Mr Chairman, yesterday was a tragic day, to sit here in this House and witness the fruits of the so-called broadening of the democracy, which the hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning is so fond of talking about.

I should rather say that it was tragic to witness the fruits of the contempt for democracy in this House, because yesterday we had the opportunity to listen to the speech of a person who was rejected twice in one year by the voters of Randfontein. Twice in one year he was democratically rejected at the polls in Randfontein, but he has been reappointed to participate in the legislative process in this Chamber, which intensely affects the voters in that constituency, who rejected him. [Interjections.] It was indeed a tragic day to witness that. [Interjections.]

On behalf of this side of the House I should like to participate in this debate to express our opposition to this specific Bill. Obviously the CP is opposed to the Free Settlement Areas Bill, because the CP is not prepared to support this Bill, which has as its objective the promotion of the integration policy of the NP.

Mr Chairman, on a point of order: I should like to ask whether it is in order for an hon member to insinuate that an indirectly elected or nominated member holds an inferior position to a directly elected member.

Order! I did not hear the hon member say that. The hon member for Ventersdorp may proceed.

The CP is not prepared to support this Bill, which is a logical consequence of the NP’s new policy. The CP owes it to the White voters outside to reject this residential area integration Bill, initiated by the NP.

On the instructions of the voters who put it in power in 1948, the NP placed the Group Areas Act and other so-called apartheid legislation on the Statute Book. The then NP complied with the wishes of the voters and proudly announced that they had proudly complied with the wishes of the voters. That is why the NP said, in Vrugte van die Nasionale Bewind, dating from that time, that the NP stood for the maintenance and the perpetuation of White civilisation in South Africa, and had adopted the apartheid legislation for that reason.

The NP of that time proudly said that it stood for the maintenance and the perpetuation of White civilisation in South Africa and had therefore considered it necessary to adopt the apartheid legislation. At the same time the NP said with regard to the United Party, or the “Sappe” as they were known at that time, of whom so many are sitting on that side of the House today, that they were adopting a course which would lead to equality, mixed residential areas, miscegenation, degeneration and ruin. [Interjections.]

Yes, Sir, the NP of that time said that the UP was adopting a course which would lead to equality, mixed residential areas, miscegenation, degeneration and ruin. The then Prime Minister, Dr Malan, said at that stage that it was necessary to emphasise that only on the basis of apartheid with regard to residential areas could we have a sound relationship between one race and another. It was only on that basis that we could have fairness for both sides.

Yes, Sir, that was the standpoint of the NP at that stage, and obviously that was the standpoint with which the hon the State President associated himself at that stage. While I am referring to the hon the State President, let us see what the hon the State President said when he was the Minister of Coloured Affairs. He said there were no moral grounds on the basis of which a Coloured could come to Parliament, because how could one tell a Coloured that he was welcome to serve in Parliament with one, but that he and his family were prohibited from living in the same residential area.

He was right!

That was the stand-point of the hon the State President at that stage. At that stage the hon the State President called this a cornerstone. Today we are justified in saying that those were the last consistent, logical political thoughts of the leader of the NP.

Later the hon the State President came along, during the 1983 Referendum, and asked the White voters for a yes vote so that Coloureds and Indians could come to Parliament. Then that cornerstone which the NP used to be proud of, was destroyed.

Coloureds and Indians came to Parliament. Coloureds and Indians became Ministers and suddenly the harsh reality of those final, logical, consistent political thoughts of the leader of the NP dawned on him. Then he realised that although Coloureds and Indians were joint rulers of the country, they could not even live where they wanted to.

Then the hon the State President and the NP realised that the Rev Allan Hendrickse, for example, although he was a Minister, could not live where he wanted to. To tell the truth, he could not even swim where he wanted to. As a matter of fact, although the Rev Alan Hendrickse was a first-class Minister at that stage, he had to swim second class. That was when the hon the State President said:

Yes. suddenly we had to hear: “We have outlived the outdated concept of apartheid.”

Sir, in the hon the State President’s so-called Rubicon speech, he said that the cornerstone of the NP’s policy was now one nation, one undivided South Africa, on the basis of equal citizenship rights and universal franchise for all the inhabitants of South Africa, irrespective of their race, colour or ethnic ties. Hon members can therefore see who is now adopting a course which will lead to equality, mixed residential areas, miscegenation, degeneration and ruin. That is why the hon the State President said that the Mixed Marriages Act and section 16 of the Immorality Act had to be improved. He said he was not going to scrap those laws, he was merely going to improve them. Yes, he said he was not going to abolish them, but merely improve them. What happened then? Those laws were improved so much that they disappeared completely from the Statute Book.

Today we are being expected to approve this integration Bill of the NP for residential areas. In the language of the reformer the NP is today asking us to approve this Free Settlement Areas Bill. We on this side of the House no longer trust the Government.

For a long time now!

The White voter outside no longer trusts the Government either. The White voter no longer trusts the Government, because the White voter is beginning to understand the modus operandi of the Government and to realise that the modus operandi of the Government was described well by Prof Huntington, when he said:

Yes, Sir, that is the language which the NP speaks. That is the language which no longer influences the White voter. The NP has contracted a marriage with the Coloureds and the Indians across the colour bar, and now the Coloureds and the Indians have walked out of the House and the NP has serious marital problems and a divorce is imminent. That marriage would seem to be on the rocks, and the only way in which that marriage can be saved, the only condition laid down, was stated by the Rev Alan Hendrickse, when he said “bring the chocolates” so that they could try to save that marriage.

Do not send the chocolates through the post though! [Interjections.]

That is why, in the language of the reformer, the NP Government must now—

The NP has lost its way; now it must scratch the backs of the Coloureds and the Indians in an effort to try to save this marriage of theirs temporarily. That is why the NP has now come along with this Free Settlement Areas Bill in the hope that the Coloureds and the Indians will be satisfied with this, but no, that marriage of the NP and the Coloureds and the Indians will not be saved by this Bill.

At one stage Dr Verwoerd said:

The CP rejects this Bill with the contempt it deserves, because we are not in favour of open areas. Nor are we in favour of grey areas, mixed residential areas, so-called free settlement areas, or whatever the NP wants to call it in the language of the reformer.

During the 1987 general election the hon the State President said at Ermelo that he had heard people talking about the establishment of grey areas. He said the only grey area he was acquainted with was the grey hair on an elderly man’s head. That is what the hon the State President said at that stage, and today, little more than a year later, we are expected to agree to this Bill.

On 9 March 1987 the hon the Minister of Foreign Affairs said the following:

Therefore, Sir, in view of the standpoint of the hon the Minister of Foreign Affairs, this legislation must be seen as part of the NP’s strategy to allow residential integration to take place in a natural and gradual way.

Sir, the Government has not only lost its credibility among the White voters, but also among the Coloureds, Indians and Blacks. That is why the White voters will reject the NP at the polls on 26 October.

Today the NP is moving in precisely the opposite direction to the course which it initially adopted. Today it is the NP which is adopting the course, which will lead to equality, mixed residential areas, miscegenation, degeneration and ruin, of which it accused the UP at that stage.

However, the CP is still adopting the tried and trusted course which the NP adopted with so much confidence over the years, and which they believed in. For that reason we reject the legislation, because we believe that the Bill will contribute to destroying the permanence and the future of the Whites in South Africa.

We on this side of the House say unequivocally that we will not go down in history as the people who led the Afrikaner to degeneration and ruin, but that it will be the NP which will go down in history as being those who led the Afrikaner in South Africa to his ruin, inter alia, by passing the Free Settlement Areas Bill.

As recently as 1985 the hon the State President said the following at the Cape Congress:

The hon the State President said that he had gone far enough, and that he was now digging in his heels. Yes, the hon the State President dug in his heels, and today we are sitting in this House to discuss these fruits of that action of his. If this is how the hon the leader of the NP digs in his heels, I want to say with the greatest reverence and respect that the time has come for the hon the leader of the NP to dig in his heels and get out!

Dr Verwoerd said:

[Time expired.]

Mr Chairman, the hon member did get round to his own party towards the end of his speech and said that they were headed somewhere. On this matter the CP is on the road to nowhere. What do we hear from prominent CP members about this matter? We hear the standpoint that they stand immovably by what the NP has always said, but we hear from Prof Carel Boshoff that he wishes to convert the largest part of the RSA into a free settlement area in toto. What do we hear from Mr Koos van der Merwe?

He concedes that, just as he accepted that it was impossible to establish own residential areas throughout South Africa when his present leader signed the NP manifesto in 1981, he now accepts the reality that there are certain mixed areas. He then had to be quickly repudiated.

All the CP want to do is to keep on reducing the White occupation of South Africa—that is the logical outcome of their policy—and the remaining Whites who cannot fit into that reduced so-called White South Africa have to live in free settlement areas. They have to live in a multiracial state where the principle of one man, one vote will apply. The CP vision of the future looks like scrambled eggs. [Interjections.] They have no message for the White voting public on how they want to perpetuate the interests of all the Whites.

The hon member devoted his entire speech to presenting a propagandist, distorted version of what the NP really says. I want to take him and those hon members back to the NP Federal Congress in Durban two years ago. The basis of what we are doing now was laid at the time. I shall quote to hon members the motion on group security:

1. (a) Die versekering van ’n eie gemeenskapslewe vir alle gemeenskappe deur middel van onder andere die instandhouding van eie skole in woongebiede, waar enigsins prakties moontlik.

That remains NP policy. [Interjections.]

1. (b) Die handhawing van volwaardige selfbeskikking op soveel vlakke moontlik, vir alle groepe en gemeenskappe, deur middel van onder andere die verdere vestiging en uitbouing van die eiesake-konsep of deur eie administrasies of op agentskapsbasis.

Ambiguous and misleading.

We find the result in this legislation. Here is a broadening of the own affairs concept. This not only gives the White Ministers’ Council of which I am the Chairman— that is why I am participating in this debate—the final say regarding free settlement areas which may be considered within White group areas or areas which have been declared White local government areas but the Coloureds and the Indians also receive a full say in deciding on free settlement areas in their regions. In this way self-determination over that area which has been set aside for every population group in terms of orderly regulations is placed in the hands of elected leaders.

In a moment I shall come to the NP’s basic view on its responsibility and that of the Ministers’ Council toward the White community. It is therefore the implementation of a resolution of congress, which was subsequently accepted by our four provincial congresses, which was subsequently included in our manifesto and then supported by a two-thirds majority of the electorate on 6 May 1987. [Interjections.]

I shall continue to quote from that motion:

1. (c) Die effektiewe beskerming van minderhede deur middel van die erkenning van die multi-kulturele karakter van die RSA en van groepsregte op die basis van gelyke geleenthede en nie-oorheersing van een groep oor ’n ander.
2. (d) Die effektiewe handhawing van balans tussen die regte van individue en groepe in ooreenstemming met Christelike waardes en beskaafde norme, gerugsteun deur ’n onafhanklike regbank en gelykheid voor die reg.

[Interjections.] In this Free Settlement Areas Bill …

Order! I think hon members on my left have now made enough interjections. I note that quite a number of them are still going to speak and surely they will be capable of enumerating the points on which hon members are interjecting so enthusiastically now. The hon the Minister may proceed.

Thank you very much, Mr Chairman, but one tends to shout if one’s case is weak.

As you did yesterday!

This equilibrium is being maintained in this Free Settlement Areas Bill.

Order! The hon member for Ventersdorp has made his last remark now. I request him not to make any more.

This balance is being striven for in this Bill because, while the basic point of departure of own residential areas is maintained, room is also being left for individuals who feel differently to be able to have an alternative. That is why I say that this is what the NP says; not what that hon member says. The NP adopted this policy standpoint, tested it democratically and received a mandate for it. At the same time that is the reply to the hon member for Ermelo who said yesterday, as he was quoted on the radio, that we had no mandate.

We went further and, after its ratification, had the President’s Council conduct an orderly inquiry. They issued a report, which was thoroughly considered by the Government. If the public want to know what the NP says, they should not listen to those people’s propagandistic distortions. They should listen to what we have to say. I cannot formulate it better than the hon the State President expressed it in this House on 5 October. That is the background against what we have before us today should be judged. On 5 October the hon the State President said in this House:

This remains a priority and this Bill alters it by neither tittel nor jot—if I may put it like that.

The hon the State President continued and said:

Sir, those are the words of a statesman! Those are words which are embedded in the realities of South Africa. They are words capable of standing the test of real justice and also recognition of others’ rights.

Sir, I shall continue:

Sir, just as the hon member for Overvaal concedes that there are certain areas which will always be occupied by members from more than one population group, in the same way those hon members sitting there, who have been in politics a long time, defended this from platforms in 1981. This is the reality of South Africa. There will be such areas again. We have reached a stage in which we have to ask ourselves, concerning that part of the problem, whether the time has not come to regulate it by law. Is it not time to regulate it properly because there is a tendency to undesirable conditions in such areas? If we regulate this properly and create scope for legalising such a situation, we place the authorities—local and others—in a position to regulate it properly.

Against this background it is the actual policy of the NP to stand for own residential areas as far as possible. [Interjections.] This is a broadening of our policy with which a start was made two years ago, which was ratified by the voters and which says that there is room in South Africa for an alternative too.

Embedded in this is the acceptance of certain basic points of departure to which I shall return. I want to say, however, that so far the reporting and comment on this Bill and the Group Areas Amendment Bill have presented a dark picture on the application of this legislation if it should pass into law.

From the left an image is being created that the Ministers’ Council of the House of Assembly, with these powers to be vested in it, will throw Coloured people in White areas onto the street in their thousands in a brutal and unfeeling manner.

An image is being created that we will permit free settlement areas here and there only on a tokenism basis in a bigoted, illiberal and parochial way. [Interjections.] From the right the image is being created that this legislation means the end of own residential areas and that all areas are now being thrown open. In both cases an unfounded and false image is being created of what the NP view actually is.

On behalf of the Ministers’ Council which will be granted these important responsibilities, I want to state a basic standpoint of principle here today. The Ministers’ Council of the House of Assembly associates itself with the point of departure underlying this legislation which is that, for the protection of minorities, the right of every population group to an own community life is recognised, which includes the maintenance of a general pattern of own residential areas.

As far as possible!

Mr Chairman, may I put a question the hon the Minister?

The hon member may put questions to me at the end of my speech.

Furthermore, the Ministers’ Council also accepts the other point of departure underlying this legislation, which is the acceptance of the principle of free association for those who desire it so that they may settle within residential areas where anybody may live and which are called “free settlement areas” in this Bill. We shall support the institution of free settlement areas and promote it where necessary.

Yes, of course! This is the new NP policy of course!

Sir, we shall do this in an orderly fashion but in a way which will not jeopardise a basic pattern of own residential areas because that is what the Whites want.

Therefore: The NP has two policies—choose the one you like!

No, Sir, it is not two policies; it is a policy dealing with the full reality of South Africa instead of a policy which says: I shall decide for everybody …

What did you do yesterday?

… instead of a policy which maintains no balance between individual rights and group rights.

What did you do on Monday?

Our approach is—we are not in control of the further course of this legislation—that, if and when this legislation is included in the Statute Book, a basic point of departure will have to be that, when the question arises whether a free settlement area should be considered or not, the need will have to be determined and need will be an important guideline. For the present I foresee only a need in greater metropolitan areas in the larger cities.

Just at first!

As I see it, that is where the need exists and that is also the extent to which we shall have to consider that need. We say moreover—this has been spelt out on various occasions—that the approach of this side of the House, and it is also the approach of the Ministers’ Council, is that the conversion to free settlement areas in existing residential areas must be subject to the support of the vast majority of the legal occupants.

We also say that no steps will be taken before in-depth consultation has taken place with interested parties and we see local authorities as a key factor in that process of consultation. Sir, surely that is a fair standpoint. It is a balanced standpoint which takes the truth of our conditions in South Africa into account on a proper scientific basis and which complies with the demands that those conditions make of us.

We see the functions which are to be assigned to us in the Bill as a positive regulatory duty aimed at the prevention of friction, the sympathetic handling of all individuals, the assurance of happy communities and the assurance that we can achieve the objective of enabling communities like the Whites, which place a high premium on their own identity, to do this. Furthermore the Bill is aimed at a democratic approach to how this sensitive task should be handled.

Our vision for the future remains a basic pattern of own residential areas. That is what the White voters want and what the NP will ensure. At the same time there will be fair opportunity and freedom of choice in cases where such a need exists.

This is why the NP says in the first place that it is in the best interests of all communities that every community obtain greater and fundamental powers by means of its elected leaders to be able to decide for itself on the approach of its specific group of voters as regards how they wish to have their socially distinctive community life regulated.

In the second place, the NP says that an absolute pattern of entirely own residential areas is impossible because everybody does not feel the same about this. For this reason all forms of residential area regulation should be brought under the aegis of the law on a proper basis. We must prevent disorderly conditions from arising. Is there an hon member on the other side of the House who, regardless of petty politicking, thinks that a healthy state of affairs exists in places like Hillbrow? Surely not!

So why do you not act?

Those hon members are closing their eyes to this. Even the senior CP member, who was invited by the American government to be worked upon there, says it is impossible, it is like water which has flowed out of a dam and which one will never recover. That hon member states that it is impossible, that for the sake of their theory they have to excise it and that a scrap of a sovereign Black state has to lie in the heart of Johannesburg. Do they repudiate him or are there perhaps some of them who consider something like this possible? [Interjections.] This statement clashes with what the hon member for Overvaal says.

Well, that is the CP’s standpoint.

Does that mean that the CP has one standpoint and the hon member for Overvaal another? That is the interesting situation with which we are dealing. [Interjections.] If the hon member returns from America after being exposed to all those things, I wonder how long it will take before he sits in the benches of the independents.

[Inaudible.]

Order! Would the hon member Mr Derby-Lewis control himself. I know he is sufficiently disciplined to do this.

Mr Chairman, on a point of order. Are you aware of the interjections which came from the other side of the House while the hon the Minister was speaking about the hon member for Overvaal?

Order! The hon the Minister may proceed.

Sir, we say it should be made subject to law and this broadening of opportunity be seen as a positive development. While maintaining the basic pattern of own residential areas, the NP will create scope in a balanced way in cases where fair needs exists and where they can be proved.

Mr Chairman, may I put a question to the hon the Minister?

Order! Unfortunately the hon the Minister’s time is up and the hon member cannot therefore be permitted to put a question.

Mr Chairman, it is always a privilege to speak after the hon the Minister of National Education, who dealt with the hon members of the Official Opposition extremely effectively once again today. The hon the Minister also spelt out very clearly in what a fair and balanced way the Ministers’ Council intends to discharge its obligations with regard to the implementation of the Bill under discussion. This assurance is welcomed, and we want to thank the hon the Minister for it because we know that the implementation of the proposed legislation and the way in which this takes place will be of critical importance to the success of the new concept contained in the Bill.

If this measure is really to be seen as a positive step, one will have to ensure that free settlement areas are a success. I want to add that as regards those who prefer to disassociate themselves and say that this is a substantive new approach to the orderly management of residential areas, we must in all our actions guard against penalising those who prefer freedom of association in an intended or unintended way because of their choice of a lifestyle which is not shared by us.

†In his introductory speech on this Bill the hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning reiterated that the Government does not have a static view on laws and that laws on the Statute Book are not sacred cows. He went on to say that laws exist to serve society and must reflect current needs and circumstances in society.

In terms of the NP’s philosophy of own group rights, freedom of disassociation is a basic right— in respect of residential areas too. At the same time, however, there are people who have a different attitude and who do not have a need for own residential areas. In this measure before the House the rights of this group of people to associate freely is established beyond question, and I welcome this as a historic step forward in our society. The fact of the matter is that this is a new need which has arisen and is not in dispute.

I would like to deal briefly with the strange and illogical phenomenon that this measure is being opposed by people to the left of the NP, and I would like to call them to account for this. For example, a women’s organisation in Natal, called Women for Peaceful Change Now, has written to me and many of my colleagues in Natal and commented on various measures before Parliament during this session, including the Bill under discussion. I quote from a letter from the chairperson of that organisation:

This very narrow and shortsighted view of course coincides with that of our absent enemies, the PFP, and deserves to be rejected out of hand in my view. It is a view which ignores the fact that this is a positive adaptation of the status quo and a step forward in terms of the Government’s reform policy.

Whilst protecting the right to exclusivity, it is for the very first time actively providing for inclusivity as well. In my view it is a tragedy that, as in the past, the PFP has failed miserably to rise to the occasion, and has missed a golden opportunity to play a constructive role for a change. No wonder they are still being referred to as the “boycott party” in so many quarters.

*Talking about boycotts, I should like to refer briefly to only one statement made yesterday by the latest addition to the ranks of boycotters in this House, the hon member for Randburg. He claimed that this was merely a “reactive” measure, because it was aimed only at areas which have already “gone Black” and where the Group Areas Act can no longer be implemented; in other words, it is only an acceptance of the inevitable. I wonder whether the hon member ever read the President’s Council report about this, and I wonder where he was when the hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning was making his introductory speech yesterday.

The fact that the greatest emphasis is probably going to fall precisely on new areas makes a farce of the hon member’s argument and merely confirms in practice the “pro-active” nature of this measure.

It is also a tragedy that certain sections of the media elected to omit to mention the positive potential of this Bill, and to bury this under a load of scare stories and reservations which related to the facts only here and there.

In conclusion, there is much good in this measure and if the media co-operate, and those who have to implement this legislation do so with an open mind and in a positive spirit, one will create a situation of which no one need be ashamed, and which can contribute largely to the improvement of inter-group relations in our country. I should like to support the Bill.

Mr Chairman, what strikes me is the hit-and-run politics the NP has been applying recently. What I mean by this is that a speaker launches a terrible attack on this side of the House and then cannot snatch his briefcase fast enough to flee. We saw this on Wednesday when the hon the Minister of Foreign Affairs spoke and we saw it this morning when the hon the Minister of Education and Development Aid spoke. He had barely resumed his seat before he had grabbed his case and run, but he did not fail to attack us. [Interjections.]

I want to appeal to that side of the House. If somebody attacks this side of the House, he should have the courage to sit there and to listen to what those on this side have to say as well. I want to tell the hon the Minister that I shall be able to say one day that I was sitting in this Council Chamber when he hammered the penultimate nail into the coffin of the Whites in South Africa. I had to listen to him!

The hon the Minister said that it had been decided at the NP congress to retain own residential areas and own schools where possible. Yesterday the hon member Dr Geldenhuys said so too. I have a little document here which was issued by the NP on 26 May last year. It was after that congress, on which so much dependence had been placed, had been held in Durban. This says, and I quote from page 6:

This is the answer and I quote:

Listen carefully now:

Nothing is said about “where possible”. Not a word!

During the election last year one of the NP candidates distributed a pamphlet in his constituency. It reads as follows, and I quote:

It continues:

Once again, no “where possible”. This was kept quiet. The pamphlet was issued by none other than our hon Speaker of the House of Assembly. He issued this pamphlet but he did not say that the NP would do this “where possible”. If one looks at the past of the NP, one cannot take their word that this will never happen. It was illustrated this morning that they had sworn by all that was holy that open residential areas and other things would not come to pass. But this morning we are actually discussing grey residential area legislation.

During the general congress of the NP in the Transvaal, the following was published and I quote again:

Referring to the staunchest UP supporter in the NP, it continues:

It continues by referring to the two archliberals on that side of the House. Dr Vilonel, the hon member for Langlaagte, is also quoted. [Interjections.] The report runs as follows:

Flats, not residential areas. [Interjections.]

The NP is speaking with two voices.

I shall revert to the question of the so-called “White schools where possible”. If there are Whites in a grey area—or a mixed area, or call it a fruit salad area because it will become multicoloured—who do not wish to live there, according to the hon the Minister of National Education, they will be moved. We do not know whether it will be forced or voluntary resettlement but they have to be moved. [Interjections.] If the Whites form the minority in that area and most of the inhabitants are people of colour and the nearest school in a Black area which they can attend is 20 km distant, what will this NP, with that hon Minister of Constitutional Development, say then? [Interjections.] He will then tell his caucus that they are discriminating against those poor Black children …

Mr Chairman, is the hon member prepared to reply to a question?

Mr Chairman, I am not interested in questions; I do not have the time. He could have put questions in Randfontein when he stood there and the voters repudiated him. [Interjections.]

Then they will say that these poor little children have to travel 20 km to school whereas there is a school in this area which is occupied by only 30 or 40 Whites. The next event which will take place is that they will come to their congress and pull the wool over the delegates’ eyes with the result that a congressional resolution will be passed that we may as well be permitted to have grey schools now too. One cannot rely on the word of the NP. [Interjections.]

I want to go still further and ask the hon the Minister something. When this legislation is on the Statute Book, will permits still be issued for pure White areas when non-Whites apply to live there? [Interjections.]

Order! There is a sporadic chorus of loud exclamations. This cannot continue. I shall start mentioning a few names and request the hon members to lower their voices. The hon member may proceed.

If permits will still be issued to people for existing White areas in cases in which they do not wish to reside in grey areas, I want to predict here this morning that such an area will become the next grey area. In this way they will infiltrate these areas one after the other. [Interjections] I should like the hon the Minister to tell us whether permits will be stopped now. Will people of colour be prohibited from living in free trade areas in city centres which are not grey? [Interjections.]

I want to pause for a moment at what the hon the Minister said in Randfontein when he tried to save a dying NP by means of artificial respiration. I quote from Beeld what he said in Randfontein:

I accept that it will be the taxpayer who will have to pay if there are people who do not agree with the NP policy of grey areas.

If somebody does not wish to live among that mishmash, he has to move. He does not want to move because he has lived there for his whole life, put everything he had into that house and now he gets a Black neighbour. If he does not want to live next to a Black, he has only one choice and that is to move. Nevertheless the hon the Minister does not spell it out to us how he intends assisting such a person.

I want to state it clearly that forced resettlement might have to take place here. Let us examine the cause of these problems. Let us look at the first grey area which originated in the Transvaal, namely Hillbrow. Yesterday the hon member for Springs asked where the Whites were to come from if we removed the Blacks. I want to state this unambiguously now. The CP policy is that such areas will be cleaned up. They will not be excised from the White area of South Africa. The day we come to power we shall ensure that the laws of the land are applied. We shall not act like weaklings and permit events to take place over which we have no control.

To revert to Hillbrow. Hillbrow was not inundated by people of colour overnight; they infiltrated slowly but surely. When the first complaints were heard, the Government should have sent those people back. Those people did not appear out of thin air. Now the NP is hiding behind the finding of the court that one has to provide alternative accommodation. Those people must have come from somewhere; they must have had accommodation.

Do all the people in South Africa have accommodation?

Order! The hon member for Langlaagte has made enough interjections now.

Mr Chairman, I think you could almost say to him what you said yesterday—to continue with his interjections because I do not take any notice of him.

Those Blacks and people of colour lived in houses before they came to Hillbrow. I want to mention another case. Zuurbekom has frequently been discussed here. In 1986—that was just yesterday—a survey was conducted. At that stage 12 Black households lived at Zuurbekom. A complaint was lodged immediately but nothing happened. Last month a further survey was carried out. At present there are 129 Black families in that area. Once again, those Blacks who live there came from houses. I believe there are few of the Nationalists or of us who could afford those houses. In other words, these people were not squatters; they had the money to be able to buy there. Once again, if the Government had not tied the hands of the police, there would not have been one Black in that area.

I personally invited—I did not challenge—the hon the Minister; I invited him courteously to accompany me. I wanted him to see with his own eyes what is going on there. I wanted him to see under what conditions Whites have to live there. They go in fear of their lives. They live in prisons. There is burglarproofing over the windows. There are electric fences because they fear for their lives. The hon the Minister came up with evasions, however, and avoided the situation. He does not want to give a straight answer and say he does not wish to look the White voters of Zuurbekom in the eye.

I can look the hon member in the eye and say that that is a lie.

It is not a lie. I can give hon members written proof of the hon the Minister’s evasions. I even asked the hon the Minister of Law and Order to come and acquaint himself with conditions but they cannot bear to look at their own little mongol which they have created. That is what is going on there!

I can buy the hon member a mirror.

That will still not solve the Government’s problems!

I invite the hon the Minister again to come and see what is happening there. He proclaimed a portion which would then become the so-called Greater Soweto. The Potchefstroom to Johannesburg road forms the boundary. A few weeks ago I asked Mr Olaus van Zyl what was to become of the Blacks who were now moving in on the other side of the road. Are they going to do something about that if they are still waiting for the hon the Minister to take a look at what is happening on the northern side of the Potchefstroom road? Since then even more people have moved into the area south of this road which does not comprise part of Greater Soweto. I want the hon the Minister to tell us whether this is to be the start of saying that the other part of Zuurbekom will become a grey or a mixed area. Yesterday the hon member for Ermelo referred to the fact that integration does not work even in America. I shall not waste time so I invite the hon the Minister to read an article in Finansies en Tegniek of 18 December 1987. In that Mr Johan Fick wrote on events in America. This Mr Fick is not a liberal; he is an important Nationalist. He is a Johannesburg city councillor, or was one. He said that integration was not working in America and that it would not work in South Africa either.

Last year False Bay decided to declare a portion a grey area. I shall quote from The Argus of 23 August 1988:

That was yesterday:

After these people had reached this decision, after they had seen what was going on, their eyes started opening.

Was it a government body which reached such a decision?

I want to put the matter like this. When grey areas are to be thrown open, the Ministers’ Councils of the other two Houses will not request that their areas be opened. They are opposed to this legislation and they will maintain their standpoint that they intend doing nothing. They want all areas to be thrown open. The Minister concerned in our Minister’s Council will request that an investigation be instituted and those areas will be inundated.

I state unequivocally today, and I am not ashamed to do so, that no good Whites will move to a Black town where a grey area is going to be created. Possibly a member of the NP will do this because he cannot think for himself but no rightminded person—whether he is a Nationalist or whatever—will go to such an area. He will remain where he is and Blacks will pour into our areas and overwhelm us.

Unfortunately the hon the Minister is not here because I should like to ask him a question. Most employers, like Iscor, the mines, etc, provide their workers with houses. We know how liberalistically inclined they are. If they start bringing in people of colour, does the Government intend providing houses for those people who do not wish to live among Blacks? The NP is incapable even now of seeing that those people have separate changing rooms at work, so why should they give those people houses?

Rev Hendrickse told the NP to bring chocolates. The NP therefore decided yesterday that it should be “Black Magic” but this did not work. Rev Hendrickse saw that chocolates were not being sent and then decided that he would send them. There has already been reference to this. [Interjections.] They must beware that the chocolates are not sent by post.

I want to conclude by saying the following. Somebody who is jogging and is being egged on from behind will have to jog faster and faster and that person will fall on his face. That is what the NP is doing at the moment. They are running at full stretch but the voters of South Africa have the final say. We repeat that next year’s election must not be postponed. We shall then see the voters of South Africa rejecting the NP.

Mr Chairman, the hon member for Carletonville spoke as if the approach of own residential areas for Whites was a thing of the past in terms of NP policy. However, he knows full well that this is still the policy. As a matter of fact, the legislation before this House, does not detract from this either. This is part of a trilogy of Bills in which, inter alia, the Group Areas Act is also under consideration. It is interesting that it was that party of which the hon member for Carletonville is a member that did not support that Bill on the joint committee either.

He also spoke about people who were living against their wishes in areas which would be declared free settlement areas, but that is not correct either. Those people will be afforded the opportunity—and here one must assume that it is a White area which is going to be declared an open area—to vacate and alienate their houses there. More importantly, if they have suffered any losses at all, in terms of other legislation which is to serve before this House, provision will in future be made for monetary compensation for any loss they may have suffered.

The hon member also spoke about the schools in those areas and he referred with exaggerated absurdity to the possibility that one could have a school 20 km from that area. Immediately thereafter he proceeded to identify such ostensible areas, but in none of those cases could 20 km or even 5 km apply. The areas to which the hon member referred, in fact have existing schools and those existing schools can accommodate those children. The question he asked had absolutely nothing to do with the matter. It is also common knowledge that up to now quite a number of schools have been established in South Africa which accommodate people of various races for academic and scholastic training on a private basis.

This debate has again accentuated the fact that residential rights are of the utmost importance to the individual. Residential rights also have the greatest direct effect on the daily lives of the individual and the community. The hon the Minister referred to the two divergent standpoints adopted here. The NP was criticised by the proponents of both standpoints. This criticism is based on emotion, because if the related Bills are considered objectively, it soon becomes clear that fairness and justice are built into them.

Over the years the NP has listened to its people with regard to their needs. The NP accommodates these needs and aspirations in a responsible manner. Because South Africa’s population consists of a diversity of groups, an apparently simple solution is not a solution to the need for physical planning. To accommodate only the aspirations of those persons who have one view of the matter would amount to neglecting the needs of those persons who have a different view.

In an imaginative way the NP Government has, through this Bill, given substance to the meaningful accommodation of these divergent aspirations without prejudicing anyone. Those persons who have a need for an own community life will be entitled to it. The NP recognises this protection as part of its policy.

It is in fact for this reason that not all the residential areas in our country can be declared free settlement areas. However, if the principle of own residential areas is recognised, it would be extremely unfair not to make provision for those persons who want to live together without any restriction in respect of race or colour. The free settlement areas will be established for these people, if this Bill is passed.

It will be up to the individual to elect to live in these free settlement areas, and no one will be forced to do so. If the Bill is passed, the success of the measure will depend on the utilisation of these areas. It will perhaps be interesting to see to what extent the supporters of integration will seize the opportunity to live in these areas. [Interjections.]

The hon member for Port Elizabeth Central is not in the House at the moment, but yesterday he referred to the Bills as if the majority of people considered them disgusting. It is difficult to understand how he, as a supporter of the abolition of the Group Areas Act, could make such a statement. Where free settlement areas are created, the Group Areas Act will after all not be in force. As the Bill at present reads, the Ministers’ Councils—the hon the Leader of the House also indicated this—of the other Houses can be instrumental in the areas occupied by the other communities also being declared free settlement areas—if the various communities desire this—in such a way that only White areas in which Whites prefer to have an own community life, will be subject to the provisions of the Group Areas Act.

One would have expected the supporters of the abolition of group areas to go out of their way to support this Bill, and not to boycott the democratic processes, as we experienced in this House yesterday. After all, an opposition is there as a possible alternative government—if they can oust the present Government. Because the Bill has the wishes of the community as a basis, and if the hon member for Port Elizabeth Central is correct in stating that the majority of people prefer open areas, he should have supported the Bill because then the objective he envisaged could have been achieved. [Interjections.] I think it is because he is wrong in his assumption that he did not support it. In order to declare existing residential areas free settlement areas, all the inhabitants of that residential area, and even those of neighbouring areas, will be consulted.

By whom?

This is determined by the Bill. It is done by the board which must submit the report. The CP sees free settlement areas as the precursor to social integration. Such a view is a misinterpretation of the reality and that party knows that the vast majority of people, and the Whites in particular, prefer to have an own community life. This right is protected in terms of existing legislation, whereas the Bill before the House makes provision for those persons who do not desire such protection, but who want to be allowed to live in free association and for that right to be protected. People are not going to be deprived of the protection they enjoy at present. The principle of group areas is not being removed by the Bill. It will depend on the people themselves whether they want it removed.

In terms of the provisions of the Bill the Government becomes a joint decision-maker and does not remain the sole decision-maker. One would have expected the supporters of the abolition of the Group Areas Act to have supported this Bill and to have expended all their energy in changing the attitude of the community in order no longer to have all residential areas subject to the provisions of the Group Areas Act. If the claims with regard to the attitude of the people towards the abolition of the Group Areas Act are correct, this Bill is the answer to evolutionary emancipation from the Group Areas Act. Does the PFP not believe their standpoint in connection with the matter?

Clause 7 of the Bill deals with the powers, functions and duties of the Free Settlement Board, and they are set out fully in this clause. The Board must publish its intention to investigate an area, and the relevant city council must notify the municipal voters in the relevant area of the envisaged investigation.

In its report the Board must deal with certain aspects, all of which are very important. One such aspect is the social and socio-economic conditions prevailing or which may develop in the relevant area, as well as in adjacent or neighbouring areas in which conditions may be affected as a result of the said conditions in the area being investigated. A decision is therefore not simply taken to declare an area a free settlement area. The consequences of such a decision are also thoroughly investigated and considered.

It is also NP policy that these free settlement areas should not develop into slum areas. For that reason the report must also specify the need for and the availability of services, facilities, amenities or works which are normally provided by local authorities.

Perhaps the most important aspect which must be reported on is the standpoint of the local government bodies, organisations and persons that have a specific interest in the social and socio-economic conditions in the area or vicinity in question.

When the Government’s standpoint was announced after the publication of the report of the Committee for Constitutional Affairs of the President’s Council, the Press announced and endorsed it with a big fanfare. It is therefore a pity that the implementation of the announcement is now being handled in a negative way in certain Press circles. In order to propagate the abolition of group areas certain Press reports have appeared on how people from different racial communities live together peacefully in certain areas. If this is true of people who are at present living together in an area illegally, why does the PFP not want to afford those people the opportunity to live together in harmony with one another legally?

In his speech the hon the Minister said that the debating and the acceptance of this Bill had certain implications for South Africa with regard to our international relationships. This is true, but it is a pity that it is true, because in addition to protecting the rights of those persons who want to live separately, rights are being created here for those persons who do not want to live in separate group areas. More important is the fact that the communities that have one eye on the outside world, can now have their areas declared open.

The attitude of certain foreign governments towards South Africa and their threats if we were to accept this legislation, amount of course to flagrant interference in our domestic affairs. They are quick to admit that there are separate residential areas for their communities in their own countries too, but then add that this is not determined by legislation but by ordinary economic forces. Of course this is a snobistic attitude, as if only rich people of colour are good enough to live among Whites. What is happening in South Africa is that the rights of both groups, ie those who want to live separately and those who want to live mixed, are being protected in their respective areas.

This Government has a responsibility to its electorate to accommodate their aspirations, and it is therefore extremely unfair of the outside world to expect the Government to ignore the wishes of its voters. None of the governments who criticise us are prepared to act against the wishes of their voters in their countries. Why do they expect of South Africa what the pressure groups against the South Africa Government expect of it, namely to implement PFP policy in spite of the fact that the PFP has failed miserably at the polls with its policy of integration?

I also take pleasure in supporting this legislation.

Mr Chairman, I take pleasure in following my colleague the hon member for Port Elizabeth North, and associating myself with the positive tenor of his speech. I am glad that I am not as terrified of the future as the hon members of the Official Opposition, particularly the hon member for Ventersdorp. I have enough faith and confidence in my people to believe that we do not need the prophets of doom one finds on the CP side.

I want to say right at the outset that the Free Settlement Areas Bill, the Local Government Affairs in Free Settlement Areas Bill and the Group Areas Amendment Bill, cannot be assessed in isolation from one another. I hope, Sir, you will consequently afford me the opportunity to allow myself a certain amount of latitude in the argument I am going to advance.

South Africa is a unique country with a unique population structure, and owing to this fact there is no instant solution to the problems arising from this. The simplistic approaches of both the right wing and the left wing in South African politics have definitely not kept pace with the harsh realities of our country.

The policy of the CP, as the Official Opposition, and their other right-wing supporters, of total racial separation or partition is simply not feasible. The economic realities of South Africa simply do not allow this. People of colour form an integral part of our economy and are therefore entitled to share in the prosperity, also by way of housing opportunities relatively near to their places of work on a permanent basis and not only as guest labourers with few if any rights.

In any case the Official Opposition does not always say the same thing. The general policy would seem to be to make the Hillbrows and similar places totally White again. In spite of this the hon member for Overvaal admitted in a conversation with overseas representatives of the BMW, in the presence of other colleagues and I, that the CP knew that they would probably not succeed in making these areas White again. [Interjections.]

The PFP and other left-wing factions recognise the economic interdependence of the different groups, but their policy of a general throwing open of all residential areas is not practical in the South African set-up either. Owing to cultural, religious and other differences most members of the different population groups prefer to live apart.

That is nonsense. That is utter rubbish. [Interjections.]

Even individual members of the House of Representatives and the House of Delegates have, on several occasions … [Interjections.]

Order!

… admitted this in private conversations.

Let us see what the NP’s standpoint is. We take cognisance of the realities and aspirations of all persons to improve their own position, also as regards housing, by means of economic activities. We recognise the wishes of the different population groups to live apart from one another.

But—this is where the draft Bill at present under discussion comes into consideration—we are also prepared to accept that there are persons in the South African society who would prefer to live across the colour bar. If we therefore respect and protect the need of those persons to live apart, why may-we not also recognise and respect the rights of those who do not want to live that way? That is all that this Bill envisages doing. After all, no one is being forced by the proposed legislation to go and live in a free settlement area. A person still retains his right to association or dissociation. The entire country is surely not going to be declared a free settlement area.

Why not?

Surely, this will only take place where there is a need for such areas. If Pietersburg does not have such a need, no one will try to force it on them. The establishment of open areas does not do away with the principle that more own residential areas can and will be proclaimed for the different population groups, in terms of the Group Areas Act.

As regards the establishment of free settlement areas in undeveloped areas, this will probably be easier because there will not be so much encroachment on established rights. However, comprehensive investigations still have to be carried out by the Free Settlement Board, and this will ensure that thorough cognisance will be taken of the wishes and feelings of any person or organisation with an interest in the area.

It is, however, true that there will be concern among the inhabitants of developed areas which in the past had a specific group character, but which at present are no longer inhabited by one population group. Hillbrow is a good example of such an area.

However, the Government does not intend to throw these people with established rights to the wolves. The necessary mechanisms for the protection of the rights of a specific group have been built into the draft legislation. No declaration of a free settlement area, situated in an area proclaimed as a group area for a specific population group, will take place without the consent of the Ministers’ Council responsible for that population group. Therefore the concept of own affairs is of cardinal importance here and every Ministers’ Council will be able to ensure that the interests of the group it represents are protected. It will even be possible for a specific group or groups to throw open all their areas if they so prefer.

The Bill prescribes what factors must be investigated and taken into account by the Free Settlement Board, and if, after an investigation, the Board were to recommend to the responsible Ministers’ Council and the State President that an area should be declared a free settlement area and if the Ministers’ Council were to consent to this and the State President were to promulgate the necessary proclamation, the Government would have committed itself to ensuring that the established rights of legal inhabitants were protected. It will be ensured that such people are not financially worse off than they were before. By doing this, people who do not want to remain in a proclaimed free settlement area will be financially able to move and obtain accommodation of a similar standard in an area of their choice.

Hillbrow and similar areas did not develop simply and solely because the Government did not do anything. These areas developed above all because there were no longer sufficient Whites who wanted to live there and White owners of apartment buildings and other residential units could not afford to leave their assets standing empty. A convenient market existed among people of colour owing to the serious shortage of housing for these groups. It therefore goes without saying that Whites seized the opportunity to salvage their economic position, and people of colour did so to satisfy their housing needs. Instead of blaming one another, we should rather work together to bring order and stability to such areas. Where it is possible to disentangle an area and return it to its original status, let us do so.

How do you want to do that?

However, where this is not possible and where the realities of a given situation make it impossible, let us rather join hands and do what must and can be done. Sacrifices will be required in such cases—that is certain—but in the interests of South Africa I hope and believe that our people will be prepared to make these sacrifices. [Interjections.]

This is positive legislation which also endeavours to confirm and perpetuate the rights of those persons who may think differently to us. Let us avail ourselves of this opportunity to prove to others, who may think differently to us, that there is also a place in the sun for them in South Africa.

Mr Chairman, in the first place I shall react to what the hon members for Port Elizabeth North and North Rand said. The hon member for Port Elizabeth North said our criticism was based on emotion, and the hon member for North Rand said our approach was a simplistic one.

I shall reply to that during the course of my speech, but the objections are not emotional. Those hon members themselves admit that they have a scientific basis. Their own State President used the President’s Council report to confirm that it is and should be a scientific approach to have had separate own residential areas in South Africa over the years. If then it is said that our approach is simplistic, we say once again that it is engraved across the history of this country on a scientific basis.

The hon member for North Rand spoke about the Ministers’ Council which would ensure, as a result of the exercise of its right of self-determination, that the group it represents would be protected. The problem, however, is that the Ministers’ Council, just like the city councils, is under pressure from the central government, which works with general affairs, to give in to the demands of the general public whom they represent. That is what happened in the case of central business districts. Despite the fact that the local communities did not want central business districts, this was forced upon them, in spite of the Ministers’ Council.

The NP are experiencing cheerless days. This was admitted by the hon the Leader of the House yesterday. We have seen what has been happening to them this week, how their new dispensation is collapsing, how they have to defend their policy by means of comme i comme a arguments.

History has shown them what happened to the United Party when they said: “If you want it, we’ve got it”. A policy for the cities as opposed to a policy for the rural areas does not work. One must deal with these matters according to principle. That is the answer.

In the first place they say they stand for group areas. Two years ago at the Federal Congress the hon the Minister of National Education emphasised that there would only be own areas. No mention was made at that congress of the possibility of there being grey areas as well. In the election campaign of 1987, there was not even the slightest indication that there would be grey areas.

There is nothing more damning than a television camera, concentrating on the hon the State President touching his temple and saying: “The only grey area I know is this one.” Upon hearing this the public laughed with him. They had the assurance that own areas would be retained.

We shall fight them from platform to platform because they are blatantly circumventing the NP policy. They are an ambivalent party. They have a policy for the rural areas and a policy for the city. If one wants to live alone, one can do so. If one wants to live separately, one can do so. If one wants to live together, can one associate freely. We shall come to that later.

You are not democratic!

To be democratic is to get the people’s mandate to retain own group areas and then to act according to that, not to change the policy before one has a mandate from the voters. That is democracy. That is how it works. It is as the hon member for Ermelo said yesterday. They concluded a contract with the electorate and they broke it. That is what they did.

It is a dark day for the NP, this once mighty NP, when it has to teeter from one slippery stone to another. With the greatest eloquence and conviction the Government party has over the years—in reality throughout its period of government— adopted the unwavering standpoint, as the hon the State President said on 6 October, that each population group has the established right to cherish and protect its own way of life, to transfer it to the coming generation and in this way to preserve its unique identity. That is what the hon the State President said.

We still adhere to that!

No, you do not adhere to it any longer. That is the point. [Interjections.] He went further.

That is correct!

Yes! It is correct. Why do they not adhere to that? If it is correct, why do we not adhere to it? After all, this is and has always been the manifestation of the NP’s way of thinking.

Not everything remains stagnant!

Principles do not change. [Interjections.]

Order! The two hon members on that side, the hon member for Germiston and the hon member for Benoni, must please curtail their interjections.

The NP received an indisputable mandate for this in consecutive elections. If this standpoint represents the well considered opinion of the NP, why tamper with it? What is it that has caused such a strong Government, which has such convinced views on such a cardinal matter, to give in? Contrary to their better judgment, contrary to their considered scientifically based views, they are giving in.

The hon the State President went so far as to claim that the international examples and literature referred to in the President’s Council report confirmed the validity of the Government’s point of view in this connection. In respect of the Coloureds in particular, the hon the State President adopted an unequivocal and clear standpoint.

I also want to go back in history, to the speech made by Dr Dönges in 1950, in which he said that this thing had started in the Transvaal in May 1848. In Natal it had started as early as 1885. Numerous petitions were sent to the old Transvaal Volksraad. These were dealt with by way of select committees which were appointed in 1926, 1930, 1936, 1937 and 1939, and by way of departmental committees. The then Minister went on to say:

He went on to say that he wanted to appeal to the Coloureds and Indians. He said it was for their sake that we would derive advantage from this. How true these predictions made by Dr Dönges were. This was proved by the hon the State President when he said the following in April 1986 (Hansard, col 3721):

He went on to say:

In 1986, therefore, the hon the State President once again confirmed the prediction made by Dr Donges in 1950.

There are other commissions too, however. There is the Erika Theron Commission, which made its findings known quite recently. Hon members can read this on page 77 of the President’s Council report.

How long ago is quite recently?

It was in 1977, and this has been an issue since 1846. The Erika Theron Commission was a mixed commission. They said:

Which made a very penetrating inquiry—

Why would one worry with a scientific principle of this kind which has been established over the years unless it is because one has become weak in the knees? It is not with daring that the NP are entering the future. There is no bravery involved in this, unless one can call the immense increase in the risk of survival and preservation of identity, brought about by one’s own actions, bravery. No, this is a reckless gamble with the future of a people which is in a ratio of 5:30 to other peoples.

The land that is intended for free settlement is White land, after all. It is White land, which has become a Naboth’s vineyard for occupation by other population groups. It is to be expected that a township developer would agitate to have his planned township declared a grey or open or free settlement area, because then he would have six times as many potential buyers for that area that he is laying out. It is a ratio of 5:30, and the hon the Minister talks about free association!

That is precisely how the NP are plodding along, granting concessions in the constitutional sphere, as with section 16 of the Immorality Act, as with the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act, the Influx Control Act and all the legislation the hon the Minister of Foreign Affairs boasts of in our embassies abroad, saying that we are doing away with apartheid, and that is a further move in the direction of a non-racial state. They dare not do this all at once, because they know that the voters will not accept it. We want to issue a warning, however, that this is ringing the final death knell for the effective implementation of the provisions of the Group Areas Act. [Interjections.] After all, we know what course was followed with section 16 of the Immorality Act and the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act, the latter in particular, which has to be considered first to see whether or not it can be improved upon. At the same time it was no sacred cow. There is proof that the Group Areas Act … [Interjections.] May I be given an opportunity to make my speech? Thank you very much…. will ultimately be a casualty. Instead of that there will be one undivided South Africa, with one nation. That is another concession on this course of integration.

Sir, Boy Louw said, “Look at the scoreboard.” Let us look at the scoreboard. What have these concessions meant to the NP? In the first place the whole new constitutional dispensation is collapsing. In the second, (a) a non-elected body in the shape of the President’s Council is being used to force legislation through and (b) the Standing Rules are being bent to make these debates possible. In the third place the status of the so-called sovereign Parliament is being diminished. In the fourth place the once mighty NP is floundering, after a destructive split. The splinter that chipped off the beam has become the beam. In the fifth place the crime rate is higher than it has ever been. These are the results of the concessions. [Interjections.]

The same applies to the tax rates! GST has increased from 4% to 12%. The inflation rate is bobbing around 14%. Our cities, our public facilities and our parks are being dragged down to Third World standards. This also applies to our beaches …

Mr Speaker, on a point of order: With all due respect, I want to contend that the hon member has deviated completely from the Bill under discussion.

Order! The hon member may proceed.

Black trade unions are showing more and more political muscle, and are moving away from the demarcated industrial sphere.

Order! The hon member must discuss the Bill a little more specifically.

Mr Chairman, I merely want to say that this Bill is a concession to the pressure exerted by the left-wingers, in their own party and elsewhere, as well as the private sector and all the other institutions of which they are the slaves. What have these concessions effected for them? What does the scoreboard show in respect of all the concessions they have made? I have almost concluded this point, Sir. The state of emergency is continuing. Sanctions and disinvestment, particularly by the USA, are being intensified. The value of the rand is dropping. In the sphere of sport we are even further removed from participation. We may not even go and watch the Olympic Games. [Interjections.] The Government is continuing to make concessions contrary to their own convictions—this time in the most sensitive spheres.

I want to refer briefly to a few comments that were made by hon members of this House amongst others. The hon member for Durban Point said he would ensure that the Group Areas Act was maintained in the constituency he represented. The hon member for Roodeplaat said we were racists if we wanted the Group Areas Act to be retained. At the same time he said that Pretoria would remain White, yet he professes not to be a racist. [Interjections.] That is wonderful!

Then I come to my old friend, the hon member Dr Geldenhuys. In answer to the question of the hon member for Pietersburg, viz how it would be made possible for the Whites who were still living in suburbs such as Hillbrow to continue their community life, he said the problem was not the fact that a Coloured person might come to live next door to a White person, but that this could entail the danger of overcrowding and urban decay. Now he suggests that this problem is going to be resolved by means of stricter rules and regulations. Sir, I wonder if he has the examples of his friend Beeld in mind, his friend Beeld, the enemy of the hon the State President, which says that in America there are by-laws that determine how many people may live in one house. Is that what he has in mind? Beeld also says:

Does he think it will be possible to enforce that? They cannot even enforce the Group Areas Act. How are they going to prevent people in Hillbrow from making a noise after ten o’clock at night? How are they going to make sure that only three or four people live in a flat in Hillbrow? That is idle talk. It is idle talk, Sir! If the Government cannot enforce the Group Areas Act, how can they enforce regulations of this kind? [Interjections.] Where are the inspectors going to come from? Then they say the endeavour towards an own community life must be respected, and on the other hand, as the hon member for Stellenbosch said, the right of free association must be acknowledged. Remember, Sir, this is not free association, but infiltration and crowding out only from the one side at the expense of the Whites. [Interjections.] Free association presupposes reciprocity.

Yes!

Where is the reciprocity in this idea of free association? It is invasion, infiltration and crowding out.

But it is for you to decide whether or not you want to live there!

Mr Speaker, on a point of order: Is it permissible for an hon member to stand with his back to the Chair while he is speaking?

Order! The hon member may proceed.

He is merely giving you the facts face to face!

I want to conclude now by saying that there are a few hon members who said it was not the whole of South Africa which would now become mixed, but you know, Sir, it is worse than that. It is a sword of Damocles over every square metre of White land in South Africa …

Absolutely!

… because I do not know whether or not the hon the Minister may have a whim tomorrow or the day after to say the area in which I live must be considered, or that the area in which the hon member Dr Geldenhuys lives or the area in which the fair hon member for Edenvale lives, should be considered.

But the Bill does not provide for that.

Every White square metre in South Africa is under the sword of Damocles, Sir.

You have hit the nail on the head!

What future is there for the Whites under a Government which was supposed to be the friend of the Whites? Sir, we reject this legislation! [Interjections.]

The electorate will reject you!

Mr Speaker, right at the outset I think I should let this hon member for Brakpan into a secret, something that his members in the joint committee definitely did not tell him. They did not tell him that we are not debating the abolition of the Group Areas Act today. He was under a bit of a misapprehension. He thought the Bill before Parliament concerned the abolition of the Group Areas Act.

That is what is going to happen! [Interjections.]

I also want to congratulate the hon member on his wonderful vision for the future when the CP takes over. Just imagine— sport links will be restored immediately, sanctions will disappear, inflation will be a thing of the past …

Northern Transvaal will win the Currie Cup! [Interjections.]

… and there will no longer be Black unrest in South Africa. This in lighter vein, but it is alarming to take cognisance of the way in which South Africa has to proceed on a difficult course with an Official Opposition of this calibre which comes forward with this kind of distortion and sets up Aunt Sallies of this kind, selling their view as the truth.

I shall come back to that later. Later this afternoon I shall ask the hon member for Brakpan a specific question. I hope he has the moral courage to answer me.

When one looks at the arguments that were advanced when the Group Areas Act was placed on the Statute Book, as well as arguments that were advanced subsequently, it is clear that the main objective of the specific Act involved two things, viz to eliminate racial friction and to preserve the particular lifestyle of Whites in South Africa, which was nothing but the Western way of life. The Group Areas Act was never the purpose in itself; numerous NP leaders said this in the past. It is merely a means to an end. It is a method of preventing racial friction and protectin g the Western lifestyle in South Africa.

Do you agree?

Of course I agree. In his absence I want to assist the hon member for Overvaal. Unknowingly he said the same thing, although he floundered a little. He said that in theory he would live next to someone, but that this was only a theoretical question. What the hon member actually wanted to say was that he did not object to this in principle, but that it depended upon the objectives that were to be achieved. The hon member went on to say they wanted to preserve the Western way of life in South Africa. The hon member said, and I quote:

There is a joke in right-wing ranks which asks where Andries was, and where was this one and where was that one. I think we must ask where Koos is. [Interjections.] Koos is playing his own funny games in his own backyard.

I want to emphasise today that the Group Areas Act, as it stands on the Statute Book at present, is no longer adequate and comprehensive enough in the opinion of hon members on this side of the House to prevent racial friction and at the same time to guarantee the Western way of life in South Africa, for the following reason. I am not ashamed to say that times have changed to such an extent that we have people in the communities of the other groups in South Africa who have also accepted the Western way of life. There are other people who also want to live like the Whites and who can do so. We had to examine the Act because it contains an element of racial friction with regard to those people and also because they regard it as humiliating. This Government cannot tie itself to the past. Do hon members of the Official Opposition, who are so fond of quoting Dr Dönges, Dr Malan and their contemporaries, have so little confidence in their own judgement? Their point of departure today is that Dr Malan in all his wisdom—I concede that—knew better in 1948 how to solve the problems of 1988 than these hon members themselves do. Surely I am better equipped to implement my principles in this day and age than someone who lived 30, 40 or even 50 years ago.

Are you repudiating him?

Red Beard, keep quiet!

Sir, the hon member does not quite understand what it is all about. I shall also put a question to him later.

Just answer the question.

I wonder if those hon members should not refuse to give foreigners the vote, as in the days of Paul Kruger. [Interjections.] For the sake of South Africa’s future, the Government decided that, if necessary in the case of this Act, it would go ahead on its own. I want to place on record that it is tragic that the left-wing opposition, the PFP as well as certain other groups, thought fit not to follow the Parliamentary process by proposing that that specific Bill be read this day six months, but that they preferred to boycott the debate.

In order to place this on record, I want to point out that they are boycotting to the extent that they come to earn their R50 daily allowance first and only then do they leave. I think that is a disgrace.

I now want to turn to the right-wing opposition, the Official Opposition. To them the issue is not that the Group Areas Act should achieve something; it is a question of separation per se. The Official Opposition has made a principle of separation. It was very interesting to listen to a tirade at the beginning and a tirade at the end. It was very interesting, because in the joint committee it looked as though there was a competition between the hon member for Ermelo, who was so talkative here, and the hon member for Haarlem to see who could say least. We get no contributions or assistance from the Official Opposition in the formulation of legislation. Is that their contribution to democracy? When one speaks on the joint committee, however, one is working. That is when one works! In the joint committee one is not playing emotional games for the public at large.

I now want to state that typical political opportunism has raised its head concerning this matter too. The hon member threatened that the CP will fight the NP from platform to platform. I shall show, from platform to platform, that they make use of lies in conducting their politics.

I now want to broach something which the hon member for Bloemfontein North referred to. The election pamphlet for municipal elections says it is NP policy to permit mixed residential areas. It also states that township developers themselves can decide whether the new residential areas that are laid out by them should or should not be racially mixed. No one in this House, absolutely no one in this House, can claim that what is stated in this pamphlet is the truth.

I asked the hon member to be present here. He informed me that he could not. This pamphlet was written, drawn up and published by A S Beyers under the chairmanship of a committee with Mr H J Coezee, MP, as its chairman. I am sorry that the hon member for Ermelo also had to leave the Chamber now.

Never mind, then I know what the circumstances are! I shall reply to the hon member for Sundays River.

I am going to put a pertinent question now, and I think I shall address it to the hon member for Brakpan since the other hon members are not here now. I am not trying to catch him out. Everyone knows that this is a lie. Does the hon member agree that it is a lie? If the hon member answers affirmatively, he will be confirming that the CP, in its blind hatred of the NP and its distorted view of what the NP is doing, is broadcasting a lie to the public at large.

If he answers in the negative, he will be confirming a lie in this House. He will be confirming a lie in this House!

They tell many lies!

You lie just as much!

Order! Which hon member said they tell many lies?

Mr Speaker, I said it with reference to what the judge said in court about their propaganda politics.

Was the hon member referring to specific members in the House, or was he referring to the CP as a party?

Mr Speaker, I was referring to the CP as a party, because the judge said they lied, were mud-slingers and that they vilified people.

Mr Speaker, on a point of order: The hon member who is speaking referred to specific members of the CP who had done certain things. Prompted by that, the hon member said they told many lies. I suggest that now he is talking about court cases.

Order! I think that in all fairness to the House, and in the spirit of the speech the hon member is making, the hon member for Innesdal should rather withdraw that remark.

Mr Speaker, the remark has reference to the CP, but for the sake of my colleague I shall withdraw it.

Order! No, the hon member cannot withdraw it for the sake of a colleague. The Chair is appealing to the hon member to co-operate, and I should appreciate his co-operation.

Mr Speaker, the Rule of the House is that one may not cast any reflection on members. I did not do that. I was talking about the CP as a legal entity, and I maintain that they lie.

Order! In view of the discussion that took place, I ask the hon member for Innesdal to withdraw the reference “they tell many lies”. I request the hon member’s co-operation.

I withdraw it, Mr Speaker.

Thank you. The hon member for Sundays River may proceed.

Mr Speaker, there is another alternative for hon members …

Mr Speaker, on a point of order: The hon member Mr Derby-Lewis also used the word “lie”.

Did the hon member say that?

Yes, Mr Speaker.

The hon member must withdraw it.

I withdraw it, Mr Speaker.

Order! The hon member may proceed.

Mr Speaker, the hon member has another alternative in acting on behalf of his party, and that is to keep quiet and therefore to be a moral coward. I want to ask him. The hon member does not have another turn to speak, but I am not afraid of an interjection. The hon member can say yes or no, or he can keep quiet, and I shall go from platform to platform to tell people about his reaction in order to illustrate the calibre of people who are sitting in this House as representatives of the CP. [Interjections.]

The hon member for Losberg can also reply. He is a lawyer. He asked a moment ago whether hon members on this side had read the Bill. I now ask him to prove across the floor of the House that he has read the Bill by answering the question I put. No, he will not answer. I place on record that there is no answer, yes or no, from that side of the House.

The Official Opposition and hon members on that side are thriving on unrest. They are inciting it. They are thriving on a distortion of the truth. They thrive on the thought that there will not be peace and prosperity in South Africa.

I also want to place on record, as a reply to the hon member in the back benches who referred to the NP’s obsession with peace, that we are seeking peace. We are certainly seeking peace in this country. If that can be called an obsession, so be it, but for the sake of the future of this country we shall continue to seek peace. This course, which the Government has to take alone at the moment for the sake of stability in South Africa, for the sake of giving everyone in the country the opportunity to live where they feel at home … [Time expired.]

Mr Speaker, it is a privilege to speak after the hon member for Sundays River, who made a formidable contribution. I do not want to set his questions to the Official Opposition aside, however. I want to address myself specifically to the hon members for Ermelo and Randfontein, two hon members who served on the joint committee. They had the Bill that is before the House in front of them and I therefore assume that they are familiar with what it contains. I now want to ask the two hon members frankly whether what is said in their election pamphlet is true. If we get no reply, I shall also go from platform to platform and say that the hon member for Randfontein—who has a certain image in the CP as the blue-eyed boy of that party—was a member of the joint committee, that he had the Free Settlement Areas Bill in front of him, but that he was not prepared to say in this House of Assembly that the hon member for Middelburg was not telling the truth in the pamphlet published by a committee under his chairmanship, in his name, about what this Bill contained.

The hon member is going to have an opportunity to reply to that, but rest assured that I shall continue to say these things I have warned him about. [Interjections.]

He is a blue-eyed coward!

Order! The hon member for Vryheid will withdraw that remark.

I withdraw it, Mr Speaker.

This legislation before us represents a positive contribution in an attempt to effect a good spirit and mutual understanding in South Africa. It would not have been possible to strengthen and ensure an own community life in South Africa without this legislation. It looks as though the hon members of the Official Opposition simply do not understand this point. This Bill contains the inherent power to eliminate the pressure that is being exerted on community life at present. In future it will play an important part in bringing about a new spirit which is so necessary in order to build a better South Africa for all of us.

As a young Nationalist I am not ashamed of this legislation. If we escape for a moment from the trilogy which this legislation is caught up in, this Bill must be good news for South Africa. One must consider Dr Anton Rupert’s philosophy. He says that when one has bad news, one must give it in one large dose, but when one has good news, one must give it in small doses, but often. I believe this Bill is good news. It is the first small dose, and when the legislation begins to function, the good news for South Africa will come in smaller doses.

The reaction to this Bill, in which the principle of free settlement is being considered, is incredible. There are three standpoints. There are those who like it, those to the left who are opposed to it, and those to the right who are opposed to it. To present this Bill as being a setback for reform is simply not to tell the truth. No government can throw open all residential areas in South Africa without the risk of large-scale racial conflict. The separation of residential areas is no invention of this Government—it was caused by social pressure—but social and economic circumstances also change. The preservation of an own community life requires precisely that one must adapt oneself.

The hon member for Brakpan said this legislation was not emotional. I want to ask him, however, why his Press presents it in such an emotional way. He must tell us why the Patriot reported as follows:

Are those not emotionally charged words? I want to say this. The Afrikaner who feels threatened as a result of this legislation is not worthy of living or surviving in South Africa. [Interjections.]

On the other hand there was very favourable reaction in the joint committee about the principle contained in this Bill. This legislation is worthy of support. It is good legislation. It is tackling a very important problem in South Africa, and I am proud of having been part of the joint committee which prepared this legislation.

In my opinion, however, there are two requirements that we as a Government shall have to consider to ensure that this legislation succeeds. In this regard I want to refer particularly to totally new areas in South Africa which can become free settlement areas. I am not talking about existing areas, but about totally new areas. I should like to suggest that we ensure that it be made possible for the procedure for declaring a new area to a free settlement area to be dealt with as soon as possible and for it to be facilitated to a considerable extent. I think it would be a good thing if the department or the ministry could consider convening a conference with the private sector involved in the development of urban areas in South Africa. We must invite them to participate and to make their input to ensure that the declaration of free settlement areas takes place as smoothly as possible.

This piece of legislation has the power to make the negative symbolism of the Group Areas Act disappear. This Bill gives us an opportunity to establish a new symbol of reconciliation and flexibility. Let these be our objectives. Let us use every opportunity to make South Africa a better place. I believe that this Bill gives us such an opportunity and I should like to support it.

Mr Speaker, I immediately want to link up with what the hon member for Swellendam said by stating that I not only share the sentiment that we should expedite procedures for the declaration of certain areas, but also that we should give positive attention to that aspect. The fact remains—I should like to acknowledge that—that investigations into specific areas, since the start, have had a significant effect on land prices within those areas. For this reason alone it is therefore vital that what the hon member is advocating should happen. I take it that the hon the Minister of Local Government and Housing will take note of the relevant ideas expressed by the hon member.

I wonder whether hon members in the House realise to what extent their actions, emphasis, statements and sentiments influence the reaction of communities throughout the country outside this House.

They went home.

Many hon members of the CP also went home.

I listened to the debate and also took note of the fact that the PFP did not participate. By their non-participation they also participated. I should like to tell hon members that we now have an example of how certain hon members in this House, who have committed themselves to the concept of democracy and the exercising of democracy, have made a contribution, in various ways, to undermining the constitutional dispensation of this country.

In this specific context I want to come to the hon members for Ermelo and Randfontein. My information is that on the joint committees dealing with this matter the hon member for Ermelo does not debate legislation. The hon member for Ermelo will concede that in regard to legislation involving the Constitution he and his fellow party members merely state their opposition and leave the matter at that.

It is frustrating you people!

No, it is not frustrating me. What is, in fact, frustrating me is that I have to listen to that here, in public. That does, in fact, frustrate me.

With malicious pleasure the hon member for Ermelo has taken note, as he defines it, of the consensus politics which has come to an end with the handling of this piece of legislation. I want to ask the hon member directly whether all parties, whatever their proclaimed political philosophy may be, are not bent on obtaining the widest possible acceptance for their policy too.

You have asked that many times.

No, answer the question.

You have asked that many times.

Of course, but the hon member has not yet given me an answer. [Interjections.] I am simply trying to get an answer from him.

The policy of that hon member’s party is not only relevant to his supporters, but must also make provision for the other South Africans living here. That is why, given the stability which that must bring about, his party or other parties—as in our case—are dependent, for a successful policy, on acceptance by other communities in the country.

Chris, the Press hears what you are saying!

I do not want to express an opinion about the Press. I immediately want to tell the hon member for Carletonville that an hon member made a remark about him. He said that the hon member should learn that one’s ability to think is determined by the grey matter in one’s skull, and the hon member wants nothing to do with grey matter. [Interjections.]

In other words, all of us in the House are confronted with the same South Africa.

We view it differently.

Quite correct; we view it differently. Whatever way we view it, the facts relating to South Africa remain the same. It does not matter how we view the situation. Having examined all the facts, we must come forward with proposals about how to deal with the situation. As a reasonable person, the hon member must concede that for the stability which adaptation must bring, we are dependent upon the acceptance of our proposals by the maximum number of people. That being so, I cannot understand why the hon member firstly does not want to participate in the processes and, secondly, derives malicious pleasure from what they say is a constitutional crisis in this country.

Are numbers a factor?

Of course they are!

Thank you very much.

Let me reply to that, because it is not as simple a matter as the hon member professes. It is therefore our view that one cannot build up a political dispensation in South Africa solely on a numerical basis. In this regard I disagree fundamentally with the hon member for Delmas. His party cannot divorce itself from the numerical factor as the dominant factor in regard to political solutions for our country. [Interjections.] I also disagree with the hon member about how this should be dealt with. His philosophy involves majority rule. Because he does not like the majority of South Africans, they must be removed from the political system.

Who is saying that?

Heavens above, the hon member has just asked me who is saying that. Surely he does not want majority rule in this country.

Surely that does not mean that we do not like people! [Interjections.]

That means that the hon member is telling me that he likes the people, but that they should not govern. [Interjections.]

I want to take that further, because I am serious about this. If we do not act responsibly in this House, the option for the country is no longer that of democracy.

Is it democracy at the moment?

No, not in the full sense of the word. The hon member knows that, does he not.

What happened this week?

Yes, that is an interesting question. Let us discuss it. By asking me whether this is democracy, the hon member is implying that it is not. Let me ask, however, whether what happened here did not happen in constitutional terms.

[Inaudible.]

I am asking the hon member whether it happened in constitutional terms.

What happened yesterday?

No. [Interjections.]

The hon member says no. Then surely he has a remedy.

What is a remedy?

For the information of the hon member who ought to know what it means, a remedy is a means of restoring one’s rights. [Interjections.] The hon member has adopted a standpoint on behalf of his party, and that places an onus on him. An onus means a responsibility. [Interjections.] I want to take the matter further, because I have an idea—it is a conjectural perception—that we do not really understand the consequences of the insensitivity reflected in the views we formulate here.

Yesterday you people were very sensitive.

The hon member for Brakpan must forgive me. No one can offset or satisfy his bitterness. No one can match his hatred.

You know why.

Let us speak about the hon member for Ermelo. He says that in an election a government concludes a contract with its voters. [Interjections.] I want to take the matter further, however. The hon member is correct. That also applies to his party, and I now want to discuss with the hon member the social contract that parties negotiate with voters.

He would not understand that.

Oh, come now, at every election, when the hon member was still a Nationalist, if he ever was one, did we not enter into an open social contract with the voters? I now want to ask the hon member whether a part of that social contract, which the hon member was party to, did not also include the fact that this country, as our fatherland, would be shared amongst White people, Coloured people and Asians? And did a part of that social contract not embody the fact that as far as the executive authority was concerned, the country would be governed by Cabinets and a Cabinet Council?

That is an old story.

You see, Sir? As if social reality can grow old! [Interjections.] I want to ask the hon member—it is a pleasure for me to debate matters with him—whether that was the case. I also want to ask the hon member whether he did not initially come to Parliament under the auspices of the 1981 NP manifesto. [Interjections.]

Could I please help the hon the Minister, Sir? I did not come to Parliament then.

No, wait a moment, that is not what I am trying to say. Sir, he says that he was not yet in Parliament then. Surely that is not what I am debating with him. [Interjections.] Was he not a Nationalist in 1981?

Never! [Interjections.]

Oh, then let me apologise.

No, he says that it did not apply to him in 1981. It only applied to his leader in 1981. [Interjections.] I am grateful to the hon member for clarifying matters for me. [Interjections.] No, wait a moment.

Let me then confine my attention to the leading lights rather than the lesser ones. Let me now ask that hon member whether the scope of his leader’s 1981 social contract was extended when he left in 1982.

With regard to free settlement?

No, Sir, we are now discussing the principle which the hon member addressed.

When you accepted power-sharing, you broke the contract that existed at that time. [Interjections.]

No, Sir, I did not break the contract. We can debate that aspect in a moment. In other words, now, after two years, one can simply break one’s contract.

He definitely did not break the contract.

There is something we must guard against—this warning also applies to me— and that is thinking that we can only express ourselves politically in this country by reminding one another of statements which were valid yesterday, but which are no longer valid today.

Tell that to the voters.

Of course I tell that to the voters!

A debate is being conducted here today on what Dr Dönges said, and let me immediately add that Dr Dönges was my leader in the Cape, and secondly let me say that he made a major contribution to my own political development and thinking.

So, you went to the dogs in your adult years.

No, the hon member went to the dogs while he was growing up.

You grew up well enough, but you went to the dogs in your adult years.

Yes, but the hon member went to the dogs from the very beginning. [Interjections.] The fact of the matter is that Dr Dönges and the leaders of his time were not asked to interpret the conditions prevailing now. The utmost respect I have for them lies in the fact that in their time they had the ability to assess the conditions prevailing at that time and to judge accordingly. [Interjections.] That does not, however, make all the decisions they took then relevant to the decisions we have to take today. [Interjections.]

Let us examine the hon member’s argument when he quotes what Dr Dönges said, and he was speaking of standpoints prior to Union. The question that arises is whether we should see the establishment of the Union as the final constitutional answer, because if we were to adopt that argument, then Union was the end of this country’s constitutional development. [Interjections.]

That is so.

Those are the consequences of the hon member’s argument … [Interjections] … because you see, Sir, that was the thinking of those erstwhile leaders …[Interjections] … because surely a generation thinks only within the context of its own times and the future. [Interjections.] I want to ask the hon member, however, whether there is no development in the way people think. [Interjections.] Is there no development discernible, even in regard to one’s concepts of morality? [Interjections.]

Not into the abyss.

Wait a moment, I did not interrupt the hon member, because he did not speak. [Interjections.] Well, at least that is a friendly remark. [Interjections.]

Order! I am sorry to interrupt the hon the Minister, but that is one of the best comments I have heard yet! [Interjections.]

Mr Speaker, if you will permit me to add something to that, let me say that at times I also have my moments. [Interjections.] The hon member, however, makes so many speeches without being given the floor that one could even interrupt him on that basis.

I want to ask, however—this is, after all, what the Bill is all about—and I am not doing so because I want to score a point off anyone: Are we not all, here and as members of the public, seeking each and every day to be give new substance to morality, justice and Christianity? And we are not alone in that. Even those who interpret the Bible, disagree in their interpretations.

This Bill before us is part of a process of extending boundaries, and not only the boundaries of various areas, but also the boundaries encompassing our view of a country. It is part of a process for extending the boundaries of the possibilities for co-operation for a country and the choices open to various communities.

Have we not yet learnt how the development of societies, systems and policies can be limited by those who think that one’s thinking can be curtailed by legislation? If we have not yet learnt that, when are we going to learn it?

I want to remind the hon member for Sundays River of the idea put forward by Mr Justice Rumpf—I hope I am quoting him correctly—who said that he would rather work his fingers to the bone for an honourable peace than to die dishonourably. The hon member, who is a young member in this House, does not need to worry about the pursuit of peace becoming an obsession. I wish everyone would do likewise, but then it should not be a peace devoid of perception. If we are unable to achieve that, it will not be our fault—it would have been our destiny. I should like to share that sentiment with those hon members who support the legislation.

The hon member for Sea Point is not here, but even his silence was a contribution to the debate, because there are two reasons why the hon member could not afford to participate in the debate. Firstly he would not have been able to make a choice about the legislation. For years now there has been a certain element in their philosophy, ie the concept of free association, and the legislation before us addresses that concept.

It does not present a solution!

Of course it does not present a solution. There is no single solution to all the problems. [Interjections.] Do hon members know, however, what does not solve the problems either? It does not help if one runs away from one’s country out of fear of having to do military service for the country. [Interjections.]

The legislation addresses the needs of a community. In my introduction I said that if legislation completely blocked the expression of the needs of certain communities, there was no way in which that legislation could be maintained.

I see a second reason why the hon member for Sea Point’s party cannot participate in voting for this, and that is because it would be breaking an agreement with those who said they should walk out, with those who said they should resort to confrontation. They would be breaking an agreement with those who said: Let us smash the system.

Is that what the telephone tapping indicates?

Sir, that is an intelligent deduction, but for the hon member that must be an effort. [Interjections.] That is why the hon member cannot place himself in the position of participating in a debate and formulating a standpoint when a vote is called. Then I come to the hon member for Claremont.

[Inaudible.]

I assumed that the hon member’s standpoint was a personal one. If he does not want me to reply to him, I shall leave the matter at that. [Interjections.]

I am just a little concerned. In fact, I am terribly concerned.

But why is the hon member so concerned? [Interjections.] There is something I should like to tell that hon member. He said that recently he made a serious effort to examine the position of people living under difficult circumstances. Let me start off by saying that examining the position of people who are living under difficult circumstances is a praiseworthy endeavour. I think we should all do that. In fact, I think we all do. But then our motives must be based on welfare considerations. From the results of that hon member’s endeavours to examine the circumstances of the Black community, I did not get the impression that welfare considerations were the chief motivation. Wherever he happened to be, unrest followed in his footsteps. I am not under the impression that creating unrest is an act based on welfare considerations.

Your legislation creates unrest.

There is a second point I want to put to the hon member. The hon member says that the NP creates an image of Black people not being able to govern democratically. The hon member says that we create such an image. Let us examine the NP’s image. In the history of this country, what party has created democratic institutions for Black communities to participate in?

You took the vote away from the Black people.

Would the hon member please give me a chance to reply to him? I should like to ask the hon member whether, in terms of the 1910 Constitution, Black people had the right to come to Parliament?

[Inaudible.]

I am asking the hon member a question. He must not say “but”.

I shall answer in my way.

Then at least the hon member must maintain some semblance of intelligence. As far as I know there are today, in accordance with choices made by Black people, parliaments and cabinets in which they serve, and in accordance with the choices made by Black people there are self-governing areas in which they govern.

But who is the boss?

As far as I know there are Black local authorities which Black people elect democratically, and there are regional services councils in which White, Coloured, Asian and Black communities serve on the same basis.

You people are still the boss.

What alternative does he suggest?

The hon member says that we remain the boss. Where do we remain the boss in the case of an RSC?

You people remain the boss at all levels!

I am asking the hon member who is the boss of an RSC.

The Minister. [Interjections.]

Well, let me ask the hon member another question. I have no say over an RSC.

Go and read the Constitution! You created them! [Interjections.]

The hon member must really not make such a public spectacle of his ignorance. Surely the House must also establish the new Constitution which is in the offing? Surely that does not mean that it remains the boss as far as that is concerned. Surely it creates other bosses in terms of the Constitution, or am I wrong?

That specific council …

Order! No, such a dialogue cannot be permitted. The hon the Minister may proceed with his speech.

I do want to say, however, that I now understand why the hon member is where he is. I understand even more. I also know why, after the next election, he is going to be where he is going to be, because if that is the way in which he manifests his knowledge to the voters, any electorate which returned him to Parliament would have to be an unintelligent electorate. [Interjections.] Let me tell the hon member that he may disagree with me about the method we want to adopt for participation by Black communities, but he is not entitled to imply what amounts to a lie, ie that the NP creates the image that Black should not or cannot govern.

I want to refer to the fact that the hon member says that this legislation of ours is only relevant to a few areas. What is the basis for his statement? If that were true, surely it would not have been necessary to draw a distinction between the procedure that must be adopted for new areas and that which must be adopted for existing group areas. Surely it would not have been necessary to make statutory provision for that. We could simply have sat down and amended the Group Areas Act.

Let me tell the hon member that apart from dealing with specific designated areas, an option or choice based on association would probably be much easier to make in the case of new areas, because then people would be settling on land which had never been settled before. There they would be in a much better position to make their own choice than in any other area. On what judicial or factual grounds does the hon member base the argument he is using?

I now just want to finish dealing with those hon members’ speeches. The hon member for Randburg is an apostle of process politics. The new process he has chosen is that of boycotting a debate just after he has finished speaking. This hon member is the only hon member who understands the concept of negotiation. He is the only one who knows the definition of consensus. He is the only one who knows the rules of democracy— according to his definition. Listen to what he says. He says:

One of the most important unwritten rules of this Parliament is that one does not, without tendering an apology, leave before someone has reacted to one’s speech.

The same applies to the hon the Leader of the House!

He tendered an apology because he had certain commitments.

Not to us!

I therefore want to say that when we make a sanctimonious fuss about rules, written and unwritten, actions speak louder than words. That applies to all of us. If we have erred, let us undertake not to do that again.

That hon member says this is reactive legislation instead of pro-active action. What is the basis for the hon member’s argument?

Mr Chairman, the second point of the Independent Movement which I want to discuss is the statement that the legislation is reactive legislation and not pro-active legislation.

Apparently we can attach different meanings to words, but let us look at the situation in practice. Is it not a fact that the Government also referred this specific facet of society for consideration to the Theron Commission? The hon member for Brakpan, in fact, quoted approvingly from that source. In other words, the Government took the initiative in having the specific living conditions investigated. Surely the hon member was still a member of the NP …

Surely you are not talking about me!

No, I am simply addressing you so that you can convey the information. [Interjections.] And he was also a member of the NP when, as an NP initiative, as pro-active action, we referred that Act and related Acts to the Strydom Committee. Sir, you are equally aware of the fact that the NP took the initiative and referred this to the President’s Council.

On what scientific basis—this is is now the new term, is it not—the hon member is therefore arguing that we did that, he alone will know. Since we have now come to the question of the scientific basis, I want to come back to the hon member for Ermelo, because he pointed out that the President’s Council had obtained legal opinion about the underlying principle of the Group Areas Act. He says that the legal principle of the Group Areas Act is separation or own residential areas. I do not care where he read that; that is his argument. As far as I can remember, however, since it was first piloted through Parliament, apart from the principle of own residential areas for various communities, the Group Areas Act also made provision for the issuing of permits. None of those hon members now sitting here has ever attacked the permit principle in the Group Areas Act or asked that it be removed.

The administrator …

No, wait a moment! That hon member must not participate in a scientific discussion now; he is already unscientific enough as it is. Let us examine this, Sir.

The fact remains that the Group Areas Act itself, in its original form, and in line with the idea of the hon member Dr Geldenhuys, makes provision for a rule and for an exception. That is why it is wrong to argue, on a scientific basis, that the Act only makes provision for the general and not for the others too.

As a result of the investigation conducted by the President’s Council, and the legal advice it obtained, in its majority report the President’s Council did, in fact, very clearly state that a general settlement pattern of communities wantin g to live within their own community context had developed in South Africa.

We have said, however, just that as there is the other element of the Group Areas Act there are also communities in South Africa which make another choice, and that provision must be made for their choice or option in the legislation, fundamentally on a more extensive basis than that of the permit system, but on the basis of a declared free settlement area.

I therefore ask the following: When we quote an authority, let us be prepared to take this to its logical consequences and bring to bear all the consequences of the authority we are quoting.

Yes, correct.

The hon member says “yes”. Perhaps he would do this for once.

I shall.

The hon member says he would do it for us again. [Interjections ] Hon members must look at what the hon member does. He quotes a letter from a lady in Natal.

He does not have her name.

I want to make another point, if I may. The hon member quoted a letter from a lady in Natal, and what does that letter state? That letter expresses that lady’s attachment to a property which she and her husband saved up to purchase and where they lived together. I have the utmost sympathy for such a person, but the people who, in terms of this country’s legislation, have had to evacuate the property they saved to purchase, have not all been Whites. According to that hon member’s definition, what about the feelings of other people for what they have acquired, or do only a specific group of people have feelings of attachment to their place of birth and to where they live?

As far as the CP is concerned, yes!

We can use that argument, but then we are moving the boundaries of solutions even further away from us. I want to pose a further question, however, because the hon member for Brakpan also came to light with his scientific argument. Hon members must have a look at that, but surely the Theron Commission, in its support, also did precisely what the President’s Council did, and that was to identify an overall pattern. They never said it was not permissible to amend the legislation. Why are we prepared, in this House, to debate something which is actually untrue owing to an omission? Hon members must examine the hon member for Brakpan’s request. He asked whose land would be involved in the establishment of free settlement areas. White land! Whose land must he obtain for his homeland?

Probably Black and Coloured land.

Whose land must he obtain for his homeland? White land?

Whose homeland?

White land!

But, Sir, now it is wrong, in principle, to take White land for a free settlement area, but it is not wrong to take it for the establishment of states. [Interjections.] What is scientific about that?

There is another question I want to put to the hon member, because the argument he puts forward here and wants to employ in public is that the Nationalists want to use White land for free settlement areas. [Interjections.] Here it is a question of the White land one is going to make use of.

I should like to put another question to him, however. The hon member advocates the preservation of the Group Areas Act in absolute terms. Let us accept this argument as being correct. Let us also accept his further argument that the land chiefly belongs to the Whites. The further allocation of group areas to Coloureds, Asians and Black people must then take place on White land. Then what happens to his …

He will not be telling his voters that!

Of course not. Some people find it difficult to associate with the truth. [Interjections.] With all due respect, Sir, that is a specious argument. I do not actually want to reply to the hon member for Pietersburg. I have answered so many of his questions, but he does not understand. I want to ask the hon member …

We are just stupid! [Interjections.]

Your first honest admission! [Interjections]

Many a true word is spoken in jest. More true words are spoken with sincerity. I compliment the hon member on his sincerity. [Interjections.]

*I do not want to quarrel with the hon member, because we are good opponents when it comes to arguing. In Pietersburg itself, in free trading areas … [Interjections.] Please give me a chance! At the moment, who is doing well in a free trading area if not a supporter of the CP?

They were forced in there.

He was not forced in there. Over a long period the hon member conducted a protracted debate with me on local government. That is a fact! The hon member will concede that we have not yet seen the report on local government. What I do know is that organised local government and the United Municipal Executive support the principle of free settlement areas.

Who is in the majority in the UME at the moment?

In other words—and I understand what the hon member is saying—in this country we must adopt a policy in terms of which we support the view of the minority and not that of the majority. That is, in fact, what that hon member is saying.

I want to make a remark which I want the hon member to remember. Just as the hon member is participating, in this House, in a system with which he does not agree, there are other members of his party who also participate in systems with which they do not agree. Today I should like to record my appreciation to those members of a party who, notwithstanding their political differences, are prepared, for the sake of their communities, to participate in systems with which they are not in agreement.

Surely that applies to us too!

Of course! I am glad you are here! You know that is true! There must just not be too many of you! [Interjections.] Their representation here—those hon members will understand the spirit in which I am saying this—must remain the same as that in the UME. Then we can govern the country and they can talk about it. [Interjections.]

The hon member for Ventersdorp says this is a tragic day. He says it is a tragic day because, inter alia the hon member Dr Geldenhuys’ presence here is an example of the Government’s undemocratic action. I want to put a question to the hon member. If that is undemocratic, and he is an advocate of democracy, what is the hon member Comdt Derby-Lewis doing here?

Mr Speaker, thank you very much for the opportunity you have given me … [Interjections.]

Order! The hon member has not been given an opportunity to do anything. He must resume his seat. [Interjections.]

Mr Speaker, the hon member for Ventersdorp displays his ignorance, not only about democracy, but also about the rules of this House. He asks what the hon the State President said on specific occasions. If, in his search for solutions, the hon the State President displayed static thought processes, he would not have been the State President of the country, because his greatest single testimonial is that in spite of it all he has been able to put South Africa’s interests first, thus allowing him to do things which even harmed his own party.

That was in the good old days!

Let me tell the hon member that those rigid thought processes and that transparent political game of quoting people’s statements within the context of a different set of circumstances to the ones applying today may be interesting …

A year ago …

… but that does not make any contribution to achieving a solution. No, wait a moment.

In Ermelo a year ago!

When the hon the State President was responsible for the Group Areas Act, he himself introduced amendments …

[Inaudible.]

… so that in its implementation people could not simply be evicted. I myself gladly participate in such an exercise, but what is involved here today is much more than just scoring political points against one another. Surely the hon member for Carletonville was not, in point of fact, telling the truth today. The hon member said that I did not want to come to his area.

I am saying that you take devious routes, and that is on record!

Yes, to avoid them … Sir, a moment ago I told the hon member that he had no liking for grey matter. The fact is that the hon member wanted me to address a mass meeting in his constituency, and I told him I would accompany him on a tour through his constituency, but I cannot explain every Government decision—I am now telling him this here—at a public meetin g, because I would never be in my office to make the decisions if I had to go and explain them! [Interjections.]

We would have arranged police protection for you! [Interjections.]

That is the only way they can still function—with police protection!

That is really a tremendous indictment of his party; does the hon member know that? What the hon member for Losberg has just said is very interesting. He says that the only way we can still appear in public is under police protection.

Why?

He must ask the hon member for Ventersdorp why.

The only time you people appear in public is when you have police protection!

He must ask the hon member for Ventersdorp why, because that is part of the CP-AWB pact, and then they speak of democracy!

Speak to the State President about that!

No, the State President has no authority when it comes to membership of the AWB. [Interjections.]

The hon member for Carletonville—hon members must now listen carefully—says that the White taxpayers will have to pay for the free settlement areas. He says it is confirmed here. But who else should pay for those areas? Sir, who is going to pay for the land for the homelands, and who is going to pay for the land for group areas?

We now have White land and White money, and when we accuse those hon members of racism, they say that that is a fabrication and that we are being unreasonable, but what has been the consistent refrain in this debate?

I express my sincere thanks to the hon members for Port Elizabeth North, Sundays River, Swellendam, North Rand and Springs, who tendered an apology for being absent, and the hon member Dr Geldenhuys, for their support for the legislation, but I also thank them for much more than that. I want to thank hon members for the spirit in which they debated the legislation. In the circumstances in which we are gathered here, and in the light of the fact that this specific piece of legislation is being boycotted by liberal members of this House and by hon members of the other two Houses, hon members must certainly have been tempted to conduct this debate in a different spirit. I want to thank hon members of my party for the fact that notwithstanding that conduct, they have been able to argue on the basis of the principles and the philosophy involved. That definitely redounds to their credit.

I want to conclude with the thought that in spite of everything that has happened, the spirit in which the NP conducts itself should consistently be one of co-operation with those who want to co-operate, and also one of seeking consensus with those who want to broaden the consensus mechanisms. We must do so in such a way that if we do not get consensus, it is not of our choosing. Let us try.

Debate concluded.

Mr Speaker, this Bill is one of three dealing with the Government’s approach to living patterns. In a society as diverse as ours, there are those who wish to live among their own people and have their own community life. The Group Areas Act is still there to enable them to achieve their wishes and ideals.

However, there are also those who do not attach so much importance to an own community life. That is why we have proposed the Free Settlement Areas Act. In this way we have made a freedom of choice between these two divergent alternatives possible. Yet all of us want to live in orderly communities and want to have certainty about their position. That is why it was necessary to create a legal order of free settlement areas, but it is equally important to maintain a legal order of group areas.

We must enable each group to strive for their own values and ideals without infringing upon those of other groups. The Government’s fundamental standpoint of granting each individual what he is entitled to is reflected in its policy of according each group the greatest possible degree of selfdetermination. This goes hand in hand with the necessity of protecting minority rights.

The Group Areas Act must be seen against this background. It has protected the identity of groups, and under the protection of this Act, such groups as well as individuals have acquired rights and developed communities which cannot be thrown overboard. This is the point of departure: The lifestyle of groups, vested rights and existing communities should as far as possible be preserved. This point of view entails inter alia the maintenance of own schools and residential areas.

In a modern state a government cannot adopt a laissez faire attitude about such important matters. They must be regulated, as has to be done in regard to many other political, economic and social affairs. If this is not done, it can give rise to legal uncertainty. In fact it may even culminate in social unrest, as has occurred in some major cities overseas. That is why the principles underlying the Group Areas Act are being retained. We have abundant evidence to show that the various population groups in this country prefer a system of differentiation. The only problem is how to accomplish this in the fairest way.

†Group areas legislation has had a long and chequered history. The first comprehensive Act by this name, the Group Areas Act of 1950, was preceded by a plethora of laws and regulations— some enacted in the previous century. The Act was supplemented, extended and consolidated by several amendments over the years. It deals, of course, with dynamic issues and no one can see it as being immutable.

It has been amended inter alia to facilitate participation in sports meetings and to establish free trading areas.

Naturally, in the meantime, changes have occurred in this country. We have created a new political system. Patterns of urbanisation have in some instances changed rapidly. Housing shortages in some sectors have become more acute. In the process the Act was kept under close scrutiny. It was referred to a technical committee of enquiry under the chairmanship of Mr Justice Strydom. That committee’s report was in turn referred to the President’s Council.

With both reports at hand, it was possible for the Government to frame guidelines about the future of the Act. The State President enunciated those guidelines in a speech in the House of Assembly on 5 October 1987. The guidelines entailed, inter alia, the creation of free settlement areas. As a result the Group Areas Act has to be amended to accommodate the new concept of free settlement areas.

This matter has two sides. On the one hand there will be free settlement areas where the limitations of the Group Areas Act do not apply. The abolition of the limitations is without any conditions. On the other hand there are group areas and the possibility of creating new ones. In them the established pattern is fully maintained. It is so to speak a balancing of interests; free settlement areas on the one hand and group areas on the other. The Government regards that as a fair dispensation.

It also became quite clear, and it is no use mincing words about it, that the whole idea of group areas must be contained in a legal framework, and laws entail sanctions. Therefore the Act also had to be adapted to make the sanctions more effective. Sanctions are, of course, an ultimate measure. I prefer to see the Group Areas Act as an expression of intent to maintain a certain lifestyle. It is indicative of a way of life, rather than a measure to combat a social ill. As a declaration of intent it might remain on the Statute Book as an instrument of social and physical planning. It should serve as a guideline for administrators and planners, rather than for policemen.

In the final analysis, however, I am afraid the goddess of justice also wields a sword. One cannot ultimately really govern effectively—not even in the field of planning and of social relationships—without an enforceable legal basis. Hence it has been seen fit to provide for alternative and improved coercive measures.

Hon members are well aware that the proclamation of group areas in some instances precedes township developments and housing schemes. Unfortunately unscrupulous fortune-seekers are exploiting the situation by buying land or taking options to buy land in the expectation of making huge profits. As a result the State must sometimes buy land for housing projects at exorbitant prices. The Government has therefore decided to introduce measures to stabilise the prices of affected land insofar as it is possible.

*I shall now deal with some of the more important provisions of the Bill. There are quite a number of incidental or consequential amendments which I shall, for the sake of brevity, not take into account.

Clause 1 amends some definitions and introduces new ones. They lay the foundations for inter alia simplifying the proclamation of group areas, instead of designating development areas, for the Black communities; for the identification of properties affected by the provisions of the Act; and for the implementation of the Act by the own affairs Ministers concerned.

In terms of clause 2 the composition of the Group Areas Board is being changed to provide that it shall consist of as many members as the Minister in his discretion appoint.

Clause 4 seeks to expedite some of the proceedings of the Group Areas Board by providing that committees appointed by the Minister must report directly to him.

Clauses 3, 5 and 6 contains a variety of consequential amendments and amendments to replace outdated designations. Clause 7 substitutes section 41(1) of the principal Act, which deals with the disposal of immovable property which is illegally possessed. In addition, unlawful occupation is now being brought within the ambit of this section and provision is also being made for the ejectment of persons in unlawful occupation.

The process of sale and ejectment is being regulated in such a way as to create more legal certainty. A magistrate will conduct an enquiry into alleged unlawful possession or occupation. He will refer his findings to the Minister concerned for further action.

In terms of the existing section 46 the courts could order the ejectment of persons who had been convicted of contravening a provision of the Act. This task will no longer rest with the courts, but with the Minister concerned. The court record will be referred to the Minister who will decide about the ejection or otherwise of the offender.

Clause 8 prohibits inspectors that are to be appointed in terms of section 49J from disclosing information acquired in the exercise of their duties.

In terms of clause 10 the penalties which may be imposed for a contravention of the Act are being increased. It also provides that an order, instruction or authority by the Minister shall remain in force notwithstanding the lodging of an appeal against or review proceedings regarding any conviction, sentence or order.

Clause 11 extends the powers of the Minister to make regulations on two new subjects, namely the compilation of lists of affected properties and the powers and duties of the inspectors that are to be appointed in terms of section 49J.

Clause 12 amends section 49A to make it clear that premises zoned for industrial purposes and not exclusively or partially used for residential purposes are under section 49A exempt from the restrictive provisions of the Act.

Clause 13 repeals a redundant provision of the Act.

Sections 49E to 49J which are being inserted by clause 14 have a three-fold objective. Firstly they are meant to stabilise the prices of land required for housing purposes.

Secondly, they will enable the Government to pay a depreciation contribution to persons whose property depreciates in value as a result of the declaration of free settlement areas. If property in a given group area is envisaged for township development the State may purchase the property at a determined amount of compensation. If an owner of property in a free settlement has to dispose of property for less than a determined compensation, he may be paid a depreciation contribution consisting of the difference between the compensation and the selling price.

Thirdly, in terms of clause 49J the own affairs administrations may appoint inspectors to enforce the provisions of the Act.

Development areas for occupation by Black persons have in the past been set aside within certain group areas without the areas concerned having first been deproclaimed as group areas. This is now being rectified by clause 15.

Mr Speaker, may I repeat that there are a number of incidental and consequential provisions which do not warrant an explanation. The clauses which I have mentioned contain the essence of the Bill.

The object of this Bill is to rationalise the whole matter of group areas under the present circumstances. It is trusted that once the dust has settled, it will be possible to apply it in a rational manner and to the satisfaction of all the communities concerned.

Mr Speaker, I am sure hon members will permit me to react briefly to certain questions put here to the CP, in particular those relating to free settlement and the interaction between free settlement and group areas. I want to refer, in particular, to the questions posed by the hon members for Sundays River and Swellendam. The questions deserve to be answered, and it is only fair that these questions be put.

Order! I merely want to point out to the hon member that I am not going to permit a repetition of the discussion of the previous Bill, since the Bill now before the House must be discussed. Do we understand each other?

We understand each other, Mr Speaker. What is involved here is simply the contention that in the face of the establishment of mixed areas, the CP made certain allegations in a document which were supposedly untrue. I am referring, in particular, to the allegation that the CP said that township developers could decide for themselves whether the new residential areas they were planning should be racially mixed or not. We say that that contention is correct. We say that, because this document was drawn up on the basis of the advice given by the President’s Council, the specific words having been quoted.

And that is the NP!

And that is the NP! I quote from page 160 of the report:

[Interjections.] When this document was drawn up, the present legislation did not yet exist. It only came into existence last week. [Interjections.] This is consequently an exact, correct and true reflection of the situation that existed on that specific day. [Interjections.]

Since we are asking one another questions, there is also a question I want to put. The hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning asked questions here relating to an allegation by me that the Government did not have a mandate for the establishment of free settlement areas, as contained in this legislation. I want to ask a similar question. I want to ask the hon the Deputy Minister, who is going to reply to the debate, to tell us whether this statement is true or not. If he does not reply to that question, we shall go from one platform to the next saying that it is untrue, that it is a lie. I am referring, in particular, to what happened prior to the election on 6 May 1987, and that relates to whether the Government had a mandate. Let me reply to the hon the Minister by telling him that I made a specific allegation that with regard to this legislation before this House today no mandate had been obtained from the electorate. I was not speaking about a general mandate. We were specifically speaking about the legislation on free settlement.

Listen now to what was said by the hon member for Stellenbosch, speaking on behalf of the NP, in a pamphlet which was published prior to the election in 1987 and distributed country-wide. In the pamphlet the following question is asked:

Hon members understand the question. The question relates to schools and residential areas. Will they be opened up to all races? It is not a question of whether there will be “own areas”. The answer is as follows:

[Interjections.] Here it is in black and white, Sir. The question is: Was such a representation made and is it untrue or not? The question is whether the NP was in breach of contract. Not only were they in breach of contract, because if I understand the hon members correctly, they have always known that there would be open areas. Then it is a deceitful misrepresentation. [Interjections.] That is the truth. Then there were hon members who responded correctly to this statement about the NP’s policy. They distributed pamphlets stating that the CP said there were going to be open areas, and then they said that was untrue. [Interjections.] I am not saying anything against those people, because that is the official NP policy. If the NP therefore passes this legislation today, they are committing a breach of contract and a breach of faith. They have misled the voters. [Interjections.]

The voters will settle accounts with them! [Interjections.]

Mr Speaker, if there has ever been legislation to protect the principle of own community life—I thought that that was the object of this Group Areas Act—it is the Group Areas Act. Now, more than ever, it is necessary for this legislation, which is now before this House, to protect those vested interests. That is so, because the principle of the Group Areas Act was already relinquished when free settlement areas were accepted. That is why the present amendments to the Group Areas Act are important, because I understood the hon the State President to have said that we should now go out of our way to protect the vested interests of the own community life of our people.

I have already indicated in the discussion, as did other speakers, that vested rights are not protected by free settlement areas. After all, there are interests of our people in those areas which are not protected. They are not being protected in terms of this piece of legislation.

We went further and said that indirectly this would lead to forced removals, specifically of those people who had vested rights within that area and would continue to have such rights. The question of a local option was done away with. It was done away with in the Act, and also in this piece of legislation, as it stands here. Free settlement, which is incorporated in this legislation, is excluded owing to the provisions of the Group Areas Act. Free settlement is excluded from the Group Areas Act. It has been relinquished.

It is now a matter of the necessity of establishing free settlement. The local option was excluded and done away with because it is no longer solely a question of the choice of the people who are involved, but because it also deals with the necessity of having that established. Even if the cases, regarded by this House as essential, are finally presented for approval to the relevant hon Minister and the hon the State President, the fact remains that the desirability of local option can be left out of the calculation. It is dealt with as a question of necessity.

The question is therefore whether vested rights in the so-called own areas are going to be protected. Given the NP’s record, I definitely want to answer “no”. It is no longer a question of whether there is an Act. Previously we could go into a street and say that is what the Act states, but these days one has to ask whether the Act is going to be implemented. It is no longer a question of whether it is in the Act? The question is whether the Act is going to be implemented. That is the question today.

What are the indications as to whether this Act is going to be implemented? The hon the State President stated, in column 6672 of Hansard, Monday, 5 October 1987, and I quote:

Now hon members must listen carefully. He goes on to state:

Here the people have been told: We propose amending the Group Areas Act, as it stands at present, to allow for free settlement, but do not think we are not going to implement it. This was the most authoritative voice in the country speaking. What happened? Just listen to the article that appeared in this newspaper on 29 February 1988. This article appeared after this warning. Here it is stated: “Anglo to defy Group Areas.” Anglo disregarded group areas. Anglo was not the only one, however, to have disregarded group areas. Numerous other companies also did so.

The question is therefore: Where is the action that was to be taken? Where is the action? I do not know of a single instance, since that day, of any action being taken in terms of the provisions of the Group Areas Act. Surely that was also the date on which the legislation was given potency. Surely it was when the hon the Deputy Minister stood up and said that they were not going to act perfunctorily but that they were going to give the legislation muscle which would ensure its efficacy.

There is a little song doing the rounds; the school-children sing it. It goes like this:

[Interjections.] That is what the children say. Those breaking the law openly declare—this is part of the evidence given before the joint committee—that they are going to stay where they are. They are not going to pay any heed to the provisions of this Act.

Do you people support the legislation?

There you have it. There is that bravado, that specific swagger. It started when a by-election was in the offing—I think in the hon member for Randfontein’s part of the world. Then there was also that bravado, similar to this bravado before the coming municipal election. Now we have that bravado again.

I think it is revealing to note how other bodies, other groups—I am speaking of specific left-wing groups, and perhaps there are also left-wing elements on the other side of the House, but let me leave the matter at that—interpret the action in connection with these Acts. They ask, for example, how grey areas developed in Johannesburg. How did it happen? One of the reasons which are advanced is that there was a shortage of housing. Another important factor is mentioned. What did the left-wing elements do? The moment people had to be evicted they obtained the services of legal experts to work with them. They fought these cases until it all came to a head with the case of The State vs Govender. They say that that was an important factor in making those areas grey areas. They also say—this is a very important factor—that the Government’s laxness in implementing the Act was a very important reason why these things happened.

The organisation which gave evidence before us on this aspect was the Institute of Race Relations. They said that the poor excuses given about the Government’s hands being tied as a result of the Govender case was a further important reason why these areas developed. They went on to say that the Government’s fear that the Coloureds and Indians would not participate in the new constitutional dispensation in 1983 was another important reason. The Government was afraid that if it acted, those people would not participate.

They also said that a list of priorities was drawn up for people living illegally in these areas. Those people had to be given preference when new housing was provided in the areas of colour. According to them another cause was the fact that the relevant Ministers in those Houses did not want to place those people on the priority lists.

For whom are you now speaking?

I am just telling the House how the Government’s actions were interpreted by other people. [Interjections.] The hon member must just hear me out; in a moment he will have a very good understanding of the situation.

They said the following:

As long as eviction does not take place—and that is where we come to this legislation—areas become grey areas. This legislation is now being changed. The one strong element in the initial Bill was that involving eviction. That was obviously acknowledged by the Government too, because one fine day this Government came along with an Act stating: Now we are making eviction compulsory. [Interjections.] If the law is contravened, the magistrate is under an obligation to evict the people concerned. A few weeks ago, in the joint committee in Pretoria, that was the legislation the Government wanted to introduce. A week later we come along here, and lo and behold—another element lending potency to the measure is missing. [Interjections.] Now it is no longer “shall”. Where it was previously the courts that had the power to have a guilty party evicted by the courts—and that was the intention too—things are now different. Had that been passed, it would have put a stop to this kind of free settlement orthese mixed or heterogeneous situations that are developing. Now the whole object is being frustrated, because now a court must reach a finding and submit a report, and then the Minister may act, but he does not have to.

Are we now dealing with the flabby muscles of the Minister? [Interjections.]

Yes, he does not need to. He himself is not compelled to either. He may. [Interjections.] About that aspect, let us now say that we proposed legislation to make this compulsory. A small amendment was necessary, but that legislation was placed on ice. The hon the Minister is not here now, but the other hon members who were present there, know this. Every time that measure had to be discussed by the Committee on Private Members’ Draft Bills, we were told to leave that in abeyance, because the situation would be resolved by this measure. Can hon members see what they were doing? As it happens, the situation was not resolved! [Interjections.] Initially an effort was made, but the moment there was any pressure, such as the pressure now being exerted from within the NP, and not only from outside—miracle of miracles— gone was the potency of that legislation! [Interjections.]

The gist of the matter is that our salvation lies in eviction—nothing less. It is not merely a question of punishment. The penalties have been increased, and we are happy about that. We shall not be objecting to that, but I want to tell hon members today that because we are now divorcing the courts from this aspect and giving the Minister the power to possibly evict these people, the increase in the penalties is going to result in the fact that when the Minister considers whether a person should be evicted or not, or whether he should obtain a permit or not, he is going to be mindful of the heavy penalty which will be imposed on that person. The heavier penalty in this case is therefore going to be counter-productive.

I also want to refer to the obvious specific concern about and fear of eviction. Why is there this specific concern or fear? I have never been able to understand why such an order could not be issued against someone who had been found guilty. [Interjections.] Those who settle there, who live there, are contravening the law. They are serious offenders because they previously had an opportunity to obtain a permit.

That permit could have been issued to them in terms of section 21 (3). Section 21 (3) defines the circumstances which the relevant Minister must consider when deciding whether such a permit should be granted, and the principles involved here are virtually identical to those laid down in the Govender case. It is there in black and white. Hon members would do well to read section 21 (3). The relevant person is one who was given an opportunity in advance. He could apply for a permit. But no, he would rather break the law, and despite that, people are afraid of an injunction to have the person evicted. Sir, it worked.

Should he have obtained permits? [Interjections.]

Of course I am in favour of those people being evicted. What does the hon member think? I have given hon members the reasons why. [Interjections.] The hon member will probably not understand that.

What is more, he surely had a place of his own; he did not simply appear out of thin air!

This has been said umpteen times, Sir. He is not an ordinary offender, he could have avoided committing an offence, and now he still has to be granted a “reprieve”—if I may use that word.

What about the death penalty? [Interjections.]

Those people contravene this Act and are not interested in making use of the available channels. And they do so in a defiant and provocative fashion. These people deserve no sympathy of any kind. [Interjections.]

Mr Speaker, may I put a question to the hon member?

Mr Speaker, I am not prepared to take a question.

In conclusion I should like to refer to the compensation payable to people in terms of the Bill. In regard to compensation, an improvement to the Act is being proposed, but I still have problems, however, with the fact that this involves a basic date on which the Department of Land Affairs must do the valuation, and then the matter must take its course in terms of the provisions of the expropriation legislation. The basic date is the problem, because the basic date is the date on which this advertisement is going to be placed. [Time expired.]

Mr Speaker, a few years ago there was a much-publicised murder trial here in South Africa involving two accused. One of these accused received a jail sentence, and the other was sentenced to death. I had a good friend who gave me the reason for this one accused having been sentenced to death. He said that that accused’s advocate was a passport to death. [Interjections.] If the hon member for Ermelo, a respected lawyer, is going to argue on the basis on which he argued this afternoon in respect of the question which the hon member for Sundays River put to him, then he is without doubt also a passport to death. [Interjections.] Surely it is not in accordance with a single principle of logic to equate a recommendation by an investigatory body with the contents of an Act or an ultimate decision of the Government. [Interjections.]

Last year on 5 October—please note, 5 October 1987—the hon the State President set out very clearly in Parliament the Government’s guidelines in respect of the President’s Council’s investigation, and in respect of the Free Settlement Board he said that the result of this body’s investigations would be submitted to the State President as well as to the Ministers’ Council involved. The State President, with the concurrence of the Ministers’ Council, will be able to declare an area open. The pamphlet to which the hon member referred was distributed after 5 October 1987. [Interjections.] If the hon member were really concerned about the untruth being advocated in this pamphlet, he would have halted its distribution. The hon member for Sundays River will, however, come back to that argument because in the 25 minutes available to the hon CP member, he had not yet replied to it. [Interjections.]

The hon member again maintained that we were telling a lie when we said that own residential areas and own schools were NP policy. He said we disseminated and proclaimed that concept, and that is also a lie, but surely he knows—I refer again to this briefly—that in our election manifesto of 1981 we of course referred to own residential areas and own schools where possible. [Interjections.] Surely he knows that in accordance with the legislation on diplomatic immunity, which was passed on Dr Malan’s initiative in the early fifties, it is possible for people of colour to live in specific residential areas. [Interjections.] Surely those exceptions do not change the rule. [Interjections.]

The hon member for Ermelo also referred here to the hesitation in issuing an eviction order, and then said that someone who had committed an offence did so maliciously because he could have acquired a permit. Now we would merely like to know from the hon member for Ermelo whether he would concede that in specific cases the issuing of a permit is justified. Will the CP concede that there are specific cases in which it is necessary to issue a permit?

First mention the cases!

The CP is not replying to this, yet they want to make eviction orders obligatory in all circumstances.

I have just one more observation concerning the hon member for Ermelo. He referred to a song which school children apparently sang. [Interjections.] Of course these school children also talk about the CP. They say that “KP” stands for “Kafpraatparty”. (Interjections.]

Everyone has realised long ago that essential change has to take place in South Africa if we want to survive in this country. I think most Whites in South Africa are not opposed to these essential changes in the political, social and economic spheres, and have also declared their preparedness to see to it that these changes are made. That was confirmed on 6 May 1987.

In spite of the fact that the Whites realise this, it remains irrefutably true that Whites, at least most Whites, place a high premium on their own residential areas and schools. During the Natal congress of the NP, the hon the State President in fact stated that he was prepared to test the opinion of the Whites in this regard by means of a referendum.

However, one also gets the impression that there are numerous members of other population groups who are not averse to the idea that their own community life should be protected in residential areas of their own. In personal discussions which I have held with members of these population groups, and especially with Blacks, I have never had the impression that there was a particular desire among Blacks to move in next to Whites. [Interjections.]

I get the impression that one of the main objections of people of colour to the application of the Group Areas Act was that its implementation would in the process prevent them from acquiring sufficient land upon which to develop their own housing, but I shall elaborate on this point in due course.

The main object of the Group Areas Act, as it stands at the moment, is to implement this desire among the Whites but also among members of other population groups, namely to be settled in their own residential areas. The Group Areas Act was consequently aimed at the orderly settlement of all population groups.

Unfortunately, however, it is true that the Group Areas Act, as it is at present, cannot, in some cases, be effectively applied in order to achieve its objectives. It makes no sense to keep an Act such as this on the Statute Book if it cannot be implemented effectively in certain respects. An alternative would be to scrap it, but there was evidence before the joint committee—I want to repeat this—from responsible quarters which pointed out that if the Group Areas Act were summarily scrapped it would lead to chaos in South Africa.

Therefore the only other logical solution is to effect those changes in order to make it possible to apply the Group Areas Act effectively in certain circumstances. The general summary of this envisaged changes is that in future effective action can be taken against not only owners, but against occupants as well.

The nature of this conduct includes the possible sale of property and possible eviction of occupants. However, the discretion lies with the own affairs Minister, who will allow himself to be guided by a great many circumstances in respect of this matter.

These measures have elicited sharp criticism in the Press and in public as well. In this regard I merely want to make a few observations. It is true that this reinforcement, call it that if you like, of the Group Areas Act in a certain respect cannot be seen in isolation from the Bill which has already been passed, namely the Free Settlement Areas Bill.

The fact that this Bill has been passed and the fact that it has been made possible for people who so choose to live on an integrated basis, also by implication gives one the right to make the Group Areas Act more effective in respect of other areas.

In terms of that legislation it is of course also possible to transform these areas which are already de facto mixed residential areas, into free settlement areas. Surely it is not true then that thousands of people are suddenly going to be left on the streets overnight as has been alleged in the Press and elsewhere.

Surely it is not true either that if it is found that someone has committed an offence tonight they will find themselves on the street the next day. The procedure of course gives one ample opportunity either to undo one’s contravention or to make other arrangements. Once again I want to say that the fact that there is free settlement legislation justifies one’s conduct of making the Group Areas Act more effective.

Local authorities who are hesitant in making land available for free settlement areas must go back and think again. This conduct might be counterproductive in respect of own residential areas.

Another objection is that the application of this legislation would lead to many people becoming informers. The Act in its present form enables any person who suspects a contravention on the part of another person to pick up the telephone and phone the group areas branch of the Police and an investigation will ensue.

And nothing happens.

As far as I am concerned, if nothing happens it is as a result of the findings of the police who are dealing with the case, and we cannot prescribe to the police how they must do their work.

The police cannot do their work, if the Government stops them.

The implication of the hon member for Losberg’s remark is that the police do not know how to carry out their task.

They are told not to take any action.

In any event, as far as the procedure is concerned, it does not differ substantially. That is why I do not think it will lead to spying and informants. The procedure here makes provision for inspectors and they are not witch-hunters. They are people who are going to be trained and their main aim is also going to be the creation of social order and not to persecute people in the night and things of that nature.

There is also the point of criticism that the role of the courts is being excluded at the final eviction order. That is so, but there was also evidence that the courts not being involved in this matter and that the entire matter was to be dealt with administratively was on the other hand being welcomed in other quarters.

That even applies in respect of the police. They welcome not being involved in this. That is why this avenue which is now being opened to deal with these matters administratively is in many respects satisfactory.

I think that at the end of the day it can be said that this trilogy of legislation has as its goal, as has been summarised so succinctly by the Department of Information, namely to live and let live.

In order to live and let live the free settlement areas have been instituted and the effective application of the Group Areas Act has been made possible. Once everything has been said, one truth remains: The surest guarantee for own residential areas is that sufficient land for urban development and housing be made available to other population groups. If we proceed to object along these lines when specific land has been identified, we must not ultimately complain because our own residential areas are being affected.

I also realise that land is not inexhaustible and that there are limitations in this regard as well. We realise that and in view of that fact we shall also have to start considering changing the nature of housing in South Africa. We shall have to start thinking in terms of high-rise Black residential areas.

A final observation, and that is that certain individuals have had traumatic experiences in the application of the Group Areas Act. That is true, but to merely say that the Group Areas Act is iniquitous, is equally untrue. Surely it is true and the hon member for Claremont must after all admit …

It is immoral.

Is it immoral if people are removed from a slum area in accordance with the Group Areas Act and are housed under more humane conditions? Is that immoral? It is not immoral. [Interjections.] Surely it is the case that if normal market forces had applied in terms of land, many fewer people of colour would have owned land today than is at present the case. If it were not for the Group Areas Act many fewer people of colour would have been housed in a humane way. Surely this Bill does not grant the right to protect their own community life and their own residential areas to Whites only but to other population groups as well.

I gladly support this amending Bill.

Mr Chairman, I have listened very attentively here this afternoon to the hon member for Ermelo, and I must say that I think it is a sad day in the history of South Africa when the chief spokesman of the Official Opposition on this matter reflects the kind of attitude that we in South Africa do not work with other people, but that they should be treated like animals. That was the tone of that hon member’s speech.

Is that how the NP treated them in the past?

That hon member has no respect … [Interjections.]

Order!

That hon member, and the hon member for Bethal behind him, have no respect for the sensitivity of other people about these kind of matters.

The Official Opposition, the PFP and the NDM arc all in the same boat …

Mr Chairman, is the hon member prepared to reply to a question?

No, that hon member had 25 minutes to speak. I think he has said enough.

These three parties are in the same boat as regards this trilogy of Bills which is being piloted through this House. This Group Areas Act is an embarrassment to the CP, because they go from place to place in South Africa and spread gossip among people that the NP wants to do away with group areas in South Africa. What does this proposed legislation do? It empowers the Government to act much more firmly against contraveners of the Act. That party can no longer go and proclaim this kind of untruth among the voters.

On the other hand, the same applies to the leftist parties, which adopt such a moral standpoint, and that includes the hon member for Claremont. Here now is the opportunity for South Africans who prefer to live together to in fact be able to do so. In that way the wind has been taken out of those moralist’s sails.

What does Beeld and Nasionale Pers say about that?

If one examines the measures contained in this amending Bill, they in fact confirm the standpoint of the Government that an own community life has to be maintained. For the first time every individual in South Africa is given the right to decide and to choose where he wants to live, whether he wants to live in a free settlement area or in his own community.

To respect the wishes of the individual in this respect is surely the action of a mature and a democratic government. The effort being made here by the opposition parties to lable the NP as a party which does not respect democracy represents a point of view which simply does not hold water.

Secondly, it is important to take note, in spite of the existence of the Group Areas Act as we have come to know it over the decades and as it has been amended, that there are people who have a desire to live together.

South Africa has changed, not as a result of the Government which sits here but because the people of South Africa are not stagnant people. They are people on the move, it is a community in motion and one must accept that the changes and desires will grow in this country.

It is very interesting that the hon members are so sceptical when the Government gives individuals the right to make a choice. I am asking these so-called democrats whether it is a mistake if one tells the general public that they can make a choice, if one tells the community of, for argument’s sake, Durbanville, that they can exercise a choice in regard to their area. No, I get the impression that these people want to apply democracy on the same basis as the so-called “people’s democracy”, which is being crammed down our throats by the hostile world.

That is the kind of democracy the CP is interested in, that is the kind of democracy in which the left-wing parties are interested, and that is the democracy for the revolutionaries and the radicals.

Everyone with common sense and a sound judgement realises that economic forces have played a major role and have been skilfully exploited in the contravention of the Group Areas Act. What forms the foundation for this? How many times have we not found it happening in Parliament that when measures are being adopted to created better facilities, living conditions and more living space for people of colour in this country, there was opposition to it on the part of the Official Opposition and they went out and stirred up emotions against the Government because it was doing its duty and undertaking physical planning in South Africa?

How responsible is an opposition which claims to be the alternative government of a country, how responsible is an opposition which tramples in that way on the rights of settlement and occupation that have to be granted to people?

The leadership of the Official Opposition reminds me of the proverbial Judas-goat. They are taking a group of people on tow on an emotional basis, but the day will come when those people are going to realise that the realities of South Africa are not to be found along the road the CP is taking.

Sir, I want to tell you frankly that this constant gossiping about the so-called benefitting of people of colour is diametrically opposed to the interests of White South Africans. With methods of that kind the CP are not serving the interests of White South Africa, they are not serving the interests of any person or any group in South Africa. I want to tell the CP this afternoon that it is not serving the cause of the Whites as it purports to be doing. It is playing a political game which can seriously jeopardise existing value systems in South Africa.

There is a strong similarity between the results that will be attained by the CP and the results that will be attained by the left-wing party as a result of their actions. Through its philosophy of withholding land, services and better living conditions from other communities, the CP is placing pressure on the existing order which it will not be possible to alleviate by means of laws.

The leftists want to achieve the result quicker through the compulsory throwing open of all residential areas. Then these are the people who accuse the Government of undemocratic action, who want to vest power in themselves and who want to compel South Africa to be the way they wanted to be.

I should like to support this Bill in the knowledge that the people of South Africa are responsible enough to deal with this important matter in such a way that it will be in the interests of everyone in this country.

Mr Chairman, after the remarks by the hon member for Durbanville, I think we should have a look at who is really playing a political game. The legislation before us today should, according to a promise made at the time by the former Minister, Mr Pen Kotze, have been introduced in 1981. Only now, seven years later, do we have before us the necessary legislation that could have prevented what has been happening in South Africa. [Interjections.]

†There is of course a very simple reason for this Bill being before us today and that is the rapidly diminishing support experienced by the NP.

You are living in a fool’s paradise!

Order!

Do hon members remember—that hon member must listen very carefully—the tricks they employed in the past? Earlier on we listened to the hon the Minister of National Education talking about how the NP was protecting the rights of the Whites. Let us look at what the NP had to say in this regard in the past. Then we shall be able to tell whether we may believe or trust them.

The NP says it believes in separate residential areas where possible. Let us look at what they actually said in the past.

†I refer to a pamphlet, “The National Party for South Africa”, issued by die NP in 1981. One of the points in it reads:

There are no qualifications about where that is possible.

I take hon members further to a second pamphlet, “Die NP is die krag van Suid-Afrika”.

*How ridiculous! Just listen to what they say here:

†I want to refer hon members to a pamphlet that will bring the present-day NP into its true perspective.

*In a pamphlet issued under the heading, “Die NP—hier is die feite”, they make the following statement:

What was the NP’s answer to this? They said:

This is what the NP says. [Interjections.] Now we know with whom we are really dealing in the political situation in South Africa.

Can we still believe the NP? Would they have believed yesterday’s Progs? Of course they would not. Why is today’s NP believed? Let us look at the reality, the areas that are already mixed, areas which are not exceptions. Let us look at the list. The hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning says: “We believe in separate residential areas, where possible.” Now listen to this list of mixed residential areas and tell me whether he is speaking the truth or whether he is making up stories. I do not have a complete list of all the affected areas. I only have a short list here. There are only 17 areas on my list, viz Windmill Park in Boksburg, Lansdowne, Woodstock, Salt River, Observatory, North End in Port Elizabeth, Albert Park in Pinetown, Clairwood, Greyville, Westville, Hillbrow, Mayfair, Berea, Joubert Park, Troyeville, Doornfontein and Fairview. Is it not possible to apply the Group Areas Act in those areas, or is he misleading the voters of South Africa as usual? [Interjections.]

†When did this whole problem start? NonWhites started invading White group areas in the mid-1970s. By 1979 some blocks of flats in Hillbrow were totally occupied by non-Whites.

What party did you belong to then?

But I did something about it, I complained about it in the caucus when that hon member did not have the courage to talk about it although it worried him. It worries his voters even more than it worries him. In 1979 the SAP had pressed charges against more than 640 people for contraventions of the Group Areas Act. They also prosecuted four landlords for allowing tenants to contravene the Act by allowing racially disqualified tenants to occupy premises. Only about 30 of the 640 prosecutions previously mentioned were heard by the courts and many of those were dropped. The charges against the landlords resulted in fines and no further action in spite of the fact that no corrective action was taken by the landlords concerned. Landlords have been too leniently treated by the courts. Many of those convicted did not even receive fines; they were cautioned and discharged.

This lack of action resulted in the emergence of a pattern of civil disobedience which has been tolerated by the NP Government. They were fully aware of all the tricks—of White fronts signing leases on behalf of non-Whites, fully aware of shops being hired by White fronts, a practice that still continues today in business areas that have not been declared mixed central business districts. They all know this, we all know it but they will not act. They keep on talking about acting, they come with fancy laws but nothing happens.

In October 1983 Mr Pen Kotze promised the White residents of Mayfair that the Nat Government would bring legislation that would—and I quote from The Citizen of 10 October 1983— “relentlessly deal with all offenders”. What happened? Nothing.

In 1984 the hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning came up with a master plan. He would rehouse hundreds of Coloured and Indian families living in Mayfair and Hillbrow. He would build 1 100 flats in Burgersoord for Indian illegals and 500 flats in Newclare for Coloured illegals. What happened as a result of that clever move? He caused the flood of illegals that has turned Hillbrow and other areas into disaster areas.

Hon members on that side talk about conflict within the party on this side of the House. I am going to talk about very serious conflict within the ranks of the NP in this House. According to Business Day of 24 April 1987 the Transvaal leader of the NP, Minister F W de Klerk, invited Whites to report contraventions of the Group Areas Act. Does that behaviour receive the approval of all hon members on that side? I know that the hon member for Umhlanga does not agree with it. He actually feels upset and got very uptight when the hon member for Durban Point refused to grant any permits in his area. He promised further that the NP Government would act against them.

In May of that year about 40 notices were issued to property-owners under section 41, warning that their properties would be confiscated if they did not eject non-White tenants. By October 1987, of course, no confiscation had taken place and neither was there any sign of attempts to evict the illegal tenants. I wonder who countermanded Minister De Klerk’s instruction. No dissension within the NP? It exists at the highest level, Sir.

Nonsense!

I want to challenge the hon the Minister today to allow his caucus members to vote the way their minds and their hearts and their voters tell them to vote as far as this trilogy of laws is concerned. Then we will see the truth of the matter … [Interjections.] … because hon members must just listen to what is reported in The Daily News of 6 November 1987 under the headline “Mixing: Nat ‘sympathy’ call”:

No dissension? What a joke! Let me read further, and Mr Matthee of course has upset his Black business partner because he is so adamant about this. In The Sunday Tribune of 15 November 1987 we read the following about Mr Kwêna Mangope, a son of the Bophuthatswana President, Lucas Mangope:

But he is prepared to make those sacrifices, Sir, because he knows very well that he is acting on behalf of his voters, and he is quite right, and some other hon members on that side should also have the courage to do that sometimes. [Interjections.] This report carries on to say:

Surprise! Surprise!—

Mr Eddie Venter of Westdene earned the wrath of the hon member for Langlaagte when he said that “the movement of other races into the area resulted in the spread of shebeens and drugtaking and that coloured children gathered ‘like finches on fences’”.

I read the following in the Natal Mercury of 16 October 1987:

A lot of other people also complained; even a former Natal MP who is now a member of the President’s Council, Mr Mees van der Westhuizen, also got very uptight about Coloureds moving into a block of flats in which he also has a share.

I can carry on; I have numerous cases here, but I think the most interesting one I must mention— because some hon members on that side had a lot to say about a pamphlet issued by the CP—is a newspaper report in Business Day of 22 February 1988. It was reporting a speech by the hon the Minister of Foreign Affairs, and it reads as follows:

Hon members must listen to this very carefully—

So even in the Cabinet there is dissension because some of them want to proceed with the President’s Council’s report and the others are not in favour of it.

Tertius, what do you say now?

I also want to refer to The Argus of 26 February 1988, reporting on a meeting addressed by Mr Piet Badenhorst, then the Deputy Minister of Development Planning. He said:

No wonder he was promoted sideways to Minister of Health Services and Welfare in the Ministers’ Council—that was one way of getting rid of him without a by-election.

Sir, we hear now what these hon members are going to do in terms of the law, but what are they going to do in terms of the resistance which they are definitely going to get in the future from Anglo American, from the attorneys-general who refuse to prosecute, from the illegal tenants who are already saying they are not budging? And I can go on and on and on about that resistance as well.

The question remains, as far as this legislation is concerned, whether this legislation will be applied or whether it is just another NP paper tiger designed to retain the voters they have without its having any effect.

Mr Chairman, we have just been listening to the hon member Mr DerbyLewis. He spoke a great deal, but said absolutely nothing. Before us here today, in the highest body of authority in South Africa, we have a piece of legislation which we are in the process of supporting. This piece of legislation emanates from the Cabinet, and the hon member can make as much noise as he wants to. The Bill is there for everyone to examine and to see what we advocate and what we do not advocate. Since we commenced with these three pieces of legislation, there have been several accusations from that side of the House. It has been said that the NP does not keep its word. The NP does not take action. The NP is tying the hands of the police and is bowing to pressure. On the question of who keeps their word and who does not, let met mention two examples. The members of the general public can then decide for themselves.

There is a question I want to put to the hon member Mr Derby-Lewis. He was a member of the NP in 1981. At the time he went around, not in the Treurnicht clique, but amongst us, touting to be elected to the House as an indirectly elected member.

There is only one person who is touting and that is you!

That is the truth. The hon member was a member of the NP, and in 1981 we published a manifesto which contained the following, and I quote from the twelve-point plan. Point No 5 reads:

That is a very definite point of view. I also want to ask the hon members for Waterberg, Lichtenburg, Soutpansberg, Baberton, Overvaal, Brakpan and Pietersburg, and also the hon member Mr Derby-Lewis, who has such a big mouth, whether they still adhere to this principle.

Which one?

The one I have just quoted, ie that we advocate an own community life and own schools, wherever possible. Are hon members of the Official Opposition in favour of that?

That is possible!

We are in favour of that!

The hon member must not say “possible”. [Interjections.] I am asking whether hon members of the CP advocate that principle or not. Are they going to implement it wherever possible or statutorily implement it throughout? I should like hon members on that side of the House to answer me.

Throughout, wherever we come across it.

No, that is an HNP answer. I am asking what the erstwhile NP members have to say. The HNP is honest; we know what they say. The hon member for Brakpan will not give an honest answer to this question.

I want to refer to a further point. The CP alleges that the Government bows to pressure. I said recently that I did not know why the CP did not support the legislation with loud acclamation. Prof Carel Boshoff is a leading figure in CP ranks, or is he not a member of the CP?

He may be a member, but he is not a leading member! [Interjections.]

The hon member Mr DerbyLewis says Prof Boshoff is a member of the CP, but not a leading member. The CP speaks about people who bow to pressure, but it would seem as though Prof Boshoff has already thrown in the towel as far as the major portion of South Africa is concerned, judging by the following statement he made, and I quote:

According to Prof Boshoff the only choice is the following, and I again quote:

I want to know from hon members of the Official Opposition whether they agree with that statement made by Prof Boshoff or whether they reject it.

This afternoon the hon member Mr Derby-Lewis made a great song and dance about people who bow to pressure. I am now expressly asking him and the other CP members—it is a very reasonable question indeed—whether they reject this statement made by Prof Boshoff or whether they are giving it some consideration.

We reject such a …

It is no use talking to those hon members. [Interjections.]

Order!

I want to allege that in their party they are giving that standpoint some consideration. They speak of a few areas which the NP is going to open up to all races, but when they come to power, these people are summarily going to hand over the whole of South Africa, apart from a small portion for a “Volkstaat”, to a Black majority government. [Interjections.] I am levelling that accusation again this afternoon, and those hon members can reply to it, because they have enough time at their disposal in this debate either to defend or reject Prof Boshoff’s viewpoint.

I want to come back to what I wanted to say initially before listening to the hon member. No one in South Africa can defuse the emotions generated by this particular subject or simply dismiss them. Why is this such an emotional subject? This is so because there are clearly identifiable conflicting interests in South Africa. On the one hand there are settlement patterns and vested rights which have been established in this country over the years. On the other hand there is a housing and settlement crisis, owing to accelerated urbanisation to certain metropolitan areas in South Africa.

It is necessary, however—this is very important—for these conflicting interests in South Africa to be reconciled and considered. This can only be done if one has a balanced, level-headed approach to the problem. Let us state frankly today that people with such emotional sentiments as the hon members on our right cannot rationally approach a problem of this nature. That is why it is necessary for this NP Government, which is in power, to deal with this matter as it is doing today.

What is the background? There is an over-supply of housing in proclaimed White group areas in South Africa. That is a fact. Hon members are free to examine the situation. In the metropoles there are scores of flats standing empty … [Interjections.] …

Order!

… in the White residential areas of South Africa. An own community life which, over the years, has become part of our diverse pattern of life, is a fact that has to be borne in mind. Vested rights, which no one is summarily doing away with, have established themselves in this country over the years. I want to emphasise that this has happened in all communities, and not only amongst the Whites. All communities in South Africa jealously guard their religion, culture, language, school education and the residential areas in which they live. [Interjections.]

Countries abroad, in particular, the left-wing elements here in South Africa, some people of colour—solely for political gain and for nothing else—and politicians with liberal views are agitating to have this measure omitted entirely from the Statute Book. The reasons they advance are that the Act prescribes where one may live and where one may not live. They regard it as colour discrimination that certain areas are reserved for certain communities. It is alleged that all residential areas, for example in and around the cores of the metropoles, are solely occupied by Whites and that the workers—that is the argument— have to be settled miles away from the metropoles. It is then alleged that in South Africa land has unfairly been divided up in favour of the Whites.

These are conflicting interests which have existed for years and which flare up from time to time. For that reason we on this side of the House sincerely congratulate the Government, because what are we managing to do? We want to create an orderly and fair dispensation in South Africa so that everyone can live together in peace. Hon members of the CP may speak about legislation which should have been passed in 1981, but the modus operandi of this NP Government is to approach a matter scientifically and not simply to come to light with a piece of legislation and grab people by the scruff of their neck tomorrow and fling them out the door.

The President’s Council conducted an in-depth investigation into this matter. The report was submitted to the Cabinet. On 5 October of last year the hon the State President laid down very clear guidelines, and within the context of those guidelines the department drew up the legislation which is now before this House.

What is the alternative? The alternative is a simplistic solution. The CP says: Take strong statutory action against people. Others to the left of the political spectrum say that we should simply delete the measure and let things take their own course. That is simply the old “either/or” brigade, either this or that, and it is either the CP or these other people. We cannot go along with those views. Those are the two extremes in South African politics. Unfortunately short-term political gain is rearing its ugly head on the CP side. [Interjections.]

Unfortunately there are elements or individuals in South Africa, estate agents and property owners who have no respect for the ordered, vested patterns and traditional own communities in South Africa. Certain loopholes in this legislation have been used, loopholes to which the Government has now, in a responsible matter, had to give attention.

We have already debated the free settlement measure, and I am not going to refer to it, except to emphasise that the Government grants recognition to those who want to settle outside the framework of the established living patterns in South Africa. Having done this now, we must protect the vested rights of our communities in South Africa, those who want to retain or maintain their community life in the spirit of traditional settlement patterns.

Problems in the implementation of the existing measure are now effectively been tackled. The provisions in regard to property which is being occupied illegally are now being extended to include the unlawful occupation of certain residential areas. The Minister is being given the power, in a responsible manner, to issue an eviction order, at his discretion, to every illegal occupier of property. Direct police involvement is being replaced by that of an inspectorate to advise and assist the authorities in these matters. This is a responsible, fair and just procedure which the Government is proposing. Action must and will therefore be taken in future against people who are deliberately going to contravene this measure. We pay no heed to what the CP says, ie that we do not want to take action. Let us wait and see, from a responsible point of view, what happens in the next few months. Hon members can assess us on that basis.

Let me deal with a few of the arguments which have been raised. [Interjections.] Excuse my cough, Sir. [Interjections.] Unfortunately one sometimes picks up an infection, and I do not wish this even on the CP members. [Interjections.] Let us take up the point about the oversupply of White housing. If there is an oversupply of White housing in South Africa, we must examine that situation in order to determine whether we cannot reproclaim certain areas to make provision for the masses who cannot be accommodated.

Let us look at the aspect of own community life. The experience in my constituency is that the voters are in favour of reform and socio-economic and community involvement for other people in South Africa. There are, however, two cardinal aspects they are not prepared to permit. Firstly, our people say that political rights should be granted on a group basis. Secondly, our people ask us to protect their own community life and the rights established for them in South Africa. That is what the NP is doing in South Africa.

I want to make one final remark, and this concerns so-called reserved land, supposedly reserved solely for Whites in the best possible areas. Let met tell the hon member to the left of me, who has occasionally been making a noise from back there, that the 1913 Act, the 1936 Act and the Group Areas Act reserved land in this country for people who were living in economic and sub-economic conditions. If those Acts had not been on the Statute Book, today they would not have had one inch of land in South Africa. That argument put forward by left-wing elements is an argument we reject with the contempt it deserves.

What we want to say, however—this is the plea that we on this side of the House make to the Government—is that we cannot simply take statutory action. We shall have to ensure that there is sufficient land for the physical planning and settlement of all the people in South Africa, and that that is done in a fair and just manner. Then let the CPs shout about that if they want to, but ultimately it will lead to the best interests of every one in South Africa being served.

Order! I think hon members will concede that I have been very accommodating as far as interjections were concerned. I appeal to hon members to make fewer interjections.

Mr Chairman, I thank the hon member for Carletonville for his presence and for his courtesy in responding to my request by being here. I shall exchange a few words with him in a moment.

In the first place, however, I want to appeal to my Free State colleagues who are also members of the Labour Party. They must beware of being caught by the bankrupt Progs who have been rejected by the White voters and in White politics, and who now want to manipulate Coloured and Indian politics. That is what they are doing. The PFP is the party in White politics which is progressively losing support. With their conduct and their encouragement that one should boycott the sittings of this House these people—the Progs—are sketching a picture of what the Labour Party really is. I want to warn these Free State colleagues of mine that this is something that is ultimately going to stick to them—that in time people can begin to get the impression that they do not care two hoots about democracy, that constitutions and charters of human rights are mere pieces of paper that can be torn up and thrown away, that their word means nothing, that they regard civilised values as something to be laughed at. They must be careful, because that is what the Progs are going to do to them ultimately. I am warning these Free State colleagues of mine in particular not to allow themselves to be misled or to be caught in the Progs’ trap. They must stand up so that people can see that they are accepting responsibility on behalf of their own people.

With regard to the Group Areas Act, I merely want to repeat the NP’s standpoint, viz that one must acknowledge freedom of association in this country of ours with its heterogeneous population as a force that works, but that one will also have to acknowledge the freedom of dissociation. One cannot overemphasise the one and simply ignore the other. In this complex society of ours one will have to take both these forces into account.

The NP’s standpoint is that we must have a certain number of free settlement areas in this country, that that is a condition for the establishment of a general pattern of own residential areas; otherwise it cannot be done. That is what this Government has experienced over the years. We know that. It is not possible to ensure absolute own residential areas for everyone throughout this country. It is simply not possible in South Africa.

I also want to refer to the new section 46(2)(a), as contained in clause 10. I want to say that the NP will ensure an own community life by the establishment of own group areas, and it is going to implement that policy positively, but compassionately. It is not going to do so by using bulldozers and machine guns. That is our standpoint. We shall implement this by means of persuasion rather than by means of force.

This brings me to the hon member for Carletonville who gave the assurance in an earlier speech that his party would clean up all mixed residential areas in South Africa. That is it! They are going to clean them up. There is not a shadow of a doubt about it. They will implement the Act, and they are going to clean up the residential areas.

That is simply not possible. His party is the party which is going to reinstate all these old Acts when they come into power one day, as they say. They are going to reinstate all these Acts once again, Acts that one cannot implement.

I want to ask the hon member for Carletonville whether it is the policy of his party, when the CP comes into power in South Africa, to place the old Free State Act of 1896, which prohibits Indians from settling in the Free State, on the Statute Book once again.

Let us, you and I, have a meeting in Sasolburg!

Order!

Come! Come! [Interjections.] The hon member has adopted the standpoint in this House that he is going to restore to the Statute Book all these old Acts which cannot be implemented. I merely want to know from him whether he knows what the relevant Act contains. I say one cannot apply the Group Areas Act absolutely to everyone in South Africa. It is not an Act which can be implemented absolutely in South Africa.

The old Free State Act which was written in 1896 stated inter alia—these are the exact words—that Coolies, Chinese and Arabs would not be permitted in the Free State. [Interjections.] That is exactly what is stated there. I merely want to ask the hon member for Carletonville whether he knows that “Arabs” includes people of Lebanese origin. That is true. It is a fact. I want to tell him in friendly fashion that that Act cannot be implemented, because if he wants to implement that Act in that way, he will not be permitted in the Free State once the CP comes into power in this country. That is the truth. [Interjections.] His standpoint that the Group Areas Act must ensure absolutely clean residential areas in this country cannot be implemented just as that old Free State Act cannot be implemented. [Interjections.]

You are absolutely insulting!

Order!

Mr Chairman, one is not surprised that intellectual leaders …

You are being scurrilous (smerig)!

Order! The hon member for Brakpan must withdraw that comment.

Mr Chairman, I withdraw it.

I merely want to tell the hon member for Brakpan that I am being friendly with the hon member for Carletonville. I am merely pointing out to him that his standpoint is not practicable. That is the only thing I want to do. I am merely pointing out that this is going to backfire on him should the CP want to institute this old Act once again.

Make your speech and get done with it!

I should like the hon member for Carletonville to have the right to live in the Free State. I want him to be able to hold meetings there. After standpoints such as those of the hon member for Carletonville, I am not surprised that the intellectual leaders of the CP are beginning to say that the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition is going to bring about terror and violence in South Africa. He is not going to bring about peace. The CP’s policy is going to mean that terror and violence in this country are going to escalate on a large scale. That is what their intellectual leaders say.

It is very interesting that there is an enormous difference of opinion in this regard within the CP, within the Official Opposition. These are not differences simply among the ordinary members. No, Sir. It is among the leaders of the Official Opposition that there are such great differences. The hon the Leader of the Official Opposition says he is going to clean up all the residential areas, but his propaganda chief says he can forget about that. He can stand on his head, but he will not manage that. His propaganda chief says so. I want to refer to a report in Inside South Africa, in which he says that the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition can forget about removing the 100 000 Blacks from Hillbrow—I do not know whether there are 100 000. He will not be able to remove them. He referred to the CP, and I quote:

He was not talking about anyone else. He was talking about the CP. He said they could forget about that. He said the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition could forget about trying to sell this to the electorate. The hon the Leader of the Official Opposition cannot do so, but the hon member for Carletonville says he is going to, even if he has to use bulldozers and machine guns. He is going to implement this.

The hon member for Overvaal, the CP’s propaganda chief, says that theoretically and in principle he is in favour of mixed residential areas. He says he has a problem with mixed residential areas in practice, but in principle, theoretically, he has no problem with living next door to Prof Jakes Gerwel and Mr Norman West, a Coloured reporter with Inside South Africa. [Interjections.] He has no problem with that in principle. There is a little practical problem, however. [Interjections.] He was rapped over the knuckles because of it. The propaganda chief in that party was taken to task by means of a forceful step taken by the hon the leader of that party. The hon the Leader of the Official Opposition said he would have to adopt some other standpoint, because that was not the CP’s standpoint. The propaganda chief in that party did not adopt another standpoint, however. He said he had simply meant it theoretically. He still felt that in principle he was in favour of mixed residential areas. One cannot interpret that in any other way. [Interjections.]

In addition the propaganda chief in the CP laughs at his own party’s policy, because he says it cannot be implemented. As in the case of the Official Opposition’s standpoint on the Group Areas Act, this propaganda chief differs in respect of other aspects. I want to point these out to hon members. In a propaganda pamphlet, KP— Vaaldriehoek, which the CP distributes in the Vaal Triangle, the hon member for Overvaal proudly announced: “Koos se plan”. [Interjections.] I was not the one to say this; here it is— “Koos se plan”. He is announcing a plan to protect the White residential areas in the Vaal Triangle. It concerns the group areas. He says the Black townships of Bophelong, Boipetong and Sharpeville should be moved to Sebokeng. Then the Blacks will be out of the Vaal Triangle. I want to ask who is bluffing, however. Sebokeng is in the Vaal Triangle; it is part of the Vaal Triangle. Hon members can see now in what important respects he differs with his party’s standpoints. His party’s standpoint is that there should be majority occupation in the Vaal Triangle. The hon member for Overvaal, the propaganda chief in that party, says we must forget about that, however; the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition is talking a lot of nonsense. He will not get all these Blacks into the homelands. The CP is simply going to move them to and fro in the Vaal Triangle. He does not say they must go to the homelands; this is implied. The propaganda chief in the CP is not in favour of majority occupation. He says this cannot be done.

There are certain people in their own ranks who point out the ridiculousness of the Official Opposition’s standpoints. I am sorry the hon member for Overvaal is not here so that I can exchange a few words with him. We must actually congratulate him on this standpoint of his, because it is a standpoint which represents and acknowledges the reality and the truth of South Africa, unlike that of other members of his party who do not want to acknowledge this.

With regard to the standpoint of the hon member for Carletonville, viz that he will ensure own residential areas by hook or by crook, we cannot but deduce that the CP will have to increase national service from two to five years. They will have to do this, as Prof Carel Boshoff says, in order to check the unrest that this standpoint of theirs is going to cause in South Africa. In any case they have to make war on this horde of small defence forces that want to establish themselves in South Africa. We know, therefore, that if the CP comes into power, national service for young White men will have to be increased to five years. I am not the one who said this; this is what Prof Carel Boshoff, one of the CP’s intellectual leaders, says. The sanctions and boycotts that the CP is going to cause in this country, as well as the cost involved in the enormous removals of people in South Africa, will amount to a total of 10 years of this country’s State budget. That will mean that you and I who are paying income tax today, will have to pay twice as much tax for the rest of our lives in order to implement this ridiculous plan of the CP. I hope there are more people in the ranks of the Official Opposition who realise, as their propaganda chief does, that it is not possible to implement these things they are telling the voters.

The NP will comply with its mandate to ensure an own community life. That was the instruction we received from the voters, and we intend to carry out that instruction.

Mr Chairman, it is a privilege to be able to participate in the debate on the Group Areas Amendment Bill. It was a pleasant surprise this afternoon to listen to the hon member for Sasolburg’s more tranquil manner until, unfortunately, he came to the contents. In his speech this afternoon the hon member for Sasolburg clearly indicated that he had accepted the hon member for Carletonville’s challenge to have a public meeting in his constituency. The hon member for Carletonville and the CP are eagerly awaiting his arrangements so that we can debate this matter before the voters of his constituency. We are waiting for his arrangements, Sir. [Interjections.]

It has been said repeatedly that this Bill should not be seen in isolation, but that it forms a unit— a so-called trilogy—with the Free Settlement Areas Bill and the Local Authorities in Free Settlement Areas Bill. It follows, therefore, that the discussion on this Bill will overlap with that on the other two Bills. The Group Areas Amendment Bill is based on three principles, which are firstly to fit in with the concept of free settlement areas and free trading areas, or, in simple language, with mixed or multicoloured trading and residential areas, secondly, to make the implementation of the existing Act possible; and thirdly, to stabilise the price of land for new developments.

I now want to refer briefly to the historical background to the origin of the Group Areas Act. The idea of separate residential areas is not an NP creation. Since the beginning of the settlement in the Cape there have been efforts to establish residential separation. The first actual legislation was most probably the well-known Glen Grey Act of 1894 which was implemented on the initiative of Cecil John Rhodes and which made provision for separate reserves for Blacks. At that stage even stricter measures applied in the Orange Free State and the Zuid-Afrikaansche Republiek. Various measures followed until in the 1940’s growing White resistance to the intrusion of Indians in particular in Durban led to stricter steps being taken by the then Smuts Government. That gave rise to the well-known Trading and Occupation of Land (Transvaal and Natal) Restriction Act of 1943, which was better known as the Pegging Act. These stricter measures formed the basis for the institution of the Group Areas Act in 1950 by the then NP Government under Dr D F Malan. The Group Areas Act of 1950 was therefore not only the product of NP ideology, but also the culmination of various efforts over many decades to establish effective separate residential areas. That is why the NP came into power with its apartheid policy. If one were to select one word which described the essence of NP policy over three decades, it would be “separateness”. The essential concept, the synoptical concept, which is synonymous with the NP and its policy, is no longer separateness, however, but togetherness, or simply integration on all levels with a few useless promises to boot.

I now want to refer to the general contents of the Bill.

Mr Chairman, will the hon member take a question?

Mr Chairman, my time is limited. [Interjections.] Firstly Bill B122 of 1988, consisting of 23 clauses, was put before us. This Bill was withdrawn, however, after which Bill B115 of 1988, consisting of 17 clauses, which is being discussed in this House at present, was tabled. The scientific process to which the hon member for Turffontein referred, lasted until a week ago, and then it was suddenly changed radically within a week. After that there was no mention whatsoever of another report by the President’s Council or an inquiry. A few small, rapid changes were simply made.

The Group Areas Amendment Bill mainly provides for the definition or further definition of certain expressions. Furthermore it provides for committees of the Group Areas Board to furnish the Minister with advice; for the disposal of immovable property illegally occupied; it empowers the Minister to order eviction where property is illegally acquired, held or occupied and to order the sheriff and messenger of the court to attach such property and sell it; it empowers the Minister to order eviction where property is illegally occupied; it increases penalties; it extends provisions that do not apply in respect of land or premises zoned for industrial purposes, which are influenced by this; it grants the State and a local authority the right to purchase certain properties; it provides for the payment of a depreciation contribution to owners of certain properties; it converts certain development areas into group areas for members of the Black group; and it provides for the appointment of inspectors. Those are the general guidelines of the amending Bill.

I now want to refer very briefly to the practical politics concerning these matters. The wellknown leader of the Red Indians in the USA, Red Cloud, once said the following to the White Americans of the USA …

Was he Sitting Bull’s brother?

I quote as follows:

Analogously I should like to say to the NP: “They made us many promises, more than I can remember, but they never kept but one. They promised to reform and integrate and they did.” [Interjections.] That is the NP’s dilemma. That is the NP’s problem. [Interjections.] By amending the Group Areas Act this party is telling us that in future the Act will be implemented more strictly in own areas and to that end the Act is now being given a few teeth—teeth which have already fallen out. The situation is, however, that the Official Opposition and the White voters simply do not believe the NP any more—and with reason.

What is the NP’s record in respect of this matter? Initially the NP promised that the Group Areas Act would not be abolished or rendered useless. That is what Mr P W Botha promised at the time and I quote him from Die Burger, a newspaper which surely is favourably disposed towards the NP. of 7 November 1981:

On 3 October 1985 Beeld quoted Mr P W Botha as follows:

Subsequently the NP started the process of creating its own reality. We stopped implementing an Act; a situation developed and we created a beautiful reality. The Government stopped prosecuting those who contravened the Act. In the Business Day of 3 September 1986 Mr Don Brunette, the Attorney-General for Transvaal, reported as follows:

This was confirmed by the facts. The hon the Minister of Law and Order’s reply to Question No 14 tabled in Parliament on Tuesday, 23 February 1988, was that in 1987 only three prosecutions in terms of the Group Areas Act took place out of 1243 complaints received. That represents 0,24%.

When the CP attacked the Government on the possible creation of grey residential areas, it was vehemently denied. On 23 March 1987, shortly before the general election, the Deputy Minister concerned, Mr Piet Badenhorst, said: “Government says no to grey areas.” I quote him as follows:

That was said, incidentally, six weeks before the general election which took place on 6 May 1987. Of course the NP wanted to attract votes, but five days after the election the Government once again changed course. The same Deputy Minister said that the Group Areas Act would be implemented sympathetically and that there was no question that the Government would suddenly start a campaign after the election to track down offenders and prosecute them. According to Rapport six days later, on 17 May, he said the following:

Five months later, after the election, the hon the State President stated that grey residential areas would now be allowed: “Oop woonbuurte—die Regering se ja”.

He did not use the word “grey”!

The Government says these three Bills should be read in conjunction with one another and that it intends reserving White areas for Whites. They are going to implement the Act more strictly, since it now has teeth. However, it is not the first time that the NP has said that. In Beeld, dated 18 October 1983, the following was reported on pages 1 and 2 under the heading “Onwettige bewoners finaal gewaarsku”:

The report goes on to say:

This appeared shortly before the referendum when the Government was also looking for support. The Government promised at the time to set matters straight. It has kept its promise to the extent that these particular areas in Johannesburg which had to be set straight in order to establish their White character, will most probably be the first residential areas to become grey areas. They will most probably become the first open areas.

The NP Government should realise that it is dealing with the voters of South Africa and not with children. If the Government thinks that its arguments are going to influence the CP in any way, it should test the general electorate. I say to the Government: “They no longer believe you,” because the Government’s actions over the past few years have destroyed its credibility completely. [Interjections.]

An interview which a German journalist, Mrs Anna Starcke, conducted with the hon the State President, then the Minister of Defence, in 1977 was published in her book Survival—Taped Interviews with South Africa’s Power Elite. On page 58 she asks the following question in with reference to Chief Minister Buthelezi’s point of view:

The hon the State President gave the following reply:

The hon the State President went further and I particularly want to read the following section for the benefit of those hon members who shout out “how” and “where” when the CP talks about self-determination:

He then went further and she put the following question to him:

Mr Botha’s answer was:

What did he say about a Coloured homeland?

Why are you so concerned about the Coloureds?

Order!

A few years later the self-same Mr P W Botha, as the State President, was quoted on page 1 of Die Burger, dated 5 October 1985, as having said the following at the Cape congress of the NP which was held in Port Elizabeth:

To me it seems to be more like coming to a fall.

That is a totally different point of view to the one held a few years previously; yet people are amazed when the Government once again makes promises and the voters simply say: “No thank you.”

These three Bills are being presented as a trilogy. Yesterday the hon member for Randburg stated that everyone present here knew that this legislation on group areas would be abolished in four or five years’ time or at some time in the future. Members of the Government on the opposite side of the House greeted that statement with a deafening silence. There were no denials, only silence.

No one is listening to you.

On 22 February of this year the hon the Deputy Minister of Information and Constitutional Planning, Dr Stoffel van der Merwe, said the following in the House of Representatives:

I should like the hon member for Swellendam, who is very talkative, to give me the assurance this afternoon that the Group Areas Act will not be abolished. Can the hon member give us the assurance that the Group Areas Act will not be abolished in future?

Now he has nothing to say. [Interjections.]

We hear nothing, Mr Chairman, except silence.

You have caught him out.

No reaction, only silence.

Order! I would have welcomed it if there had been more silence. The hon member may proceed.

I now want to refer briefly to a single clause of the Bill itself, viz clause 4 of the previous Bill which was put before us. but which has been withdrawn in the meantime. That clause provided for the creation of free trading areas; as the department put it, to expedite up the process establishing more areas.

The clause provided that such a decision could be made in principle and it then went on to say that a local authority could prevent it. This viewpoint was debated in the joint committee and the Government was perturbed to learn that its own wording implied that local authorities had a builtin right of veto to stop this process at that point.

Needless to say, with the introduction of this Bill the former clause 4 was left out, since the Government is undoubtedly determined to proceed with integration also in this area. One must not permit local option to be exercised, there must be no question of a veto right and therefore they removed it from the Bill so that they could simply force it on the communities.

The NP is in a classic dilemma. With these three Bills it is trying to be all things to all men, but in practice it means nothing to anybody. To the left the Government is trying to appease the Black, Coloured and Indian population groups with the Free Settlement Areas Act. That is why there is excitement in advertisements and on the joint committees that one can now live where one wants to.

The appeasement of the left is so successful that those Houses are not even here. At the same time the Government is trying to satisfy Whites with the Group Areas Amendment Bill and that is why the NP propaganda on mixed residential areas points out that mixed residential areas are the absolute exception in terms of NP policy. The NP is not satisfying either of the two. The problems have just started. The voters are taking note of its trapeze effort to satisfy people on both sides. It is trying to sit on two stools at the same time and it is going to fall between the two.

This legislation forms part of the trilogy and the CP is not fooled by a few rubber teeth. We shall not be supporting this legislation.

Mr Chairman, on the one hand it is pleasant to follow the hon member for Randfontein. He gave a very interesting historical explanation of the Glen Grey Act and the Pegging Act of 1840 and so on which culminated in the Group Areas Act. It was very informative and interesting. I think his submission is quite correct regarding this. Unfortunately he gets bogged down in the years 1948-50 and then he does not reach 1988.

A few other trifles emerged from his speech which make one wonder. He mentioned Red Riding Hood or Hansel (Hansie) and Gretel again; I cannot recall which one he spoke about.

Gansie!

Once again this is a revelation of the CP’s kindergarten mentality when the point at issue is the reality of South Africa. They believe in fairy stories so the entire direction of their policy is aimed at fairy stories. They believe in a dream and that is why they are so obsessed with verses which are learnt by children at primary and nursery school and with old, outdated fairy stories with which they now want to catch the voters of South Africa.

In addition, I want to mention a few other matters. The hon member was particularly talkative, very much more so than he was on the joint committee. I understand this, however. He must have had to do some homework and must probably first have had to consult his caucus. They cannot state an independent opinion in that party. Nevertheless, if my memory serves me, the hon member did not utter a single word on the joint committee. If I am wrong, I apologise.

The hon member said something else to which I think one could probably reply. He really had me, and I think the rest of the hon members here too, in a state of great expectancy when he said that hon members always asked how and when. Silence descended upon our ranks and we thought the great answer of the how and the where of CP policy was about to be revealed. It was just another false alarm, however, to tell us they were keeping it as a surprise for us. They are also keeping it as a surprise for the voters. One day they will go to the voters with an extremely unpleasant surprise.

A further element to which I should like to react is the question that the NP suddenly came up with free settlement areas after the election. This is simply in line with posters about separate residential areas where possible—coming to terms with the realities we have to deal with. I shall leave the hon member at this point and come to the amending Bill under discussion.

This amending Bill again raises the desirability, or otherwise, of the Group Areas Act. I shall not discuss the specific Act again but in the first place I want to argue briefly in favour of the necessity of amending legislation and more particularly of the Group Areas Amendment Bill. In the second place, I want to refer very briefly to the implementation of that legislation.

As regards the amending Bill, and even the principal Act too, various theories were formulated when the necessity for this measure was being considered. Opinions were aired and points of view raised, frequently by those who do not need to implement or have no prospect whatever of implementing their theories. It is true that theories are not without meaning but are lent significance only if they could be applied; otherwise they merely remain a futile intellectual exercise.

Approximately eight theories exist on the idea of the protection of human rights or group rights. I do not intend to elaborate on each theory because each of them advocates a specific standpoint which is supported by some and rejected by others or is supported or rejected with qualifications. A detailed discussion of each of these theories is consequently of little use in this debate.

In spite of this, I should like to refer in brief to a few of these theories, among them the CP theory. To them the entire question of group rights is simply a perpetuation of the old apartheid which also wants to entrench the position of the Whites constitutionally. The exclusive question here is material privilege on the basis of a specific skin colour.

A second theory in respect of the protection of group rights is held to the right of the political spectrum. This is the theory based on the socalled survival fear. It is this survival fear which is personified by the AWB elements in those ranks. It simply comes down to the fact that the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act, the old Group Areas Act in its rigid form and all the other discriminatory Acts which the Government has already scrapped should simply be retained because the principle issue is the retention of discriminatory measures.

One has to deal pragmatically with prevailing realities. One of the questions which arises on consideration of the necessity for the principle Act and therefore for the amending Bill is whether a charter of human rights is not sufficiently effective to protect group rights too. I shall return to this aspect later.

As regards the reality of the existence of different types of groups, with the possible exception of the PFP which is not present here, there is a great degree of unanimity on this and on that side and, to go further, there is great unanimity throughout the world as expressed in the UN and this has been embodied in a long report by a certain judge, Francesco Capotorti. These rights have also been formulated by a German, an American and various others whose names I shall not mention. We therefore have to do with a worldwide recognition of such rights, once again with the apparent exception of the PFP and their satellites.

Recognition of a group right is one matter; its application is another. Self-determination is argued by some to be a group right and that is only partially correct, but not without qualification, because what is self-determination for group A is treason for group B.

In this case we are now dealing with a conflict of interests which has to be dealt with by the State. The authorities are now called upon to create and maintain a specific legal order and in such a way that every subject can fulfil his destined function in the social context, one individual to another, the individual to society and one social group to another.

It is true that, as regards making the Act more practicable, we had expected the Official Opposition at least to support the principle contained in the Bill, but we did not receive this support. They abstained from voting—to which we are accustomed.

Just as South Africa stands alone against the world, is always under attack and practically without a friend in the outside world, we of the NP are also accustomed to this. We sit here with the CP, the independent spectrum, various groupings, the PFP, the ECC, the ANC … [Interjections.] … the AWB—forgive me for not mentioning this initially—but all are opposed to the NP with the exception of a few members. We are accustomed to this and the NP can cope with this, just as we have coped with this country for 40 years.

Just as the individual is entitled to specific personal rights such as a good name, honour, the sanctity of the body and also the right to privacy—and I am addressing this more particularly to the absentees from the House, the PFP—a people is equally entitled to a specific right to privacy, which it can then exercise in own residential areas under specific conditions and in specific areas where such a people can live together because its rights and the prestige of the group represent its privacy which it can protect in its residential area.

Own residential areas have a diversity of meanings of which I want to emphasise only a few in a more cultural context. In the first place, a residential area is the home, stronghold and base of activity from which the individual departs to his work place in the morning and to which he returns in the evening.

In the second place, it has also become a religious-ecclesiastical home to him in spite of the fact that various denominations exist.

A third element in which the own residential area is involved is family life in the sense that the adults and children in a family can make friends with other families and so build up a circle of friends.

Then there is also the school, where the young person is mobilised to take his place in society, in corporate life, the business world and civil administration.

It is true that there are many fears among the Whites about what could happen if the Group Areas Act were either adapted or repealed. The fear is expressed for instance that residential areas could be inundated, that proprietary rights could be threatened, that the value of property could decline and that identity could be threatened, and these are realities which a responsible government has to take into account.

It is also interesting to note in this connection that the South African Institute of Race Relations came to give evidence before the joint committee through a research committee under the direction of a certain Prof Steve Friedman in cooperation with a certain Mr Moosa Ebrahim and a certain Mr C Pickard-Cambridge. These people came to give evidence on the acceptability of the Group Areas Act or the idea of groups in specific residential areas.

They carried out research—they did not do so among the CP—and found that there was no scope in Windhoek, Harare and Hillbrow for the application of the principle of groups.

In reply to a question whether they had carried out any research at all in Coloured and Asian areas and, if so, (a) why they had kept quiet about this and (b) what the results were, there was no reply as regards the concealment and, concerning the result, there was the interesting finding that the protective measure offered by the Group Areas Act was acceptable to the Coloureds and that they made use of it.

This Bill for the umpteenth time reaffirms the Government’s standpoint of own residential areas for the various population groups and also the legal protection that goes with it. In this way the need for an own community life in own residential areas and the protection and broadening of property rights is confirmed.

At the same time it was argued in this House yesterday and today in the discussion of the Free Settlement Areas Bill that provision should also be made for those who are not particularly interested in a specific residential area. It remains the Government standpoint, however, that the rights of individuals and groups under South African conditions can best be protected in the context of an own community. In all cases the vested rights of individuals must continue to be respected.

I support the amending Bill.

Mr Chairman, it is my pleasure to be speaking after my colleague and friend, the hon member for Bloemfontein North.

However, I should like to preserve a remark for posterity, in case this remark which was made by way of an interjection by the hon member Mr Derby-Lewis, was not recorded in Hansard. I am talking about the remark the hon member made when he made it very clear to all of us present here that Prof Boshoff was not a leading (lei-dende) member of the CP. [Interjections.] We must always remember that in the future.

How does he spell that? With a “y”?

I made the statement earlier today that what was being proclaimed by the CP in a pamphlet and which, as far as I know, appeared for the first time in Patriot on 6 May 1988, was a lie.

The statement is that it is now NP policy that mixed residential areas must be allowed, and furthermore that township developers themselves can decide whether the new residential areas that are being established by them, should be racially mixed or not. I asked for a response to this. There was a response from the hon member for Ermelo. I made it clear that my standpoint would be that any person who said that what was stated here was the truth, would be confirming a lie in this House. The hon member said that it was the truth. The hon member said that it was the truth because it was based on the Report of the President’s Council. Surely the hon member should know that the Report of the President’s Council is not government policy.

In fact, on 5 October 1987, months and months before this article appeared, the Government had already adopted a standpoint by way of a statement made by the hon the State President. What did the hon the State President say? With regard to new residential areas, the hon the State President said the following on 5 October 1987 (Hansard: Assembly, 1987, col 6670):

Does that appear to be a free choice?

It is not even being done any longer!

Would the hon member not rather read the Act?

But you are the ones who are introducing free settlement areas now.

Sir, I cannot react. The hon member does not even know what I am talking about now.

In col 6672 the hon the State President said the following about free settlement areas:

Does that look like a free choice for developers? I am saying that what they are publishing is a lie. It is a lie twice over. [Interjections.]

Let us see what is really written here. Township developers themselves will be able to decide, so they say, whether the new residential areas that are being established by them, should be racially mixed or not. Hon members are obsessed with telling voters that they will be forced to live in open areas. They are saying that the developer can decide whether the area should be racially mixed. The developer cannot decide that the area must be racially mixed. He can only decide that the area may be racially mixed. Surely that does not suit hon members. I am saying that it is a lie twice over. Actually, it is a threefold lie.

Let us look at what was really contained in the report and recommendation. The recommendation under the Chapter Samevattings 7.3.14 from the President’s Council’s Report of the Committee for Constitutional Affairs on the report of the Technical Committee, 1983, and related matters reads:

I am emphasising this—

What is contained in the CP’s document? For the sake of convenience the words “in die geval van nuwe residensiële dorpe” are omitted. It is merely said that the NP is in favour of open residential areas based on the choice of township developers. That is the threefold lie. [Interjections.]

When one considers this type of politics and then has to sit in this House and receive confirmation that this is indeed the way in which these hon members want to conduct their political activities, one begins to wonder what our political scene is coming to. But it suits them, Sir.

I wonder if hon members have recently been to Sunnyside. I went there, and I was shocked. I was shocked to see placards there on which the following words were written: “Voorkom Hillbrowslum in Sunnyside”. Sir, it is a disgrace, and what else was on that placard? Crosses, Sir. Hon members can tell me what that represents. What do those crosses represent? Are they perhaps gravestones? I just want to say one thing, and I am saying it as a Christian Afrikaner in this House: Those hon members are asking for trouble with tokens and symbols of greater significance than the petty politics they are indulging in.

Hear, hear!

I object to it, and I want my fellow-Afrikaners and my fellow-churchgoers outside the precincts of this House to hear of the misuse of a token and a symbol of something that has no place in the petty politics those hon members are indulging in. [Interjections.]

They are now carrying on in that way, and I am once again coming to the hon member for Ermelo. The hon member adopted a standpoint in this House today by asking why we did not make evictions compulsory. “What is the problem with regard to evicting people?”, he asked. The hon member for Durbanville said that that hon member regarded people as and handled them like animals, and I am saying that what the hon member for Durbanville said is true. They do not regard the fact that the man may have young children who would not have a refuge for the night as a problem. Nor does it matter that the man’s mother or other members of his family, or he himself may be ill. Evict him! Evict him in the interests of the principle that only White people will live in certain areas! Surely he could have asked for a permit if he had wanted to live there! [Interjections.]

You wanted to do that last week!

Sir, let it be placed on record that the NP members gave notice on that joint committee of the amendment which was ultimately before this House. It is not something that was initiated afterwards as a result of pressure. It was the motion of the NP members that was accepted by the Government.

It was Beeld which exerted pressure on you.

Don’t be silly!

No, Sir, politically I will be very happy when I go home after this debate. I shall tell hon members why. The CP can trade on hate, and on spite, and on raw emotion to a certain extent, but they are underestimating the Afrikaner. They are underestimating not only his intellect, but aso his integrity, his honesty and his sense of justice. [Interjections.]

Sir, I would rather leave that party and its activities at that, and, in a more serious vein, deal with the question that is not only being asked by the left wing, but also by supporters of the NP with regard to this Bill that is now before the House. The question we are being asked is whether we accept the principle of free association, and with that whether, in view of natural population patterns throughout the world, the Group Areas Act überhaupt is still necessary. Today, in all seriousness, I want to give this House and those who are asking this question an answer.

This side of the House accepts the concept of “free association”, but this concept means that everyone can choose with whom he wants to associate. Justice cannot be done to concept free of asssociation without the existence of different choices and groups. It would mean that if we did not have such a wide choice, one would be confronted with a single choice only. The whole principle of free association would fail.

The situation in South Africa is not the same as in many other parts of the world in which certain population patterns have developed of their own accord and where one in fact encounters natural segregation in the residential areas. The difference is that here in South Africa we have a large group of people who not only have a Third World lifestyle, but who live under Third World conditions. Any indiscriminate throwing open of areas is simply going to mean that nothing will come of the concept of free association. In the abnormal condition in which we find ourselves here— abnormal in relation to conditions in other parts of the world where specific patterns have developed of their own accord—we cannot even consider or think about it at this stage. To the question whether the Group Areas Act will remain, I want to answer that of course it will remain. This law will remain in existence as long as it is necessary for the protection of everyone in South Africa—of the Whites as well. [Interjections.]

I said earlier today that the CP made a principle of apartheid and segregation. However, separate residential areas is a method whereby something larger, better and more important can be achieved. We need them as an instrument on the road to peace. We do not want to and need not use this in the same way as the CP. We do not want to use it as an instrument for confrontation or racial friction, because it would then become an instrument with which the CP will ultimately cause the Whites of this country to meet with disaster.

Mr Chairman, I listened with considerable interest to the speech of the hon member for Sundays River. One point that struck me was that the spirit and content of the hon member’s speech—and some of the other speeches I have heard this afternoon—were not compatible with some of the harsh provisions of the Bill before us. That is the very problem I have with this Bill.

Before I deal with that further, I want to associate myself with some of the remarks made by the hon member for Sasolburg in regard to what took place in the House yesterday. I too want to express my disgust at the boycott behaviour yesterday of the PFP in withdrawing from this Chamber. Such hit-and-run tactics achieve nothing. I regard the PFP’s actions in this respect to be highly irresponsible and a deliberate attempt to undermine the status of Parliament. However, when one thinks about it, that party is perhaps still smarting from the drubbing it received at the hands of the House of Delegates and the House of Representatives during the joint meeting when the National Council Bill was being debated. This is probably an attempt to appease those who expressed their criticism.

Turning to the Bill before us, I want to say I am aware of the changes that have been made to the original Bill. However, as far as I am concerned, they are not sufficient to enable me to lend my support to the Bill because this legislation will only aggravate the urbanization problems with which this country is confronted.

There are aspects of this Bill of which I am fully supportive. However, when one looks at the negative aspects, the harshness of the penalties for contravention of the Act stands out like a sore thumb and is out of all proportion to the seriousness of any crime that may purportedly be committed under the Act.

Similarly, proposed measures in the Bill to tighten up on the mechanisms in the application of the Act are devoid of any respectability or reality in today’s political climate. I want to appeal to the hon the Minister not to alienate the support of moderate-minded people by introducing legislation of such severity to placate the feelings of the right wing.

As the hon member for Yeoville stated earlier this week, the Government is endeavouring to win back its lost voters. Let them go! I want to emphasize that the Government should not destroy the support of moderates at this crucial time in our history by overreacting to a situation which includes measures which may be repugnant and unacceptable to moderate-minded people.

In all honesty, although one welcomes certain changes to the original Act, these changes do not go far enough. While I accept provisions for open areas, I want to know how the clause which empowers the Minister to order an eviction when a magistrate fails to do so can be justified? One must therefore by careful to keep the application of a Bill of this nature within the confines of legitimacy.

As I have stated previously, the concept of local option should provide the means whereby local authorities can be given discretion to decide as to what or whether action should be taken against those who may be contravening the law. Fundamental to such a decision should be the prerequisite that alternative accommodation is always available to those persons who, for bona fide reasons, find themselves resident in a defined area of another race group.

I have received numerous requests from people who have been born and bred in an area and who now face ejectment or eviction under the provisions of the Act without there being any form of alternative accommodation available to them within the precincts of the area where they live and have lived all their lives.

I accept that the Group Areas Act is a cornerstone of Government policy but I would like to emphasize that the manner in which it is applied will also determine the cornerstone of orderly reform in this country. I also accept that the Act cannot summarily be scrapped but, surely, one should be looking at means of gradually phasing it out in a responsible manner.

This is where I have a problem with the present Bill because, even in its present form, it is a contradiction of the Government’s assurances that it is sincere in regard to reform. For example, may I ask where this Bill fits in with the muchpublicized National Council Bill which, incidentally, I was pleased to support, and whose success will depend on enlisting the support of Black leaders? Is it not being made even more difficult for them to participate by the introduction of legislation of this nature?

The Bill in its present form should not be proceeded with. As I see it, the passing of this Bill will do more harm than good in the long term and its implementation will be retrogressive to the whole concept of reform.