

I understood so.

He has not even been here.

The hon. member for Oudtshoorn knows that in the past when the holdings were allotted, they were bare farms, without a house and without water, and that was the cause why there were, so many failures among the settlers. The policy of this Minister is to see that there is a house and water for the settler, and as that is his policy, we promise him our full support. I again want to express my agreement with the policy that the Minister will not allot one inch of land until after the war. In spite of what the Opposition may say, I shall resent it if this Government would do it all the same, for that would be tantamount to improper discrimination against those boys who are today waging war and who are busy defending the country and making it secure for the people over there in spite of themselves. I cannot do otherwise; I want to support the Minister where he follows that policy. Today we have a successful farmer and a practical man as our Minister of Lands and I am going to support him to the full.

There is real distress in our country today. The hon. Minister knows that famine is threatening in many parts of the country. I now want to ask the Minister the following. Under the Irrigation Act which enables him to purchase farms, this House put in a provision that any owner whose land was being purchased, would have the right to keep out 100 morgen. The Minister tried to come to an arrangement with certain owners. The offer the Minister made them for their land was too low according to their opinion, and the Minister did not succeed in coming to terms, with them. The people began to develop their land. After the crops were standing on their lands, the Minister gave instructions that their water was to be cut off, and he caused those owners’ products to whither for lack of water. I now want to ask the Minister whether he considers that to be a sound policy in view of the conditions prevailing in this country at present, and whether it does not reveal a policy of hatred, envy and persecution? I should like to hear the Minister give me a very clear explanation on his actual policy, for I can assure him that that Irrigation Act would never have been passed by this House if it had not been for the fact that his predecessor gave us the assurance that these 100 morgen would be allowed to be kept out. He realised that a sentimental value was attached to those properties. Today the Minister refuses to negotiate with a man unless he is prepared to forego that right which was given him. The Minister is not prepared to negotiate with a man unless he is prepared to forego the right which was given to him in the Act. In spite of the fact that those owners are prepared to pay their water rates, the Minister refuses to grant them that right. He simply does no want to allow those people to produce. There are people today faced with famine and death. Those are facts. I now want to ask the Minister—the man who, as it is said, champions democratic rights but takes away the rights of our citizens—whether he is going to deal with those people on the old price level or if he is going to take into account the very low value to which money has fallen in this country during the last five or six years. The Minister of course realises that the actual purchasing power of money is 100 per cent. less today as compared to its value five or six years ago. I now want to ask the Minister whether he will take that fact into consideration when negotiating with those people about the purchase of their land. It is a great pity that the Minister allows himself to be influenced by hatred and envy and that he passes insinuating remarks here against the Churches. The Minister tries to maintain discipline at his own settlement, but here he allows himself remarks which make it virtually impossible for the Churches to maintain discipline. It does not behove the Minister to make such allegations against the Churches, as if the Churches are bent on robbing the people. Hon. members have spoken here of a sort of settlement policy which the Minister is supposed to have, namely that he will not allot Crown land to Europeans until such time as the soldiers return. The one moment the Minister states that he will treat them all on the same basis but the very next moment he declares that the people who do not go and fight are Fifth Columnists. I want to ask the Minister how he can reconcile those two statements. Why does he not tell the country frankly that as long as he sits there no man who does not join up will receive any land from the Government? This is a straightforward question I am putting to the Minister and I hope that he will give me a straightforward answer. Let him state frankly whether he will also consider as settlers persons who did not join up. The Minister now says this is his policy. Recently I made representations to the Minister in connection with a certain settlement and the Minister wrote to me to say that he is not prepared to allot that land to a European He is not prepared to hand it over to the white man, but he does hand it over to a native. I am referring to the farm Fontein in the Loskop scheme. A native is being allowed to plough there but the Minister refuses to allot that farm to Europeans. I want to appeal to the Minister not to be guided by hatred and envy against the people who do not think the same way as he does. It is impossible for an Afrikaner to think as the Minister and the hon. member for Kimberley, District (Mr. Steytler) think, for they are Imperialists.

I cannot say that I am precisely surprised at the speech of the hon. member for Witbank (Mr. Bezuidenhout). We expect it of him, but we are disappointed nevertheless that he should persist here with his irresponsible allegations. He speaks of hatred and enmity. That does not come from this side of the House. He speaks of responsibility. It is precisely because the Minister realises his responsibility, because he knows that we are dealing here with State funds, because he realises that this House is asked every year to write off hundreds of thousands of pounds in respect of settlement schemes where such schemes were perhaps too highly evaluated, that he is setting to work carefully. The Minister’s policy is to make the existence of the settler possible, and I want to congratulate the Minister on his policy. Give the man a chance to exist economically; give him a holding that he can develop on an economic basis, and we go further and say that the selective system which this Minister had introduced is very laudable. I have never seen a farm that can make a farmer, but I have seen many farmers who can make a farm. It is therefore a wise policy to select your applicants. You must ensure that Crown lands are allotted only to those people who have an aptitude for farming, and who stand a reasonable chance of making a success of it. My hon. friends on the other side say that they are the patrons of the soldiers, but they want to place those people who are not even prepared to sacrifice everything for their country on the same footing as those who remained at home, so far as the allotment of Crown lands are concerned. They cannot blow both hot and cold on this matter. They must choose. Will they say to the soldiers today: “We begrudge you who have suffered all the dangers the right to apply for a bit of the land which you defended so bravely, and heroically”. No they are not serious, and they are not honest and frank as regards the soldiers. Can hon. members on the other side mention me a single case where a man made application under Clause 11 of the Land Settlement Act, and where he deserved help on merits where that application was not granted? I can mention dozens of cases of applications that were all granted during the last few years—and that from applicants who do not support the Government. As regards Clause 11, I know of no single case where such political discrimination has been exercised. I can give hon. members on the other side the assurance that the Minister is not going to exercise any unfair discrimination after the war. But he wants the soldiers who return to get the same opportunity of applying for Crown lands. I can well understand why those hon. members are so dissatisfied. The hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie) launched an attack here, but that attack has failed. After the reply of the hon. Minister we would like to hear more from the hon. member. The Minister acts here as the protagonist of the settlers. The Minister saves them from exploiters and themselves. A few weeks ago we had in this House the Farm Mortgage Subsidy Act. Then members on the other side asked that we should reduce their interest on the bonds. Now these same gentleman come along and they want to force the Minister to drive up the rate of interest against his own settlers. That is their policy. They do not want settlers who are satisfied and happy, because a settler who is satisfied with his lot and who makes a living is usually a supporter of the Government. But if they can create dissatisfaction among those settlers, if they can incite the sentiments of those settlers and multiply their difficulties, then those settlers will perhaps support them. But as soon as the settler is satisfied, he becomes a Government supporter, and that does not suit their political game.

Is your allegation that only dissatisfied people are supported by the Nationalist Party?

I say that the more dissatisfaction they can create among the settlers, the better chances they have of getting the support of those settlers.

And when you were a Nationalist, about what were you dissatisfied?

There were many things. I told the hon. member for Piquetberg (Dr. Malan) at the time that there was no necessity any longer for the Nationalist Party, and for that reason he assisted in the establishment of the United Party.

How far are you and the Minister of Agriculture now from one another?

Much nearer than you are.

Order, order!

We expect those irresponsible interjections from the hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie). We say that it is a sound policy that is being pursued by the Minister to ensure that a man should receive an economic holding, a holding that will give him a reasonable livelihood. That is the best, and we believe that so long as he has the right to protect those people from themselves and from political exploitation, he should make use of that right and keep their rate of interest as low as possible. And more than that, we say that he must confine all applications for Crown land to those who have shown by their past and their attitude that they have a reasonable chance of making a success of farming.

The hon. member who has just spoken (Mr. Jackson) has said that we cause dissatisfaction among the settlers by trying to get supporters. I would say to the hon. member that he should address those words to the hon. member for Kimberley, District (Mr. Steytler) who spoke here this afternoon about the dissatisfaction of the settlers. I should like to say this, that member is shifting forward today, and at present he is speaking almost from the seat of the Minister himself. The hon. member for Kimberley, District has said here, although he did not speak on behalf of his own constituents, what we on these benches have been bringing to the Minister’s notice for years. He raised the grievance of the settlers, and the hon. member for Ermelo (Mr. Jackson) should address his words to the hon. member for Kimberley, District. I cannot understand why the Minister of Lands always, when dealing with something of this nature, seeks reasons for involving the Church. I have listened to the Minister today, and I have wondered where he was wandering about. He wandered about until he noticed the Church, and then he again attacked the Church. Does the Minister not realise that the Church has done pioneer work here in South Africa in respect of land settlement? I do not deny that the Church has also made mistakes, and there may be people who may be dissatisfied about one thing or another. But why does the Minister of Lands always see an opportunity of involving and launching an attack on the Church? He went out of his way here to say that the Church’s shop at Kakamas was the first to increase its prices.

And that is so.

The hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie) has told me that he has just telephoned to Kakamas. He spoke to Mr. Beyers, and while he was talking, the Price Controller happened to be there with Mr. Beyers, and he said that the prices charged in that shop at present are the lowest in the whole of the Union of South Africa. I deplore the Minister of Land’s action in taking up the cudgels against the Church in this manner. If the Church constitutes a night-mare to him, I should like to suggest that he leave the Church, for there are other people for whom the Church does not constitute a night-mare, and he should not come along and say things here that are untrue. It does not behove him as Minister to make such utterances. The Minister referred here to the drilling machines of Namaqualand, and he mentioned various places. I had hoped he would also mention Calvinia. He says he went out of his way to help the people, but only 25 applications were submitted, and so he decided to give up Namaqualand. He is now going to begin in Vryburg. I can well understand why the people did not apply. It is impossible for those people to transport the drilling machines. The farms are 20 and 30 miles apart. That is the reason why the people did not apply. H says now that he is going to announce easy terms. The Minister should first announce those easy terms, and then he will see that those people will apply. I should also like to put the Minister this question. A few years ago I asked what his policy was in connection with holdings that are cancelled. I think the Minister stated that his policy was as follows: When a holding is cancelled, the owner gets the first opportunity of being overseer. I think the Minister said that. It has been my experience in my constituency that that does not happen. I do not know when last a holding was cancelled and where the owner was given the opportunity of becoming supervisor. When I look at the people who have been given the opportunity of becoming supervisors, I find they do not belong to the party of this side of the House. I have told the Minister that once before, that it is only fair to these people, who have bought the farms and who are unable to hold out, perhaps because they have paid too high a price or because the farm is too small, that they should get the opportunity of becoming overseers. They have invested their money in it, namely the one-tenth, and they have effected improvements. It is their due to have preference, to become farm overseer, for which they receive only £2 per month. I hope the Minister will tell us whether he still adheres to that policy. If he says so, I should like to know from him why it is not done in my constituency. Then I should also like to ask the Minister a question on what he said at Hanover in my constituency. There he envisaged the prospect of using the settlement as a fodder bank. I should like to tell the Minister nicely that he gave those people the impression that he wants to use that scheme as an experiment for a fodder bank. Now I should like to know from him whether he can tell us what the policy of the Government is in regard to the settlements he intends using for fodder banks. Have the farmers to produce the lucerne, and the State then buys it from them, or is it the intention of the Government that where the farmers have this irrigable land, and in the opinion of the Minister they cannot cultivate all the land, the State is going to buy up that land? I am asking the Minister this question because the statement made by him in my constituency was not clear. I was there with the Irrigation Commission, and the farmers were all confused. They did not know what the policy is, and the Irrigation Commission also did not know and could not give any explanation. The Minister of Lands also was there. The people living there are mostly supporters of the Minister, but after what the Minister said, they could not tell us clearly what the Minister had said, how he proposed to carry out that fodder bank scheme, and I should like to learn from the Minister what his policy in that regard is.

I should like to reply to a few of the speeches. I begin with the hon. member for Albert-Colesberg (Mr. Boltman) with regard to the fodder bank in the district of Hanover, namely on the Seekoei-river. I shall deal with it when we come to the Irrigation Vote. Then I should like to say that the hon. friends opposite, as soon as I say something in connection with Kakamas, immediately suggest that I am attacking the Church. I have never attacked the Church as such.

But you did say it is an exploiter.

The hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie) has attacked me with reference to the settlement at Vaal-Hartz which is outside his own constituency. He has told me that I have to see to it that those people are put on an economical basis. He stated it is my duty and he added that the people are sitting on seven morgen, and that that is not economical. He has also stated that I should protect and safeguard those people against unscrupulous traders and speculators.

And then you asked what about Kakamas.

Give me an opportunity now. My reply was that it is my policy to protect, those people, in the first place by placing them on economical holdings and in the second place by safeguarding them against unscrupulous traders and speculators, and I said that, while my hon. friend was so concerned about the position at Vaal-Hartz, I should like to know whether he was also pleading for the settlers at Kakamas who are settled on six morgen of land. I stated that the Church has a trading monopoly there. I referred to the excessive and colossal profits being made and I added that the interest of the Church in Kakamas was limited to the shop business.

You referred to the profits made by the Church there.

I referred to the colossal profits, and I referred to the profits being made in the shop business. I repeat what I said here, namely that when the war broke out, Kakamas was the first to increase the prices.

That is not so.

Now my hon. friend says that the Price Controller has stated that the prices at Kakamas are lowest. Does my hon. friend know that the same Controller has fined Kakamas because they charged excessive prices?

But the Controller cannot fine them?

But he institutes action.

What was the action about?

It suffices if I say that they were fined in terms of the regulations on account of charging excessive prices.

By whom?

By the Controller.

He cannot impose fines; you are talking nonsense.

Proceedings were instituted against them and before the case was heard they admitted guilt and paid the fine.

To whom?

To the Controller. The members are now trying to side-track the issue, but the position is as I have stated here. They were charged and they admitted guilt before the case came before the magistrate. The Controller now says, according to the hon. members, that the prices are lowest.

Is the fine paid to the Controller?

I must ask hon. members not to interrupt the Minister so continuoulsy.

Now they say the Controller states that the prices are lowest. I deny and challenge that once and for all. I say again that my friend should also plead for the settlers of Kakamas against the type of thing I have been talking about, and if he does that, he might be able once again to show his face in Kakamas. The hon. member for Brits (Mr. Grobler) has asked me when the settlers will be passed out at Wolwekraal. I may tell him this, 23 have already been passed out and the cases of the others that have not yet been passed, are being considered at present. The hon. member for Kimberley, District (Mr. Steytler) has requested that the amount of the Trust Fund which the Department holds for the settlers, should carry interest—he has asked that we should pay interest on it. Well, the matter is being investigated. In terms of the law as it stands, we cannot do so but we are at the moment seeing what we can do. Let me just tell my friend this, that the settlers there have done so well this year, that where they had obtained advances from my Department to an extent of £38,000 for the purchase of stock and other things, they voluntarily repaid £21,000 so that they owe only £17,000 more. In connection with the damage to wheat, I am afraid we cannot do anything about that. I know the damage has been caused by too much rain. Damage has been done, but we cannot accept responsibility in that respect. Now I come to the question of the writing of letters direct to the Minister. The settlers at Vaal-Hartz are all probationary lessees and we cannot permit them to write direct to the Minister or to their member of Parliament, for if that were permitted, it would be difficult to maintain proper discipline. They may write if they like, but then they should do so through the superintendent, and then we could have his opinion on the matter. The hon. member for Waterberg (Mr. J. G. Strydom) has asked what we are doing with the holdings on the New Belgium Block. There 34 farms have been surveyed. The houses have been built and everything is fully complete, and they are awaiting allotment. A number of the places have been leased but we do not propose to let the rest during the war. Now, with regard to the complaint of the person whom the hon. member for Malmesbury (Mr. Loubser) met on the way, and who threw the blame upon me—I repudiate it with contempt. The man might have been on the farm of a settler and the settler can only keep as many head of stock on his farm as he is permitted and no more. The Department has to see to it that the veld is not trodden out. It is clear the man wanted to hire veld from Coetzee, and Coetzee did not have the right to do so. It is contrary to the regulations and if that were allowed, it would only mean that the veld will be trodden out. With regard to Vaaldam and the poisoning of the dam raised by the hon. member for Heilbron (Mr. Liebenberg), I should like to say this. Immediately after the poisoning of the dam was brought to my notice, I sent some of my Land Board members together with Dr. Steyn from Onderstepoort to make an investigation of the matter on the spot, and to take precautions for keeping the stock away from the dam while the experts were investigating the matter. After that I communicated with Agriculture, whose technical assistants were investigating the question of poisoning, and I was informed that experiments were being conducted at the dam in order to determine what was the actual cause of the poisoning. The general suspicion thus far has been that the poisoning was caused by the algae on the dam. I have requested Agriculture to inform me of the result of the experiments, so that everything possible might be done to deal with the matter. Members will appreciate, however, that we are here concerned with a problem which falls wholly in the province of the technicians and I have also learned that Public Health officials, in consultation with Agricultural experts have taken the matter in hand, and that on the 7th instant a meeting of the experts will be held at Johannesburg to discuss the whole matter. As soon as the experts have determined the cause and have suggested a remedy, members may be sure that I shall not lose any time to do what is required of me. On the 1st April I received a report from one of the Land Board members who was present at a meeting held there by the farmers in the vicinity. He informed me that the position was fairly under control, and that I would receive a further official report regarding the matter shortly. Members may therefore rest assured that I shall do everything in my power to deal with the matter after the technical people have determined the cause of the poisoning and have told me exactly how to deal with it. Subsequently I was informed that the experts at Onderstepoort had decided that we should try to use blue vitriol to deal with the poisoning. My Department undertook to do so under the supervision of the experts from Onderstepoort. We do not wish to do anything that might lead to accidents. We have tried to secure blue vitriol but thus far we have not yet succeeded; however, we are hoping to be able to obtain a certain quantity. With regard to the question of partitioning in camps, that is a matter we shall deal with. I shall give the reply to the hon. member for Klerksdorp (Mr. Jan Wilkens) tomorrow—it is in connection with the potatoes. Then I should just like to say this that the hon. member for Witbank (Mr. Bezuidenhout) has again talked about Loskop. He has again concerned himself with Loskop and I am afraid he has had no greater success than on the last occasion when he brought up this matter. The difficulties are not such as he describes, and with the exception of three or four owners, we have satisfied the people there. I have recently sent out the Chairman of the Central Land Board to discuss the matter with the so-called dissatisfied people and I shall read what they decided there. This is what they say—it is an extract from the information I have received from the Chairman of the Central Land Board—

I think we may leave the matter now. I think I have dealt with all the points now, except the one point raised by the hon. member for Klerksdorp.

At 5.55 p.m. the Chairman stated that, in accordance with the Sessional Orders adopted on the 28th January and 26th March, 1943, and Standing Order No. 26 (1), he would report progress and ask leave to sit again.

House Resumed:

The CHAIRMAN reported progress and asked leave to sit again; House to resume in. Committee on 13th April.