Mr. Speaker, there is, I regret to say, very little that I heard in the speeches from the Government benches last night which warrants any lengthy reply. However, I think I should make a brief reference to at least three of those speeches which, in my view, came near to insulting the intelligence of this House. [Interjections.] I refer in particular to the speeches by the hon. member for Port Elizabeth North, the hon. member for Prieska, and the hon. the Minister of Water Affairs. The theme that went through those speeches was summarized by the hon. the Minister with reference to the hon. member for Johannesburg North. It is not my function here to defend the hon. member for Johannesburg North, but it is a trend which came through all these speeches, and consequently I am going to refer to it briefly. It is this: South Africa’s trouble today, and particularly her unpopularity in the world, can be attributed largely to that section of the people referred to by one of the hon. members as “ons vyande”. That reference was to the English speaking people of this country. [Interjections.]

The finger was pointed particularly to the hon. member for Johannesburg North, because he happens to have been born in Scotland. The fact that he was born outside of South Africa has no more relevance to our events than the fact that the late Dr. Verwoerd was also born outside of South Africa. [Interjections.] During the course of my speech I shall attempt to indicate the true cause of our problems and the true cause of South Africa’s unpopularity in the world. I should have thought that, in these times in particular, instead of the expressions we heard last night of a section of the White people being “ons vyande”, we would have had expressions of appreciation from the Government benches for the fact that the overwhelming majority of all the white people of this country are responsible citizens who have concern for the welfare of South Africa, because that is a fact.

There was one speech, however, which I listened to last night, from the Government benches, which was of great interest. That was the speech by the hon. member for Johannesburg West, a speech which I shall have something more to say about a little later this afternoon.

In my view, there are three priorities, and I believe everybody will accept that there are three priorities in South Africa’s present situation. As I see it, they are, firstly, the country’s economic strength, secondly, her military preparedness and her ability to defend herself, and thirdly, the creation of a situation where some great world powers are not hostile to us and where some of our neighbouring African States are friendly disposed towards us. Those three are the priorities as I see them, and I should like to examine each of them at a little length.

Firstly, let us look at the country’s economic strength, and let us consider for a moment what that entails and what it means. I believe that our budgetary situation, which has occupied the time of this House for two days or more, can be very briefly stated. It can be briefly stated and understood in relation to one’s own business enterprise.

Let us consider for a moment South Africa (Pty.) Ltd., a company with assets, land, capital equipment and employees. It has an income which the Government derives by way of taxation from the people. That income is normally used for the normal running of this company, of South Africa (Pty.) Ltd. Like every company it requires—if it is to prosper—capital for capital development, because without capital development, one’s company stagnates. In South Africa (Pty.) Ltd. we raise that capital from a variety of sources. We raise it from private sources overseas for investment in South Africa. We raise it from Government loans raised abroad for capital investment here, and we raise it from South Africans who invest capital in South Africa in the private field. That, simply, is the way we operate.

Our running costs come from taxation. Our capital for development, which is essential to our welfare, we raise privately at home and by Government loans, and privately abroad and by Government loans. If a situation is reached where we can no longer raise that capital abroad—and figures have been given to indicate that that is a large part of our capital source at the present time—either we stagnate economically, which is part of our malaise at the present time, or we have to use part of our revenue internally by way of raising taxes to provide the capital for the further development of South Africa (Pty.) Ltd. If one looks at it in that light, which is, I believe, all that the hon. member for Johannesburg North said, but in more elaborate terms, then one realizes that to a large extent we are reliant for our welfare upon Government and private money coming from overseas, and if we are governing ourselves in a manner which prevents this money from coming in, we must take the consequences, which will be heavy and expensive. Why is economic strength the first priority in the present situation? It is the first priority because, in my view, it is so much easier to make political and social adjustments in a multiracial situation when you are in an era of prosperity with full employment and low taxation, than in a period of economic depression with unemployment and high taxation. Whatever stratagems may be adopted by the Government at the present time, we are in a situation where haltingly we are making economic and social changes, but where the need exists for dramatic economic and social changes.

There is another factor which has to be considered in this situation. We have been warned by the Western powers that if we continue on our present path they will have difficulty in exercising a veto in the Security Council of the United Nations in our favour to avoid economic sanctions of one kind or another being imposed on this country. I wonder whether this House has ever stopped to consider the gravity of what that situation would mean to us were it to be imposed.

Explain it to us.

I shall explain it to the House. Let us consider our exports for a moment. I shall name only some of them; wool, wine, fruit, gold, minerals of a wide variety, sugar and an increasingly wide variety of finished and semi-finished products. Imports like machinery of every kind, agricultural equipment of every kind and almost the whole field of what we need in order to survive will be affected. [Interjections.]

That is not to mention oil and defence, upon which I shall elaborate in a moment. Whilst I accept that in the modern world— and Rhodesia has shown this to us—no system of sanctions is wholly effective, a system of even partially effective sanctions would gravely imperil our economic life and certainly our economic prosperity. To a large extent Rhodesia has survived through her own ingenuity in the first place and, secondly, because of the fact that she has South Africa next door. In our case there would be no South Africa next door. There would be at worst a naval patrol patrolling our shores as happened earlier on in the case of Rhodesia in order to impose the sanctions ordered by the Security Council, probably with bases in Mozambique and Angola as happened in the case of Rhodesia, or, at best, there would be trade sactions imposed domestically by and within countries that normally trade with us. Even at that level the consequences would be dramatic and harmful to our economic prosperity.

If there are those who think that the present economic climate is a difficult one—and I am one of those who think in those terms—it will be as nothing compared to what lies ahead if our present course were to result in sanctions against us being imposed by the Security Council. I hope that what I am saying will not be interpreted as suggesting that we must bow to every whim of world opinion. I do not believe that that is so and I have stated it frequently in the past. However, what I am saying is that it is high time that we do here of our own volition what we know to be right and proper in respect of all our population groups.

I come to the second point, which is military preparedness and the ability to defend ourselves against agressors from outside. I use these two phrases deliberately because military preparedness is one thing—to a large extent we buy the equipment and make the rest—but our ability to defend ourselves is a far wider concept. I do not have to argue the case for military preparedness. In this budget we will vote an amount approaching R2 000 million for our military defence and that speaks for itself. I believe it has the support of everybody in this House.

I wonder, however, if this House appreciates that the bulk of our military hardware is imported, and largely from one country in Europe, viz. France. I also wonder if the House realizes that France is one of those countries which is showing signs at the United Nations of taking a more stern attitude towards us in respect of sanctions. [Interjections.] As I am reminded, one must bear in mind too the influence in France of recent local elections.

If we appreciate the position of France in her domestic situation and in the Security Council and in relation to those who supply her with oil, then we must realize that that position can change and from where do we then get the equipment necessary for our defence? Here again I appreciate that there is a black market in arms and equipment which is available to every country in the world. However, it becomes increasingly difficult and wildly more expensive.

You are revealing your absolute ignorance.

I hope the hon. the Minister will come into the debate and give us some facts and figures on this matter.

I shall reply to you on my Vote.

I shall be very glad to hear your reply on your Vote.

I am not going to reply to every bit of nonsense you talk …

From what I know about the hon. the Minister, he will evade all these issues because he knows most of them are true. [Interjections.]

I want to look at the next point, which is the key to our situation, and that is the ability to defend ourselves. In simple terms this means the ability of the Government to unite all South Africa’s peoples in common cause against any possible aggression from abroad. No one who is in possession of his senses can contemplate a successful defence of this country against external threats whilst at the same time suppressing internal disorder by sections of a disaffected population within South Africa. Every military spokesman in this country emphasizes that point. The White Paper of the hon. the Minister infers exactly the same thing, and of course that is quite right. How is that unity of purpose to be brought about? It cannot be imposed or done artificially. It must come about—and I emphasize this—naturally from the hearts of the people, all of them. It must come from a wish to defend what they have because they prefer what they have to what is being offered by any potential aggressor from outside. That is the key to the situation. The people must generally prefer what they have to what is offered by those who seek to impose it from outside.

In short, and in blunted terms, the Coloured man and the Black man must be prepared to defend South Africa against Russian and Cuban directed aggression because they prefer being ruled by White South Africans or, more particularly, the White Nationalists—the hon. gentlemen sitting over there—who carry this responsibility at the present time, to being ruled by a Russian, a Cuban or a left-wing Black South African.

That is your version.

I shall be very glad to hear the Chief Whip put up a different version of the situation. I want to ask my hon. friends opposite who are in that situation whether they, the Government, would be certain of their position if that choice had to be made in South Africa within the next 12 months. How sure can they be of their position to rally enthusiastic support from all races for the defence of this country under the policies which they pursue at the present time? It has not gone unnoticed to all classes and people of this country that President Podgorny visited the countries next door to us. What did he talk about and what was the phraseology he used? It appeared on television and in the Press. He talked about freedom and justice and a sharing of wealth and power and of throwing off the yoke of White colonialist imperialism. However, the words that worried me were words such as “freedom” and “justice”. The true facts of life in Soviet Russia are not known to a great many of our people in this country. I doubt whether the bulk of our Black and Brown people are knowledgeable of the true state of affairs in Soviet Russia, where there is political dictatorship, economic slavery, a total absence of freedom and a total absence of all those things which the Soviet President was preaching when he visited our neighbouring States in Southern Africa. What is regrettably known to the Black man and the Brown man of this country are the facts of his own situation. He knows very well, for example, that he cannot own a square inch of land in Soweto as a Black man. He knows that certain jobs are barred to him because of his race and he knows that his quality of life—to use a phrase that has been used earlier during this debate—in a place like Soweto is in many respects quite shocking, and it cannot be described in any other way. South Africa’s ability to defend itself and its economic strength are directly related, the one to the other, and both are to a large extent dependent upon the quality of life which we are able to engender for all the people of South Africa, people—I refer to the Black and the Brown people in particular—who are daily being more and more educated and informed by the Government to an awareness of the quality of their lives. It is inescapable that that will take place with the greater economic and educational advantages that are being made available to them.

We know that.

If the hon. gentleman knows that, I see no appreciation of its effect. [Interjections.] We are educating these people—I emphasize it—to a greater and greater ability to assess and appreciate their own position in South Africa and to compare their position with that of the Whites as to its equalities and its inequalities, and as to the credits and the injustices of that position. I am not referring to the rural Blacks, because amongst them there is ignorance to a large extent as well as unsophistication. I am, however, referring to the Coloured man and to the urban Black, who are becoming increasingly aware of events and who are, as I assess the situation, reaching the stage where they are no longer prepared passively to endure the indignities which stem from many aspects of Government policy.

Name them. [Interjections.]

I want to summarize this aspect of what I have been saying. In short, I believe one will retain the loyalty and support of the young Blacks and the young Browns—because they are the people to which our gaze should be directed—firstly if the quality of their lives here is as good or better than they can acquire elsewhere. I am prepared to concede immediately that in the economic field we have already, to a large extent, put them in that position. Secondly we shall retain the loyalty and support of the young Blacks and the young Browns provided that the values which the Government and ourselves are teaching them at school in ever-increasing numbers, are seen by them to be real and attainable and not illusory and something which is reserved for the Whites. Along that road I see only danger.

The third point I shall mention only in passing because I think I have covered it to a large extent. The third priority is that we should bring about a situation where there are at least a few Western powers which are friendly disposed towards us, but more important, where we have a number of African neighbours on this continent who are friendly disposed towards us; and by that I mean sufficiently friendly as to be unprepared to harbour camps of guerrilla insurgents for use against South Africa. After all, the greater part of our defence effort at the present time is taken up in trying to contain this type of guerrilla warfare. If we could bring about a situation where our neighbouring States were no longer prepared to be host to those people, we would not be spending R2 000 million on defence and we would not be in the position of economic strain in which we are at the moment.

I do not believe—and I now address myself to the hon. member for Johannesburg West—that the situation could have been better put in broad principle, than was done by him. What did he say? He said that we must be prepared to relinquish much in order that we retain that which we regard as valuable, in other words that one must have priorities and weigh up the situation, that one cannot keep it all, as times are changing, and that one must see what one can discard and get rid of in order to retain that which is important. He said that the basis of responsibility for survival had to be broadened to include all South Africans who shared a common fatherland, and that therefore a new understanding between different groups had to be found. What have I been trying to say for the last 20 minutes in this House but what the hon. member said yesterday? He went further and said that we should, above all, set aside personal political ambition. There are many on the Government benches who hold the same views as the hon. member for Johannesburg West. I want to ask how it is conceivable that hon. members who hold the views expressed by him and by others can sit on the same benches as the three hon. members whom I referred to earlier in my speech, whose vision for South Africa and for debate in 1977 is to use sentiments which would have been an embarrassment to the NP in 1948. [Interjections.]

Order!

The tragedy of our situation is that not only are there in the ranks of hon. members on the Government benches a number of people who think as does that hon. member in the comer, but that there are people in all three Opposition parties who think the same. In other words, on all sides of this House and in every party represented in this House there are people who think similarly upon the principles which that hon. member stated and which I have attempted to state here this afternoon. Why then cannot something coalesce out of this community of thought, particularly when South Africa is facing the urgency of the situation which it is facing at the present time.

Why cannot these people be brought together on the basis of an agreed programme of action? Let us forget long term solutions which may never see the light of day. Half of what I sat here listening to the late Dr. Verwoerd preach is already forgotten history. Let us—indeed forget the historic importance of Afrikaner exclusivity and dominance which had its place but which I believe no longer has a place. Let us above all—and I consider this to be of primary importance— set aside personal political ambition and place-seeking because until that is done on all sides I do not believe that any new political party will succeed. The hon. member for Johannesburg West stated the principles and I believe … [Interjections.]

Order!

… in relinquishing some practices and prejudices in order to retain that which is valuable. What we are trying to do in the new political dispensation which is being launched is precisely that. If we succeed in getting broad-based support for even a short-term programme of action, I believe that we shall have done this country and the Government a service.

I would now like to address myself to the leadership of the governing party opposite. Traditionally, and for the last 30 years in particular, the Nationalist politicians have sought leadership within their group, that is to say the leadership of the NP, because that has opened the door to political power and influence in South Africa. Naturally enough, that is to be commended. However, it has been leadership of the NP alone and it has been dominance of the rest of South Africa, both Black and White. Today the hon. the Prime Minister leads his party, but does he lead South Africa and all its people? [Interjections.] I doubt it very much. The hon. gentleman dominates South Africa and its people because he is the leader of that party. I believe that that era is passing. We are passing that position where any group can dominate in this country. I believe that the main service left to the leadership of the NP, particularly the Prime Minister—and I say this seriously and with respect—is to move from that position, i.e. leadership of the Afrikaner but dominance of South Africa, to a new position of leadership of South Africa, leadership of the Whites—I trust my change of terminology is noted—I repeat, leadership of the Whites. This will provide a platform, not for dominance of the rest, but for leadership of the rest. If he can do that, he will go down in history, not as the man who divided Afrikanerdom, which is the cardinal sin, but I believe as the man who saved Afrikanerdom.

In conclusion, let me state that if the hon. the Prime Minister and his colleagues cannot do that, i.e. transfer the situation from dominance of South Africa and all its peoples to leadership of South Africa and all its peoples, he and his colleagues will go down in history as the men who not only broke Afrikanerdom, but also broke South Africa on the wheel of obsolete traditions and prejudices.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Umhlatuzana made an important speech, a speech in which, in my opinion, he honestly—I know him to be an honest person and I should like to accept him as such—sought clarity, not only on the problems of South Africa, but also on the problems in regard to the people in South Africa in an attempt to solve the problems. I want to accord recognition to the earnestness of his argument that a situation has to develop in which certain persons in the English-language group, as he singled them out at the outset, also have to find a political home somewhere. But I just want to say that I immediately reject his argument that the NP Afrikaner is exclusive … [Interjections.] and in this way offers no political home to any other person. Since we listened to what he had to say with honesty and in earnest, I should be pleased if that favour were shown to me as well. My experience at the present time, and pre-eminently the results of the city council elections in Johannesburg and the fact that no Opposition candidate is fighting an election in Westdene, endorses with great emphasis the fact that with the death of the UP there are many good English-speaking South Africans who are seeking a new political home and who are looking to the NP with ever-growing interest as the alternative. [Interjections.] This is being illustrated in practice, and no amount of barracking in this House will be able to undo it.

Where were you yesterday evening?

I was here yesterday evening, precisely where I am standing now. The hon. member stated very clearly that the Prime Minister is only leading South Africa’s Nationalists or the Afrikaners—I do not know precisely how he put it. He said it was time the hon. the Prime Minister made an adjustment and led South Africa and all its people. But surely it is true that some time ago a survey was made by a Bantu newspaper called The World in which it was very clearly apparent that a high percentage of the Black people in South Africa accepted the Prime Minister as a competent, dedicated leader.

They accept him within the framework of our normal circumstances. If the hon. member wishes to adopt that standpoint—I want to give him credit for it—I want to ask him whether he sees any other leader in this House or elsewhere in South Africa, former judges included, who could be a leader of all the people in South Africa on a broader basis than the leadership of the present Prime Minister? Is there such a person, and where? I therefore find myself in the position that, although I should like to appreciate the earnestness of the hon. member, I have to make it very clear that we as Nationalists in this House have just as much to lose as the hon. members opposite if things were to go wrong in South Africa. It is just as important for us that this country be saved for the generations who come after us. On the contrary. For us there is so much at stake because we want no other political home of any nature than South Africa. Therefore the hon. member may with great confidence and assurance leave the future of our country in the hands of people on this side who have just as much, if not more, at stake as some people opposite, and when I say this, I do not wish to reproach anyone.

Mr. Speaker, every true student of international politics is certainly aware of the Russian world strategy which seeks ultimately to establish a world republic of the workers in which Moscow will have the upper hand. No one doubts this. Every true student is also aware of the fact that Russia has up to now carried out its plan of action with painful precision, inter alia, in Eastern Europe, by infiltration in Western Europe, by its actions in the Far East, in the Near East and also in the rest of Africa.

At present Southern Africa is receiving its special attention. Every student of international politics will also be aware of the fact that this ambition of communist Russia must ultimately lead to a confrontation with the Western way of life and with Western concepts of freedom, etc., and that that confrontation must take place at some time or other, unless the West is prepared to throw in the towel and lie down, without offering any resistance, before the onslaught of Russia.

The general concept of “the West” comprises certain principles, certain patterns of life, of which the USA is certainly one of the most clearest exponents. Owing to its military and economic strength, owing to the decisive role which it played in the last two world wars and owing to the fact that it is somewhat removed from the sphere of influence and conflicts of Western Europe, America is universally accepted as the leader of the West and the bearer of the Western idea. Let me say at once that I personally have a great appreciation and admiration for the American people. Like us they are also a relatively young people that have within a century or two achieved what has not yet been achieved in some European countries after many centuries. Their technological, economic, social and military achievements are known and renowned throughout the world. They have utilized to the full their own ability, their own raw materials, to the benefit of their own country and also the outside world. America is therefore the undisputed leader of the Western world, and therefore indirectly also the leader of South Africa because we believe our place is in the Western world and we apply Western concepts in everything we do. But my experience of the Americans has also been that they are a nation who speak very frankly and to whom one is able to speak very frankly. They are a nation whom one can attack if it has to be done and whose ears are open to arguments if they are strong arguments. They are also people who can take strong action against one, if it may be necessary.

There is no doubt that at present Russia is appropriating Africa for itself. Since 1954 a special effort has been made to win Africa for communism. This was very clearly stated by Prof. Ivan Potekhin when he said that the groundwork should be done “to fit Africa into the pattern of Marxist analysis”. The Institute for the Study of Conflict in London recently published a very interesting brochure in its series Conflict Studies, written by David Rees, with the theme “Soviet strategic penetration of Africa”. In this extremely interesting brochure the extent to which Russia has already penetrated into Africa and precisely what bases it has already obtained for itself on this continent are very clearly set out. Allow me to quote a few passages from it in order to open the eyes of those who believe that there is no Russian threat. In Somalia, in the city of Berbera, an enormous base has been established from which the Red Sea is in fact under surveillance by the Russians. Add to that the already existing naval base at Aden as well as the facilities in South Yemen, and one gets an idea of the extent of the Russian naval strategy.

It is known that in the Republic of Guinea, at the harbour of Konakri, an airport has been constructed which has already been used by Russia to convey Cuban troops to Angola and for bringing in fuel. The Russians have a base in Guinea-Bissau, as well as a strong influence in the republics of Sáo-Tomé and Principe. On the island of Bazarutu, near Mozambique, 16 km from the Mozámbique coast between Beira and Inhambane, an enormous air base is at present being constructed by the Russians from which their jets will be able to operate. In addition the Russians have during the past few years also obtained bases in Angola, i.e. Luanda and Lobito, and along the east coast the bases and harbours of Maputo, Beira, the deep-sea harbour of Nacala and also Porto Amelia. It is particularly the Indian Ocean, in which a vacuum was left after the removal of the British fleet, that the Russians have found specially accessible, and they have filled that vacuum.

It is interesting to note that the Russian fleet has been expanded tremendously in recent times. This has come to our attention, and it has been asked why this is being done. Certain world strategists have offered the interpretation that Russia has by now more or less achieved the influence which it was able to exercise in the northern hemisphere, that it has now turned its eyes southwards, to the southern hemisphere, and that the southern hemisphere, if one looks at the map, is not a land mass, but oceans into which several fingerpoints of land masses thrust southwards. To make its influence felt there, Russia therefore needs a fleet, a fleet to maintain surveillance over the oceans. In July 1976 Admiral Gorschov spelt out his style with pleasure, and I quote—

Further on he added—

In the article from which I have just quoted in “Conflict Studies” Rees puts it as follows—

If, in addition to this, it is observed that an agreement, a 20-year treaty, has just, during the past month, been signed between Mozambique and Russia, during Podgorny’s visit, and that a treaty was signed last year between Angola and Russia during Neto’s visit to Russia, one sees very clearly how far matters have already developed. Then one realizes how Africa is at present receiving the full attention of Russia, and at present Southern Africa in particular. With all these facts as clearly before one, one is astounded that an important person such as Mr. Andrew Young, the American Ambassador to the UNO, can react by saying that he regrets that his country over-reacted to the “so-called” Russian threat in Africa, that his country unfortunately reacted paranoiacally. Such open blindness in a person who ought to know better or ought to be better informed by his advisers, astounds one. In regard to President Carter—I am deliberately discussing America today—I want to make it clear that he has apparently set himself the goal of achieving a few things during his term as President. He wants to ensure that human rights come into their own in the world—a wonderful, highly moral ideal. Whether it is feasible in the world in which we are living, full of faults and human failings, he shall have to find out.

Secondly, he wants to bring about peace in Southern Africa if he can, and thirdly he wants to try to win Africa for the West. I want to say at once that I have great respect for President Carter in this sense—I want to say this to his credit—that he is asking for human rights for all countries, unlike so many previous critics of ours who applied this criterion to South Africa only and closed their eyes to the rest of the world. He, on the other hand, is asking for these things for all countries. Consequently he is also asking for human rights in Uganda; he is asking for such rights in Russia, and has already had his nose bloodied as a result. I do not want to be unfriendly towards the Americans, but they are people who can hit hard, and take hard blows. But I think we should discuss human rights in the USA itself. I have here in my hand an advertisement which was taken from the New York Times of 1 April this year, a very recent publication therefore. It is an advertisement placed by the Cambridge Book Company—a New York Times company—in which certain after-hour classes where people could learn certain things were advertised. How does this advertisement read? It reads as follows—

Then the following facts are enumerated—

This was stated in the New York Times of 1 April of this year.

How much does that help South Africa? [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, I do not want to cross swords with the hon. member for Yeoville unnecessarily. However, I am asking in all honesty whether it is not a perfectly normal human right—in view of the striving after human rights of the President of America—in every Western State to at least be able to read and write. Is it not necessary that people should be able to do that? I am merely asking an honest question. I think it is necessary for America to be told that President Carter should be careful that he does not eventually become known in history as the American President who lost the cause of the West because he was pre-occupied with high moral ideals, such as human rights, while Russia successfully planned and executed its world strategy in a practical way. In my opinion this is the warning which should at this stage be addressed to the Western World and to America. After all, it is clear that Russia’s eventual target must be America. Seen from all points of view, it has to be America. After all, America remains the bearer of this idea, and the eventual confrontation will therefore have to be between Russian and America.

I am aware that many hon. members on the opposite side of the House, as well as many people outside the House, will immediately argue that South Africa cannot rely on help from America, that it cannot expect help from America because of its domestic policy. This is the cry which is being raised by many of our enemies. I am the last person who would refuse to concede at once that our internal policy is definitely not without faults. There are things which can be changed, which have to be changed, as circumstances require and within the framework of certain concepts which are necessary for the country and for its overall prosperity. [Interjections.]

But why do you not do so?

Mr. Speaker, it is being done, at the pace at which it is practicable. However, I want to add that we in South Africa believe that we have to be realistic. The onslaught that is being made on us at the moment is not only aimed at our internal policy. Is there anyone in this House who believes that Russia will alter its ideal of eventual world conquest in a single respect if we were to change our internal policy? In that way we would definitely not make matters easier for ourselves. On the contrary. No matter what we did, Russia would still continue with its aims.

I want to contend myself by making the assertion that Russia, in its policy and in its actions, is behaving like a mole. Not only is it working subversively and underground, but—and I am convinced that the history of the period from the Second World War to the present proves this—it only acts by way of rare exception when it meets with stout resistance. Just like a mole when it comes up against a hard object, Russia does not try to penetrate or burrow below it, but turns away in another direction. Therefore I believe that our inherent and military strength is one of the best guarantees against an onslaught by Russia, as history has already demonstrated.

Let us consider a few matters. As far as the making of concessions is concerned, I want to say that we are definitely making adjustments. However, we have had the Turnhalle conference in South West Africa, a conference which the hon. members on that side, like us, were very proud of. They, and specifically the hon. member for Sea Point, wanted to know why we did not do the same in South Africa. Did Turnhalle and everything that went with it achieve any recognition for South West Africa in the world, even in the Western countries only?

What about Swapo?

Yes, Swapo must be included. In other words, the hon. member for Houghton concedes that even if we were to make all the concessions in South Africa the West would still demand that the ANC and PAC should also be involved. [Interjections.] Who are they, and whom do they represent? [Interjections.]

I want to level a further reproach at America in regard to this matter. America has proved in its history that it is frequently prepared to condone certain concepts and policy aspects. America did not lift a finger in regard to the situation in Uganda. America did not lift a finger when Nigeria destroyed Biafra. Nor did it lift a finger when Mrs. Indira Ghandi eliminated all freedom in India. Let me take the clearest example of all. In the Second World War America was prepared to condone the blatant Russian communism of Stalin because it had determined its priorities and decided that Nazism was a greater danger. It condoned communism in all respects. [Interjections.] In 1970 Nixon was even prepared to condone Red China’s policy to bring about a balance of power in the world in that way. [Interjections.] If all these things were true, is it asking too much of America and the Western world, knowing what is happening in South Africa in regard to policy, knowing that things are already changing in the country, knowing of the spirit of enterprise which is being applied daily, knowing that basically we want to promote the prosperity and interests of South Africa in all circumstances, to condone our policy as well under certain circumstances as a priority compared with the greater danger of a Russian threat? Is this too much to ask of a civilized, intelligent Western country? After all, the adjustments which have been made in this country’s policy are crystal clear, and there for everyone to see. It is moving in a definite direction. However, America must clearly realize that this country and its people are slowly becoming sick and tired of blows from sources from which we did not expect them. We receive no recognition and nothing we do is good enough. No adjustments we make are accepted. All that happens every time is that greater demands are made. The South African people are now reaching a stage where they have simply had enough of this. The Western world can take matters too far, and then they will arouse the true fighting spirit in this nation, as has not been seen in years.

Over and above this specific right which we have to ask for condonation of certain concepts which we have to implement for the sake of and in the interests of South Africa, there are in addition two other major matters at stake in Southern Africa, namely the strategic situation of this part of the world, a part which in a confrontation with the Russians is in the interests of the Western world itself and, secondly, the considerable quantities of strategic minerals in South Africa which, if they were lost to the West, would cripple the West until it could no longer move. These are the two additional prizes for which the Western World ought to be competing when it comes to South Africa and the future of the country.

You are panicking!

Who is panicking? [Interjections.] The hon. friend at the back there only appreciates the Haas Das programme. [Interjections.] This bogus attitude which is being adopted by America ought to be properly considered for once. By way of illustration I want to mention an example to summarize it and explain precisely how it works. I maintain that it is a fig leaf behind which the Western world is sheltering.

I also want to make another concept very clear. In numerous countries in the world people have already experienced this. It is that the Russians keep on penetrating and keep on lending assistance under a wonderful cloak until it is eventually realized that the country concerned is being taken over. Only then do the people wake up, sometimes too late, as in Somalia, and sometimes in time, as in Egypt, which the Russians gradually wanted to take over under the same conditions and under the same circumstances until in 1972 President Sadat simply threw all the Russians out of his country because he realized that his country was being destroyed.

What are the steps which ought to be taken by the USA? This is where my difficulty lies. When I consider the international world I see that communist countries are liaising with each other internationally, whether it is Cuba, East Germany, Czechoslovakia or whatever country. There is international liaison between all the communist countries in the advance on the West. On the part of the West there are only a few isolated examples of liaison, in Nato for example. For the rest each fights with heroic courage on its own and each will go under heroically because there is no liaison and co-operation between them, and they are delivering one another into the hands of the enemy with all kinds of ulterior motives. That is our problem.

One of the Black leaders with whom we were in contact some time ago summarized it very neatly by saying that Africa should not in future be divided on the same basis as before. The division in Africa could be between Whites and non-Whites—which is an emotional division and is not effective. It could be on religious grounds between Mohammedan and Christian, which is an emotional but not a practical division, or it could be between radical and moderate, or between communist and anti-communist. He rejected all these divisions, because none of them were practical. The division which is necessary in Africa at this juncture is that between Marxism and anti-Marxism. From his argument it appeared very clearly that he did not exclude Red China. His argument was very clearly that the communist Marxism of Russia was very clearly aimed at world domination and world strategy. Red China has never set this as a goal and ideal for itself. The Russian is a danger to Africa, not the Chinese. That is his point of departure. Consequently it is the task of a country like America to take the initiative and to unite this group of friendly countries, countries which are all joined together by one common idea, namely anti-Marxism, countries such as Egypt, Morocco, which is now sending aid to Zaire, Zaire itself, the Sudan, the Ivory Coast, Liberia, Senegal, the Central African Republic which has now become an empire, Kenya, Zambia—if it wishes—Malawi, Rhodesia and South Africa, and to provide the necessary arms and resistance so that it is logical that one will in that way succeed in building up a resistance.

However we now have the sanctimonious attitude of America that it only provides aid which cannot be utilized for violent purposes. It provides no arms or soldiers. In the meantime the Russians are unashamedly pouring military force into all parts of Africa. I think it is time America woke up. Although the struggle is not at present in its immediate sphere of influence, it is clearly on its way to that country too. Does America require another Pearl Harbour in order to wake up? Must we wait for that? Who will be Pearl Harbour this time? If America does not want to bring these nations together or try to unite them, perhaps it is for these nations themselves to seek closer contact with one another in order to get at the common enemy and defend themselves against him? One may ask oneself this question. South Africa of course finds itself in the strange position that for many years it has voluntarily and without being asked to do so, offered its services to the cause of the West. We fought two world wars side by side with them. We fought in Korea and we were part of the Berlin airlift. At all times we have always been on the side of the West. If, in spite of everything one does, one receives only blows and a bloodied nose, time and again, from the friends whom one is helping, one sometimes wonders whether one is not compelled to seek other friends, friends that might perhaps be interested in appreciating one’s friendship. I want to make it very clear that we are not making any threat. There is well-known old Chinese saying: “My enemy’s enemy is my friend.” If South Africa, in spite of everything it has done, is at all times merely left in the lurch, ostensibly as a result of its policy, one asks oneself whether South Africa is not being taken too much for granted by the West and whether we should not for a change consider anew what the real interests of South Africa are when all these matters are at stake. I want to repeat the standpoint which I adopted earlier this year in this House by saying that when the survival of a nation is at stake, no rules apply.

In the last few minutes at my disposal I want to compare South Africa’s position in international politics with a ship sailing the oceans of the world. At the moment the ship is being buffeted by storms and bombarded and fired upon from all sides. This ship will try to remain afloat at all times. That is its main task. If the ship wants to call at so-called friendly ports to seek shelter for a while or to take in fresh supplies and these ports fire back persistently and even refuse it temporary admittance, one wonders whether such a ship should not perhaps consider sailing under the flag of another line. The most important aspect in regard to such a ship—regardless of who is firing at it from whatever quarter—is to ensure that it satisfies its own people so that there is no mutiny, for that presents the greatest danger of destruction. What is the attitude of some of the Western countries in this regard? Their priorities are more or less as follows: The ship is about to sink, but we are not going to send anyone to its assistance, because the ship’s sailors are not paid enough. That is approximately what the international attitude is at present. We have to get our priorities straight and have to ensure that the attitude of the people on our ship is correct, so that they do not mutiny.

What is necessary now to set our own people straight so that there will be no mutiny on the ship which has to remain afloat? In the first place there has to be a greater mutual understanding of one another’s ideals, aspirations, problems and needs. This has to be reciprocal. The Black and Brown people of South Africa must also understand that the Whites of South Africa have as many ideals and have as much right to be here as they do. I make no apology for this. In the second place we have to try to create better human relations. People must treat one another with human dignity, in such a way that each individual is respected. Once again it has to be a reciprocal gesture. The Brown and Black leaders of South Africa ought to make an appeal to their people to behave themselves in such a way and to act in such a way that they can be treated with human dignity. A third important aspect is that the will to fight and to struggle for this country and its future should be inculcated into everyone. Patriotism, above all, is now essential. In Johannesburg I saw a bumper-sticker with these words, words which are at present necessary in South Africa: “South Africa, love it or leave it.” [Time expired.]

Mr. Speaker, I have listened with great interest to the hon. the Minister of the Interior this afternoon and two or three thoughts about him struck me. The first was that he is very much like a ballet-dancer who longs to be a singer, because I think that the hon. the Minister of the Interior has a secret longing to be Minister of Foreign Affairs. The second thought that struck me, was his sudden attachment to the Red Chinese. These are interesting allies which the hon. the Minister is now claiming. I must remind him that when South Africa intervened in Angola, the Red Chinese were busy helping the FNLA, who were also South Africa’s allies, and those inscrutable little men took one look at the South Africans arriving on the scene and ran for their lives, not because they were frightened of South Africa, but because they were frightened of being associated with South Africa. [Interjections.] If the hon. the Minister really wants to make allies out of the Chinese, he had better start off by making the Chinese living in South Africa honorary Whites in the same way the Government has done with the Japanese living in South Africa. That is merely a hint for the hon. the Minister.

I was interested to note that the hon. the Minister actually quoted once again the survey that was done by the newspaper The World about the Prime Minister in trying to show that the hon. the Prime Minister was not only the leader of the Nationalist Government and the Afrikaner Whites, but also of English-speaking South Africa and Blacks in South Africa. I would like to remind the hon. the Minister that that survey was done either in December 1975 or January 1976. It consisted of The World asking its readers to write in and tell them what they thought of the Prime Minister of South Africa. Out of over one million residents of Soweto, something like 200 people took the trouble to write, and of these 53% said they thought the Prime Minister was a good Prime Minister. That was in December 1975 or January 1976. I wonder whether the hon. the Minister would care to repeat the experiment now, after the riots in Soweto which took place on 16 June 1976? I wonder whether the hon. the Minister thinks that if that survey were repeated now, a single solitary African in the whole of South Africa would write in to say what a good Prime Minister they think the Prime Minister is.

The hon. the Minister’s speech is a typical example of the Nationalist proclivity for believing what they want to believe and, of course, discarding everything else. That is exactly the impression the hon. the Minister’s speech gave me. He talked about communism and about America and the possibility of America’s coming to the aid of South Africa because of South Africa’s strategic position and because of all the valuable minerals, etc., that we have. What seems to have escaped the hon. the Minister’s notice is the bitter experience that America had with her intervention in Vietnam and the tremendously unfavourable reaction at home in America. The last thing that America would ever dream of doing would be to send aid to South Africa to defend it against communism.

The hon. the Minister has forgotten about Angola and the fact that America was not interested in Russian and Cuban intervention in Angola and made not one effort to lift a finger to save Southern Africa in that event. They are not interested in South Africa’s claim that she is the bastion against communism in Southern Africa. That is of no interest whatsoever to America and the hon. the Minister should know it. The deciding factor in our relationship with America and the rest of the Western World is not the fact that we are a bastion against communism in Southern Africa, but the fact that we have entrenched, legalized race discrimination in South Africa. That is the major factor which will decide our relationship with the Western World and more particularly with America since the advent of the Carter régime.

I want to tell the hon. the Minister that if any party has assisted in the development of communism in Africa and in South Africa it is of course the NP Government. The good comrades in Moscow must have been having many a hearty rousing Russian laugh over the propaganda in favour of communism that this Government has free, gratis and for nothing been spreading around Africa since it came into power 29 years ago. I wonder if it does not occur to the hon. the Minister that the stupidity of this Government in identifying every anti-apartheid move, every antiapartheid statement and every antiapartheid sentiment with communists and communism has given the biggest possible boost to communism in Africa. If antiapartheid propaganda, statements, etc., are synonymous with communism, then surely communism must have great respectability in the eyes of Black Africa and communism must have acquired great respectability in the eyes of Black South Africans, to our detriment, I may add. Of course the slogan is: “Roll on, communism, roll on Marxism in Black Africa because anti-apartheid is synonymous with communism.” I hope that the hon. the Minister will dwell on that rather elementary fact before he carries on about communism.

Now I want to come back to the Budget and say something about this whole question of capital in South Africa. A lot has been said about the shortage of capital in this country, particularly the shortage of investment capital. Previous speakers, like the hon. member for Johannesburg North and the hon. member for Yeoville, have pointed out that this acute shortage of investment capital has had very serious effects in South Africa, both on the growth rate and on unemployment. One of the main reasons for the shortage has, of course, been extensively covered, i.e. the fact that there is a lack of confidence in South Africa. There is a lack of confidence in the stability of South Africa, more particularly following on the unrest in Soweto last year. There is another reason, however, for the capital shortage, not perhaps as important as the risk factor which is, of course, always predominant as far as long-term investment is concerned. It should not, however, be lightly dismissed. I am referring here to the growing pressures that overseas companies, overseas investors, have to face from organizations, individuals and stockholders at home because of their involvement in South Africa. The hon. the Minister, in his capacity of Minister of Information, will be aware of the tremendous propaganda that is always exerted overseas when the annual general meetings of some of the largest of the British and American companies are held. Stockholders come along with a barrage of questions because of the involvement of those companies in South Africa. It does not help to complain about double standards, which I am the first to admit do certainly exist. The stark reality of the situation is that the actions of oppressive Governments against their hapless inhabitants pale into insignificance in the face of the legalized racism which is South Africa’s official policy. As I say, that is the overwhelming question in the last quarter of the 20th century. Racism is the major question. What Whites do to Whites or Blacks do to Blacks somehow has less significance in the eyes of the world than what Whites do to Blacks. That is the predominant issue and the hon. the Minister will have to admit it.

I know that better than you do.

Oh, he knows it better than I do. I am sure he does. Perhaps he also knows the following better than I do. What is the Government doing to enable foreign investors to counter all those pressures, i.e. the pressures to withdraw from South Africa, to cease investing or not to invest at all in South Africa? Despite what the hon. the Minister says, i.e. that no one recognizes what we are, in fact, doing, I maintain that we are doing precious little.

The hon. member for Beaufort West, in his farewell speech as Minister of Foreign Affairs, talked about the achievements of separate development, which he rates very high. I can only say that these achievements have had palpably little effect overseas. He cited two or three examples which I shall mention in a moment. There is no doubt that despite these achievements there is one issue on which the Western World, the Eastern World and the Third World are entirely united—I include, of course, the communist countries—and that is the issue of South Africa. The achievements have therefore not succeeded. He mentioned two or three of them. He mentioned—and I shall come back to this—removing unnecessary discrimination. He also mentioned putting the Indians and Coloureds on certain councils and he mentioned granting independence to the Transkei. I want to say that putting Indians and Coloureds on to the councils has simply not been noticed at all by the rest of the world because it is such a palpably superficial thing since the councils on which they sit do not, in fact, pass the laws that govern their lives. This Parliament passes the laws which govern their lives and in this Parliament they have no say whatever. As far as the Transkei’s independence is concerned, again as the hon. the Minister will perhaps know better than I do, no country in the Western world, or elsewhere for that matter, has recognized that independence. So that certainly has not achieved anything as far as removing the pressure is concerned. As for unnecessary discrimination being removed, if the hon. ex-Minister was thinking of the removal of “Whites only” notices and things of that nature, the opening of the Nico Malan to Blacks and even the establishment of international hotels, which the hon. the Minister of Justice is so proud of, let me say that things of that kind do not count for a row of beans in an outside world which does not know such discrimination anyway. Therefore the removal of those discriminatory measures does not mean anything overseas. I say today, as I have said over and over again, that one can remove all the petty apartheid measures one likes, but as long as grand apartheid remains in South Africa—I am referring to group areas, race classification, gross educational and economic differences of opportunity, gross differentiation in the standards of living between Black and White—and as long as people get no say in the processes of law which govern their lives, the scene outside will remain completely unchanged. The hon. member for Carletonville, who was braying away earlier this afternoon while the hon. member for Umhlatuzana was speaking, said: “Tell us what to do.” Well, Sir, I am telling them what to do. Remove grand apartheid if you want to win …

Does it mean bringing Black people into this Parliament?

It means having Black people in Parliament. [Interjections.]

That is all I wanted to know.

Of course it means Black people in Parliament. It also means, believe it or not, White people in Parliament. It means a multiracial Parliament. This is a multiracial country and all of us have the right to be here. All of us love this country and do not wish to leave it. Not only does the Government not help to remove these pressures with which the hon. the Minister is so familiar, but I say that in instance after instance it has exacerbated the pressure.

Let me give a few examples. Firstly, there is the rejection of all the major recommendations of the Theron Commission.

That is nonsense.

Yes, all the major recommendations have been rejected. Secondly, there is the ham-handed way in which the squatters have been dealt with. Whether they were removed with bulldozers or with front-end loaders, does not make the slightest difference. That matter created a terrible impression overseas. Then there is the appalling way in which the unrest was handled last year by the Prime Minister who calmly washed his hands of the whole affair, telling us there was no crisis in South Africa. There is also the appalling way in which the hon. Minister of Bantu Administration and Development and his Three Musketeers, the Deputy Ministers, abdicated their responsibility in this regard. Believe it or not—it is almost unbelievable—between them those gentlemen paid exactly one visit to riot-torn Soweto from the time the riots started until the end of last year. Sir, can you imagine it!

You were there all the time, I suppose.

The hon. the Minister of Justice went twice.

I was there three times.

I beg the hon. the Minister’s pardon; he went three times.

Or four times.

There were six or seven months of rioting and unrest in Soweto and the Ministers responsible for these areas did not set foot in there more than once. I think that that is an absolute disgrace. They went and took one look and ran for their lives. They left it all in the hands of the poor old Minister of Justice who had to handle, ham-handle, the whole show.

What has the result of that been? Over 500 young people were shot. Thousands were wounded. About 135 persons, …

It is a pity you were not one of them, Helen.

… the leaders, with whom the Government should have been consulting instead of locking them up, were held under the Internal Security Act. About 460 people were detained under section 6 of the Terrorism Act and held in solitary confinement. Many of those, I understand, are still in detention.

Some were let out. It was more than that.

Yes, it is more than 460. The hon. the Minister tells us that the list published by the Institute of Race Relations was incomplete. Sir, I have tried to get the exact figures from the hon. the Minister, but he is so shy about this that he never gives me an answer. He tells me that it is not in the public interest to know. Let me say that at least we have now established that more than 460 people were detained under the Terrorism Act. Many of those—perhaps he will tell us how many—are still in detention. I say that some of those people have been subjected to vicious interrogation by the Security Branch, whose actions, unfortunately, have always received condonation in public from the hon. the Minister of Justice. That is one reason why they continue. Only today we read about the 13th death in detention under security legislation since the beginning of last year. I suppose the hon. the Minister will assure us that this again was another one of those heroic communists who took his own life rather than divulge information. The hon. the Minister of Information nods his head. The hon. the Minister of Justice might know better in this event.

That is a disgraceful speech.

Shall I tell the hon. member that it is not the speech that is disgraceful, it is the goings-on in this country which are disgraceful. [Interjections.] I think it must be a great pity that the hon. the Minister cannot just ban the reports of these suicides, in the same way that he banned the Christian Institute’s report on torture in South Africa. It must be much easier to ban reports of these incidents than to have to explain them away. [Interjections.] I would think that the hon. the Minister was no doubt consulted as to whether it should be banned or not. Maybe he even dropped a hint in the ear of the censor. If he did not, I apologize, but nevertheless the thing has been banned and I dare say the hon. the Minister would very much like to ban these reports as well.

I wonder if hon. members opposite have an inkling …

It is a pity you cannot be banned.

I know the hon. member thinks it is a pity that I cannot be banned. There is nothing to stop the hon. the Minister from banning me, is there?

It is not necessary, because you talk much drivel. [Interjections.]

It is much better than having to listen to these accusations which he cannot reply to. It is easier just to ban everything; just to sweep it under the carpet and to get it out of sight and out of hearing.

Why should I ban people for talking nonsense?

I wonder if hon. members opposite have any inkling at all of the effects of all these things, not only overseas—that is important because of the whole development of this country—but more important, on the Black population of this country. Do they have any idea of the growing hostility and hatred that these events have engendered? Do they have any idea of the hundreds of thousands of young Blacks who have been instantly radicalized by everything that has gone on in this country? I do not think those hon. members have the slightest idea, because they stand up and glibly talk about the stability that we have in South Africa. They completely ignore the parlous economic condition to which they have reduced a once-prosperous country. They completely ignore the unprecedented slump in the property market and in the stock exchange. They completely ignore the soaring figures of unemployment. These things mean nothing at all to them. They talk about stability. It is the stability of the gun, it is the stability of the banning order and it is the stability of detention without trial. It is the sort of stability which you have behind the Iron Curtain.

What do you think the effect of your speech will be?

It is true, I must say, that some hon. members opposite have talked about the dangerous and difficult times in which we find ourselves. They pleaded that all of us must stand together through these difficult times. Of course, they forget to mention that they are largely responsible for the creation of these dangerous and difficult times. They do not, moreover, give any indication that they have the slightest intention of making any of the meaningful changes which may possibly save this country from the ultimate ruin which is staring it in the face. They make changes on the soccer field. This is very nice; I welcome them. Those, however, are not the sort of changes which are going to make any difference to the future of South Africa. These hon. members justify their obstinacy by saying that the world demands everything of us, majority rule, no less. I am prepared to bet that if we went in for meaningful changes quite a long way short of majority rule, they would be grasped eagerly by our friends in the Western World who are longing to have something with which to counter the pressures to which they are being subjected at the United Nations. But we have got to lend a hand, otherwise we are lost. We have got to make changes which mean something, otherwise those countries are going to have no option but to jettison us, because their own interests are a stake. For most of those countries, their trade with South Africa is but a small fraction of their trade with Black Africa and the hon. the Minister should know that as well.

At least they get paid for what they sell to South Africa.

To wind up this sad and sorry tale, I am sorry to say that I cannot echo the optimistic note of the hon. member for Yeoville, who made an interesting speech on Tuesday. For my part, I must say that after listening to this debate for three days, I am profoundly pessimistic about South Africa because the Government displays a frightening lack of concern about the whole situation. This is whence my pessimism stems. They do not give a glimmer of hope to this country.

That is the reason, I want to tell hon. members, why we are losing so many valuable citizens from South Africa, valuable citizens who are taking their talents, their expertise and perhaps, worst of all, their children, the life-blood of the country, and are leaving. They are leaving because the Government offers not a glimmer of hope for the future prosperity and security of their children.

Mr. Speaker … [Interjections.]

Come and dance with me!

How are the ballet classes going? [Interjections.]

Order!

Mr. Speaker, the presence of the hon. member for Houghton and her speech here this afternoon is one of the reasons why we in this part of Africa are experiencing as much unrest as that to which she referred here. The hon. member was at her best once again this afternoon, and this is of course because she was able to succeed so perfectly in spitting out all the gall and hate which she has in her heart for the White man in South Africa.

She is a terrible old woman!

I think that she was very unfair to launch a personal attack on the hon. the Minister of the Interior, while he tried in all sincerity to illustrate the threats to Africa from the East. Furthermore I believe that she offended the hon. the Prime Minister by accusing him of no longer being the leader capable of taking the lead in this country.

I have here in my hand a magazine titled Plain Truth. It also has a sub-title: A magazine of understanding. The chief editor of this magazine, a certain Mr. Armstrong, was recently in South Africa on a visit. He also had the privilege of paying a call on the hon. the Prime Minister. I should just like to present here two facets of the impressions which this man formed after having spoken to the Prime Minister. I quote as follows—

And good-looking! [Interjections.]

The quotation goes on—

Mr. Speaker, this is the one impression which this visitor from America formed of our hon. Prime Minister. However, he goes further. After his meeting with the hon. the Prime Minister, while on the way back to his hotel, he says to his friend sitting next to him in the car—

Mr. Speaker, I believe that the hon. member for Houghton ought to apologize for having the audacity to say what she did to the hon. the Prime Minister. However, she made another statement. She said that when antiapartheid people are discussed, we always refer to them as communists.

Of course!

Those hon. members opposite all profess to be anti-apartheid people. However, we have never said that they are communists. The real communists were driven from the country years ago by the NP Government. The Government is still busy eradicating them here in South Africa today. [Interjections.] Furthermore, the hon. member for Houghton had the audacity to suggest that she wants to give us advice this afternoon. I can only say, thank goodness the voters of South Africa do not listen to her. Thank goodness she will be the only one in this House once again after the next election. The other members of her following are only temporary people here. [Interjections.] The hon. member for Randburg … Who does he represent? He no longer represents the voters of Randburg The hon. member for Pinelands will probably not return to this House after the next election either. At that time, and also before the budget was presented, there were many people who gave the hon. the Minister of Finance advice about what should be done. Hon. members said that the budget was a symbol of the economic and political malady from which the Republic is suffering. Innumerable solutions for the problem were suggested. The best known solution is, of course, the popular cliché which we have heard so much from the other side: “Change to maintain stability.” These words of theirs have become a popular cliché. What exactly is meant by it? They speak about an “open society”. The hon. member for Sea Point is not in the House this afternoon, but I want to ask the hon. member for Houghton whether I can go to Sea Point and say that when the “open society” policy of the PRP is applied, it will mean that the Sea Point swimming baths will be opened to White, Black and Brown?

Yes.

The answer is “yes”. The hon. member for Sea Point has never yet wanted to say “yes”. The hon. member for Houghton has now said that the “open society” means that the Sea Point swimming bath will be opened. I am not against the Coloureds and other population groups having swimming baths too. Now we shall tell the people of Sea Point that the PRP said that their swimming bath is going to be opened to all Blacks and Coloureds on holidays, Saturdays, Sundays and all other days. We shall see what the reaction will be then. That is why I say that the hon. member for Sea Point will not be in the House after the next election either. [Interjections.] The political philosophy propagated by the hon. member for Houghton has never yet been applied successfully anywhere in Africa where there has been order and growth. One can name African states which were orderly and where growth took place, but once the PRP’s political philosophy was applied there, the economy and political stability of those countries was destroyed.

†Before the hon. the Minister of Finance delivered his budget speech there were quite a number of economists and other financial experts who gave advice as to what he should do and what he should not do. It struck me as very strange that these so-called specialists had apparently decided and agreed to differ in the advice they gave to the hon. the Minister. The one group of economists and so-called financial experts said that the Minister should cure inflation. They said: “Kill this inflation monster at all costs”. They said further that the hon. the Minister should kill inflation even if unemployment would arise because unemployment was a good thing as it would curb wage demands. That was the one type of advice given to the hon. the Minister of Finance. Another group of economists and financial experts told the hon. the Minister that he should avoid unemployment and that he should stimulate the economy even if it would mean mounting imports and more balance of payments problems.

*These are the two extreme types of advice. Of course the hon. the Minister of Finance did not take either. He chose the golden mean and presented a budget which entails immense advantages for us. In connection with the budget and what we are going to spend, if we look at it with a view to the policy of the Government, I want to ask the hon. member for Houghton what is really better for South Africa. Firstly, there is the existing order and one must bear in mind that we are committed to evolutionary growth and development. All of us sitting here tell one another that as a country which is developing economically, we are also developing politically. We have not yet found the final answer as regards what the political structure will be in two, three or four decades. What is better than taking this existing order and developing it in an evolutionary and fruitful way? The alternative is to do away with the existing order and then to come up with a policy of negotiation, as the hon. member for Rondebosch propagates. This is a policy which has been tested very recently in Geneva. We know what happened there. Must negotiating power to be given and solutions sought through negotiation or should we not rather develop South Africa, with all its problems and possibilities, in an evolutionary way in the political and social spheres so that everyone in the country has a place in the sun?

I should not like to analyse the Opposition’s arguments, but I find a few mistakes in them. Firstly there is the old story which is raised every year in connection with the defence budget. All the members opposite say that we need it. They do not criticize that large amount, but nevertheless they say that it is inflationary and contra-productive and that we could have saved that money, “if we only want to change our political policy”. In other words, they imply that South Africa has these problems with its defence budget because we have the wrong policy. There are other countries in the world with far larger defence budgets than we do. Are they also guilty and is their domestic policy also wrong? What is the answer to this?

A second mistake which I find in the Opposition’s arguments, is that they allege that our State expenditure is too high. I have before me a cutting from the German Tribune dated 31 March 1977. This states, inter alia—

This is just one example of the fact that State expenditure is not high in South Africa alone. If we study the budgets of all the countries in the world, we will find that State expenditure is increasing. Why do they make out that it is just South Africa which is experiencing problems of State expenditure? If we look at the services which the Government must provide, such as security services, social services, economic services and general Government services, we see that these services require money. Over and above the fact that we are a young, developing country, we need a great deal of capital in order to create our infrastructure. That is why I say that South Africa is not the only country which has greater State expenditure.

There is a third argument which is used against us and that is that we are creating unemployment. Unemployment is a world phenomenon. I want to quote once again from a report of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe. In this report they review the latest situation in 32 member countries. In it they mention how unemployment has increased in those countries—this is not because they have a policy of separate development. It is a phenomenon which occurs throughout the world as a result of the economic depression which is being experienced.

A fourth mistake which I find in the arguments of the Opposition—I am very sorry that they make this mistake—is that they say that we are experiencing a crisis of confidence. It is not only in South Africa, but throughout the developing world, that capital is scarce.

That is not true.

I said that capital is scarce throughout the developing world. We are a developing country and that is why we have a shortage of capital. I concede that we also have other problems, like the internal unrest which we have experienced, but where in the world does unrest not occur from time to time? Even in that wonderful Britain from which the hon. member comes, there is unrest in Ireland and even in Scotland. In America, France and in practically every country of the Western world too, we find unrest, because there are other elements which influence stability of the countries concerned. I ask the people who are so sharply critical of the fact that our economy is experiencing a depression: Are you criticizing us because you are worried that you are going to make less profit in your business undertakings? Is the hon. member for Johannesburg North really worried about the future of South Africa as his fatherland or are he and those who think like him expressing their concern because their profits may drop and they may possess less money and capital when, having ruined the country by their speeches, they leave this country to lead a peaceful life in San Francisco or Hong Kong?

The Opposition is giving the wrong impression in many respects, because they say, inter alia, that the Government is drawing more money from the private sector and in this connection they refer to the building societies. I have a newspaper cutting here—I am not going to mention names, but I am prepared to give this to hon. members on request—according to which prominent people in the building industry and in the property market are placing advertisements for loans which are readily available. I should prefer not to mention names, because then I would be getting personal, but two persons in the property market are given special mention and one of them says the following—

The second person, the managing director of a very large property company in South Africa, says the following—

He continues in this vein. I think that we are making a mistake if we allege that the R120 million which the hon. the Minister is drawing from the building societies, is going to result in our people no longer being able to obtain homes, buy houses or obtain bonds. I have a great deal more to say in this connection, but my time has expired.

Mr. Speaker, all forms of Opposition politics which I encounter today are old, boring and sterile, if I may say so. These days, when I open a newspaper and I read about the hon. the Leader of the Opposition, Mr. Gerdener, the hon. member for Bezuidenhout and the hon. member for Houghton, I just look at the headlines and then I put down the newspaper. Opposition politics in South Africa are completely sterile, old and meaningless today. The whole lot of them are almost verkramp. For that reason I am glad that I am able to speak after an hon. member on this side of the House and that I need not react to a speaker on that side of the House.

I want to address my remarks today specifically to the NP, not to the West Coast, but to the NP. This is the party which I believe to be the most unique political party in the Western world today, the party which in recent years, and since the days of Gen. Hertzog, has always instinctively taken the right course in regard to the challenges with which South Africa and all its people are faced. Over the years, the National Party has been the greatest single creative power regarding all forms of existence in South Africa. I want to take the liberty today of speaking openly and frankly to the NP. I want to begin by stating that we in this country, all of us who are sitting here this afternoon, whether we belong to the PRP, to the UP or to any other party, those of us in this country who have a white skin, find ourselves in a crisis of existence. I would almost say we find ourselves in a perpetual crisis of existence. What applies to us also applies to other minority groups in this country, our Brown people and our almost 650 000 Indians.

In the normal course of events, survival looks after itself. The American, the Englishman, the Frenchman and the Russian do not speak of survival. Why would they speak of survival? After all, they do not share their country with others who are in the majority. They have no fear of ever being wiped out from inside. That is why these countries and nations do not speak of survival. In the world of today, it is mainly large minority groups in the midst of majority groups that are struggling with the problem of survival. I think of the Jews who are scattered all over the world, the White Rhodesians, the French Canadians, the Flemish, we White Afrikaners, our country’s Brown people and our country’s approximately 650 000 Indians. It is the minority groups in the world today that occupy themselves, in the course of normal political argument, with concepts such as survival, adjustment, renewal and change.

Never before in a Parliamentary session have I heard so many references to concept such as survival, adjustment, renewal and change. In the absence of Opposition politics, we are increasingly analysing these concepts within the National ranks today, knowing that the NP is instinctively right in its feeling for the fundamental things affecting our survival and that of the minority groups in the first place. I believe today—and I say this with great seriousness—that there is a dormant power within the NP which enables our Government, showing new, if I may say so, audacity in its dream of freedom for everyone within our national borders, to tell the world that we want to survive. We want to survive creatively and not to sit in sack-cloth and ashes to be kicked at by every Tom, Dick and Harry and then to cry because the world does not understand us.

It is this truth and this attitude within the NP which make it possible for me, speaking from a front of the NP, to put the following five questions very frankly and openly to this unique party, which has been in power for almost 30 years. These are the five questions. The first question I want to put to this creative power, this unique party, is whether the time has not come for us fearlessly to draw clearer boundaries on the map of South Africa. Alternatively, we may say that if all the non-Black minorities in South Africa, namely the White people, the Brown people and the South African Indians, are to survive, we three minority population groups within the same fatherland will have to join forces in a crusade to ensure that the urge of Black nationalism to rule over an undivided South Africa is diverted with greater momentum into a divided constitutional structure.

Let me put the question more concisely: Has the practical situation not lagged behind our vision—and now I am addressing my own party, the party which has the creative power, which has the ability to create—of separate Black freedoms? I shall come back to this question in a little while. However, I now ask my second question: Is the exploratory work in which we are engaged at present, in order to amend a Westminister system so as to make possible the political accommodation of our non-Black minorities within the borders of our fatherland, of such a nature that it will comply with the principle—please note—of the same freedom that we claim for ourselves, we who are sitting here this afternoon? Here I am referring to political freedom. I repeat: Will it comply with the principle of the same freedom that we claim for ourselves? Now I come to my third question: Can we South Africans, i.e. all our population groups in non-Black South Africa, really afford the paralysing privilege of continuing to build our existence on increasing Black labour within our national borders? Should not we, especially White and Brown in the southern regions of our country, join forces with greater ingenuity to escape from this dilemma of existence, to which I shall also return in a little while? Now I ask my fourth question: Do we, as a creative party which is unique in the Western world, which is instinctively right about the future politics of the country and its people, know exactly where we want to go with the presence of the increasing number of urban Blacks, especially in the northern part of our country?

That is a good question.

To this, too, I shall return in a little while. Now I come to my fifth question. After all the years of prosperity, with the slogans of development, growth and progress, with a high gold price and a population explosion in Southern Africa, are we today working in a co-ordinated way on a master plan which excites the imagination on the economic level in the world which all of us will inhabit in the future? These are my five questions. In the short time available to me I shall now say something more about each of these questions.

My first question was concerned with the political future of the non-Blacks in South Africa. I am aware of the fact that, following upon the Erika Theron report, the possible amendment of our Westminster-based system is presently being considered on the highest level. I do not want to complicate the difficult task of these people even further. It would be inappropriate to discuss the function and task of this particular committee at this stage, but I do want to make a few remarks, with only the very best intentions. When we look at the task that lies ahead for this committee, the first priority, to my mind, is the political future of 2,5 million Brown people whose place is, I believe, on the side of the 4,5 million Whites, for the sake of a proper balance.

I am pleased that a White Paper appeared on our benches yesterday. We may disagree with one another about many details in that White Paper—I am not concerned with the details—but the undertone of that White Paper implies the recognition that the Government is telling us that these 2,5 million Brown people will not be pushed over to the side of a Black majority in South Africa in the future, but that their place is on the side of the Western civilization of the White people.

Secondly: In the past, in spite of a great deal of friction, especially on the political level and, let me say quite frankly, inside the NP ranks as well, there have been strong assertions from important leaders, leaders who have stated unequivocally that White and Brown belong together in South Africa, politically speaking.

Allow me to mention just two of these leaders. I could go back to the days of Gen. Hertzog many years ago. I shall quote only two examples from the period after 1948. I am speaking of people who have led this unique party and who have governed South Africa and performed a creative task in the country. The late Dr. T. E. Dönges, who was leader of the NP in the Cape Province in his day, once pointed out fearlessly—this was many years ago, when the time was not yet ripe, or not as ripe as it is today—that there were hearts here that beat as one. I now come to the second example. At the beginning of our republican dispensation in this country on 10 May 1961, there were four representatives of South Africa’s Brown population sitting in this House. They sat here in front of me. I still have a photograph that was taken here. The four representatives participated in the designation of South Africa’s first State President. They voted for Mr. Justice Fagan at the time and not for ex-President Swart. But the fact is that they were present here on behalf of the Brown population of South Africa.

Who threw them out?

Concerning the presence of these representatives of South Africa’s Brown people, no less a man than—please note, Sir—the late Dr. H. F. Verwoerd declared in writing that this representation would never be removed from this Parliament. Nor can I imagine that a man with the intellect and the integrity of Dr. Verwoerd could ever have thought that those four representatives who sat here would always remain only for White representatives, that they would not eventually become Brown representatives and that there would always be just the four of them.

Looking at the faces of the friends in front of me, the Opposition which does not have the creative power to which I have referred, I see that they are smiling.

Take a look behind you.

Let me say at once that I am not pleading now for direct representation of South African’s non-Blacks in this Parliament. I shall tell you why not: I am more afraid of a red carpet than of a dose of bird-shot. I am only putting in a final plea, before this committee concludes its activities, that the committee now investigating the Westminster system should see that the two minority groups of the Indians and the Coloured people are politically accommodated within the same fatherland in such a way that the formula produced by the committee will be completely in line with the principle of the same freedom that we claim for ourselves, those of us who sit in this super White Parliament today.

Is that a homeland?

May the Cabinet Committee, which is also going to deliberate with the leaders of these population groups in due course, be granted great wisdom and grace from Above. This is one of the most important decisions that has had to be taken in this country since 1910.

Is it a homeland?

Now I come to my second question, i.e. my question about the urban Bantu. I have already asked whether we know exactly where we want to go with the increasing presence of a Black majority of people within the fatherland of the Whites, the Coloured people and the South African Indians. Let me say at once that there will be no suggestion of dishonesty if the NP were to tell the world quite frankly today that it has not yet arrived at a final conclusion in this respect.

In the past it has been the custom of the NP, as a creative party, to apply its genius from time to time to bringing greater clarity about crucial questions as far as our future is concerned. In the past there have been, if I may mention only two, a Tomlinson report, to which the Government responded, and, quite recently, the Erika Theron report, which will be reacted to and which it will be possible to build upon in time to come. Now this question occurs to me: Has the time not come for the Government to appoint a commission of learned people and politicians—call it an Erika Theron commission if you like—to make an in-depth study of this dilemma? Could such a commission not conduct a thorough and urgent investigation within the next three years into this greatest of all dilemmas of existence, namely the presence of a Black majority within the borders of the area inhabited by South Africa’s non-Black people? I want to make a plea to the Government for the appointment of such a commission.

I agree.

Now I come to my third question, viz. clear boundaries on the map of South Africa. When Mr. Hammerskjöld, the secretary general of the UNO, visited South Africa during the early sixties, someone asked him: How are we to solve South Africa’s problems? What does he suggest? It was interesting that he said, amongst other things: Draw boundaries, draw lines on the map of South Africa. I want to suggest that in thinking circles, among the most loyal members of the NP, more and more momentum is being given to our pattern of thinking that we should draw clearer and final borders on the map of South Africa. To put it differently, new momentum for the formula of freedom through division. New emphasis must be laid on the meaning of separate fatherlands for South Africa’s Black people. I use the term “fatherland” on purpose. We have moved away from the concept of “reserves” to the concept of “homelands”, and in the process, a great deal of colonial thought has clung to the concept of “homelands”. For this reason I think that the concept of “fatherland” should become the operative one today, “the creation of fatherlands”. We must change the concept from “homelands” to “fatherlands with clearer borderlines”. This would emphasize the idea of the geographical and psychological areas in which the respective nationalisms of a Black majority should express themselves. Alternatively, people and their territory are always two sides of the same coin. The citizens of a country do not defend their country because they are paid to do so. People are prepared to die for the preservation of the land of their people. The territory of a people is much more than merely an economic asset to be used for feeding the population. In the same way, it is much more than just the natural environment, the rainfall or the landscape. It is this basic truth to which we shall have to give greater meaning in the implementation of our policy, of our magic formula of freedom through division—territorial division.

No one who has any sense and who loves this country of ours would dare to tell me today that the present consolidation of the homelands is final. Unfortunately my time is limited, but I shall be able to mention several examples of various homelands where consolidation has resulted in up to eight separate pieces of land. This is what people are receiving as their so-called fatherland. This cannot work. The argument that it will cost too much money to buy out the land of the Whites in order to consolidate these fatherlands in a better way is simple anachronistic. On the one hand, White industrialists are being encouraged to invest in the homelands today. On the other hand, we are bungling the consolidation of the homelands and we are creating White corridors because there is no money available for buying the land of the White farmers. If the Government can guarantee the money of a White industrialist against the possibility of nationalization in a Black fatherland, why can it not also guarantee the presence of White farmers who would remain under a more realistic process of consolidation of imaginative and colourful fatherlands? Nor can I understand why the Whites who remain in those fatherlands after imaginative boundaries have been drawn could not exercise their political rights in their own fatherland as well, just as the Black people exercise their political rights in their own fatherlands. In fact, I believe that there is a much greater need in the homelands for the expertise and the enterprising spirit of the White farmer than for the presence of the White industrialist. The Black farmers in the homelands must first of all be taught how to produce food so that they may feed their people and so that you and I, Mr. Speaker, may continue to sleep peacefully at night.

In conclusion I want to state that a territory is essential for independence and for self-reliance. If that is lacking, no nation or state or fatherland can exist. Even the Jews, bound by the strong ties of their own identity, were unable for centuries to achieve their separate development until they obtained a territory of their own. There is no other solution than for such a territory to be given boundaries. [Interjections.]

My next question dealt with the growing penetration of Black labour into the area inhabited by our non-Blacks. In this respect I ask myself whether we, who call ourselves an independent nation, can continue to rely more and more on foreign Black labour within the borders of the area which we inhabit. I do not have time to quote it, but I have a paragraph in front of me which was written by “Dawie” of Die Burger in a book which appeared in 1964. The book contains an article, “Terug na ons geloof in Vryheid”, which was written by him. This article contains the two truest paragraphs in South African politics today in which the dilemma of the minority groups in South Africa today is portrayed. In this article, what does he say to the White man, including us who are present here today? I shall summarize it. He says that we are a free, independent Republic in South Africa today. We have a flag, a national anthem, and we are an independent, free country, but we have built our existence on the presence of foreign Black people. He say that this is where our dilemma lies. I want to quote two short sentences—

The author is referring to the termination of British imperialism—

The author calls it a “baasskap van onder”. I do not have time to read the rest of the article, but I want to advise the hon. members to look up the article and to read in these few paragraphs the summary of the dilemma of existence in which we find ourselves today in this beautiful South Africa.

I just want to mention a few examples. The capital of the White part of our country, Pretoria, came into being 122 years ago around Church Square, and today this heart of the White man’s capital is surrounded by millions of Black people. In the Transvaal triangle there are millions of Black people today who have come to constitute an independent labour-contributing satellite of the White cities and towns. Scientific calculations indicate that almost 8 million Black people are waiting to become permanently urbanized today. As far back as 1970, 4,4 million or 55% of the total Bantu population in our fatherland was resident in the White cities and towns. [Time expired.]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Moorreesburg asked five questions here today which, in the first place, were directed at his own party. These are not new questions of course, although it was refreshing to hear them once again. The hon. member has asked more or less the same questions on previous occasions inside and outside the House. What I find very ironical is the fact that those questions were put by the hon. member for Moorreesburg. Firstly, the hon. member is concerned about the fact that the Whites in South Africa have to share their freedom with the 2,5 million Coloureds and with the Indians. The hon. member does not want any separation between us and those people. Somehow he want to create a system by means of which the Whites, the Coloureds and the Indians can be brought closer together and make contact with one another. I do not differ with the hon. member but what I find ironical is that after 29 years, nearly 30 years of NP rule, the hon. member has to put that question to his own party; because has this not been the great bone of contention of the past three decades? It was in fact the standpoint of the NP that they wanted separation between the Whites and the Coloureds in the political sphere as well, so that one could not exert an influence on the political arena of the other. Surely, then, the hon. member for Moorreesburg must have listened to the warnings that were issued from this side of the House during the past 28 years, namely that we should keep the Coloured as close as possible to the Whites. But for 29 years, those warnings and please have fallen on deaf ears and today the hon. member for Moorreesburg is asking that something be done about it. The hon. member for Moorreesburg then goes further. When he comes to the other groups, where greater separation has not taken place—I am talking of the Black man now—but where there has instead been greater economic integration during the past 30 years, the hon. member asks for greater separation.

I was unable to complete my speech.

It was not necessary for the hon. member to complete his speech. Many of us have already heard the hon. member’s philosophy.

You are completely wrong.

The hon. member is worried lest we should base our entire economy in the White areas on the ever-growing number of Blacks.

You are completely wrong.

The hon. member says I am completely wrong. What, then, is the hon. member’s argument? Does he want the Blacks out of our economic life? The hon. member quoted Pretoria as an example. Pretoria’s Black population has increased tremendously during the past few years. The hon. member is now asking that we eliminate separation in the case of the Coloureds, yet in the case of the Black his request is that we should have greater separation in our economic life.

Such flights of the imagination are interesting but it is time we in South African also learned a few home truths and took stock of the situation in the country. How do I see South Africa when I walk out of this Parliamentary building? How do I experience South Africa in society, in the factories, on the farms and in other industries? How do I experience South Africa in my daily routine? It is wonderful to present this beautiful picture of how one would like the future of South Africa to look. The hon. member for Moorreesburg is worried about the Blacks in our White areas. I think it is true to say—I do not believe it is wrong—that there is not one farmer in the hon. member’s own constituency, in the whole of the Swartland, who would not like to have more Black labourers at his disposal.

Especially the dairy farmers!

Of course! The hon. member for King William’s Town has reminded us of the dairy farmers. Years ago, when the late Dr. Verwoerd was still Prime Minister, the dairy farmers of the Western Province were concerned because they could not obtain sufficient labour. They took their problem to the Prime Minister. One detects a strong element of idealism in the plea of the hon. member for Moorreesburg. There are many of his ideas with which no right-minded person would differ. If we are to change South Africa, we have to do this within the framework of the facts and not within the framework of our imagination. Let us be practical. Then perhaps we can accomplish something.

Then we have to have Black majority rule.

No, not necessarily.

Of course we do.

Why? It is not necessary for us to carry through this train of thought to the extent that it necessitates our having Black majority rule in South Africa. We could work towards the maintenance of the identity of every group and we could base our approach on the fact that we are a plural society, but then we shall have to realize that no matter how much separation we may apply—even the measure of separation the hon. member for Moorreesburg wishes to apply—we shall never be able to separate power and authority to such an extent that we could state that there are no spheres of our national life that do not affect all groups or which are not common to everyone, except for the homelands. If we could somehow draw the Coloureds closer to the White man and make provision for him in that regard, we would have to bear in mind that the increase in the Coloured population is more rapid than that of the Whites. Is the hon. member for Moorreesburg prepared, then, to have a system under which the Coloureds comprise the majority and under which the White man will consequently be unable to maintain his group identity? What would then become of his standpoint that he does not want majority rule in South Africa? Consequently, we shall have to make completely different arrangements in South Africa if every group is to maintain its identity and if we still want to be fair and just towards everyone and maintain civilized standards in South Africa. We shall have to start thinking in other directions, then, and not always in terms of complete separation.

As far as the budget is concerned, there are very few Ministers under the present circumstances who, in the eyes of the IUP, deserve as much sympathy as the hon. the Minister of Finance does. He has not made his task any easier; nor have the economic conditions in South Africa and the world conditions around us simplified the hon. the Minister’s task. As a result of the tremendously high inflation rate, South Africa’s economy has had to slow down during the past few years. Despite the lull, or recession, we find ourselves in at present, the hon. the Minister of Finance had to find additional revenue. In particular, he had to draw large amounts of money from the private sector.

In addition, there were a few other factors that did not simplify the hon. the Minister’s task either; factors we in the House must be prepared to accept, because it is only being honest to accept the facts. South Africa’s economic progress is not isolated from that of the rest of the world and although there is a revival in the economies of most countries to which we export, the improvement in that regard is tremendously slow. In addition, the countries to which we export and which we depend on to stimulate our exports and to improve our trade balance, cannot stimulate their economies too quickly due to the fact that they, too, have internal inflationary phenomena and in some countries—West Germany, for example—they often tend to get out of hand. I have here a report which states that the inflation rate in Britain during the past year was approximately 21%. For that reason, hope of an improvement in the economic climate among our trading partners could possibly be rather misplaced. We must not be too hopeful that there will be a considerable improvement in the foreseeable future. The biggest obstacle to South Africa and the hon. the Minister is the fear that Southern Africa is heading for an unstable period. For that reason foreign investors are hesitant. We find that the influx of private capital to South Africa is not what it should be. I am afraid one has to admit that that hesitancy will remain for the foreseeable future. It is not so easy to argue, as the hon. member for Houghton and other hon. members do, that we need only make large scale changes in South Africa, “just this side of majority rule”, as they say, to find that confidence in South Africa will recover. I want to point out to those hon. members that under those circumstances, we could have greater chaos and we could discourage the flow of private capital to South Africa to an even greater extent. Although interest in Southern Africa by foreign powers—that which we welcome in this respect—has recently been stimulated, one could find the situation in which the interest that now exists in Southern Africa’s future, will be coupled with abnormal pressure which, as I have said, might lead to greater chaos and cause a further loss of confidence. It seems to me that some friendly nations want to exploit the very fact that there is a lack of confidence in Southern Africa in order to exert greater pressure on the country. I am pleased the hon. the Minister of the Interior politely taught some of our Western friends a lesson today by making it clear to them that we want to be an ally of the Western world. We are their friend and what we are doing in South Africa—despite the Government—is to protect civilized standards in this country at all times. By pressurizing South Africa in a direction in which we have to make radical changes, a great disservice could be done to the Blacks and it could cause those people, the people the West would like most to help, the greatest inconvenience. No matter how good the intentions of the Western nations may be, it is now, more than ever, that South Africa needs their co-operation because despite everything, a new South Africa is being created. If there is one form of pressure on the part of the Western world that we shall welcome, it is pressure on the communist world to give Southern Africa a chance. The Western world must tell them that they ought to keep their hands off Southern Africa. This country is not prepared to be bullied into a direction which bodes little good to anyone. I think one will find that the attitude among all political parties in South Africa is that our internal affairs are our own concern and that we are entitled to work out our own salvation without pressure from outside.

It is against this background that we have to view South Africa’s economic problems. If one does not view them against this background, then one is not being fair under the present circumstances, nor is one taking an honest view of South Africa’s economic problems. Because this background is not only part of the NP but of South Africa as a whole, we say that under these circumstances, we do in fact have a great measure of sympathy for the hon. the Minister of Finance. Although this background gives rise to a great amount of concern, it ought not to make us apathetic or defeatist. Just because there are storm clouds gathering is no reason why we should sit among the ashes and bewail our fate. In his chairman’s address to the South Africa Foundation Dr. Jan Marais recently said that he was optimistic about South Africa’s future. He said that never before had so many South Africans taken such a hard look at themselves and taken counsel among themselves so extensively. I am in full agreement with that.

What is South Africa to do under these circumstances? In the first place, we cannot play around with our own internal and external security. Any country whose sovereignty is at stake, things which can decide its fate, must be prepared for any eventuality. The hon. the Minister of the Interior drew us a picture of what is going on around us, of what the communists are doing. He is completely correct. These are generally accepted facts, although there are some people in South Africa who do not want to face up to them. However, no person of sound judgment could be misled by the professed goal of the communist world. Where have they ever liberated any people or country? We need only look at countries such as East Germany, Hungary and Czechoslovakia and ask how Angola was liberated. Wherever one imperialistic power disappears, a far worse one usually takes its place. That is why South Africa will have to launch the greatest possible information campaign among all its people—White and Black— against communist enslavement; a greater campaign than we have ever had before in the history of this country. That is why I welcome the speech of the hon. the Minister of the Interior in this regard. We shall to an increasing extent have to point out to our people—White and Black—the dangers South Africa is facing and we shall have to point out the contrast between, on the one hand, what the communists want and, on the other hand, what we want from Western culture, from the Free World. We shall have to eliminate with all our might those elements in our society which advocate anarchy and revolution if we want to succeed in any effort in that direction.

Moreover, I do not believe South Africa has yet used all her safety-valves. Our greatest safety-valve still remains doing unto others as we should like them to do unto us. The White man, who has had the bucket of hot water thrown over him, has no desire to remain master of the destinies of others. The White man in South Africa is familiar with the desire for freedom that all peoples have and that desire for freedom amongst the coloured peoples in South Africa will have to be satisfied. It may not be disregarded. All right-minded people are committed to the removal of discrimination. This is no longer in dispute in South Africa. We have never viewed the removal of discrimination as a plan to undermine the identity of groups. We shall have to spell out the moving away from discrimination far more clearly, however. Responsibility and authority over matters pertaining to each particular population group will have to be given to them at an accelerated rate. Even before the hon. member for Moorreesburg starts drawing new lines on a map, we shall have to give more to those people, authority and responsibility, where possible. The sooner we do this, the sooner we shall take the sting out of the intentions of those who are dissatisfied. In the past, we spoke very glibly of “the sky is the limit” for every group in South Africa. We are certainly on that road when it comes to the Bantu homelands. However, one has to ask the question: What is the position of the urban Blacks? The hon. member for Moorreesburg and other hon. members opposite want to wish away the urban Bantu. However much respect I may have for the idea that one should do something to entice them away, I am afraid we shall have to accept that they are with us for good.

Where would you accommodate them?

Where are they being accommodated at present? Where have we accommodated them during the past 30 years?

Do you want to establish another Soweto?

If it appears necessary to establish more Sowetos in South Africa, it will have to be done. The present Soweto will certainly not meet the demands of the next 25 years.

It is already overcrowded!

What political status would you give them?

I repeat: They are with us for good and the Black urban complexes remain our greatest asset, although I admit that they are also our greatest headache. South Africa cannot go on regarding these complexes as temporary ad infinitum. By anchoring these people firmly as established companions in a better society, we will be better able to safeguard our own position in South Africa.

I wonder what sort of South Africa the hon. member for Marico has lived in for the past 15 to 20 years. Under their regime Soweto has grown bigger all the time.

It was established under your regime.

Fair enough. If it was wrong under our regime, why has the state of affairs not been reversed since then?

We have made a tremendous effort and you have not helped us!

We simply have to accept that in places such as Port Elizabeth, Durban and Cape Town, the problem will become even greater during the next 50, 100 and 200 years. We shall also have to give the Blacks in our urban complexes the responsibility and the tools to move away from a proletarian community to a prosperous, civilized community. This would also give more credibility to the idea of parallel development, if the hon. member for Marico is prepared to accept it. Everyone could have a hand in this development in South Africa. Surely there ought not to be any dissension on this matter. Businessmen, industrialists— everyone—are prepared to have a hand in this. I believe differences on the presence of the urban Black would then disappear— except, apparently, for the hon. member for Marico. If the Government accepts the permanence of the urban Black, then this will not be held against it. This, I believe, is simply an essential adaptation and is not a negation of the Government’s homeland policy. One could even interpret it as a splendid consequence of the Government’s policy. To extend decentralization of authority from the homelands to the urban Black is a further extension of the Government’s approach as well. [Interjections.] An hon. member says “no”, but in terms of legislation already on the Statute Book and of that which is yet to come, the Black man in those complexes is going to be given a greater say. That is my reason for saying that giving them power and authority and accepting the permanence of these people, is not a negation of the Government’s homeland policy. Everyone realizes that the urban Black has to contend with socio-economic problems today. We as Whites cannot solve these for them. Consequently, they themselves will have to play their part. Moreover, there is no reason for thinking that a corps of leaders amongst the Blacks in the city will not be able to undertake this task. [Time expired.]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Newton Park and I are diametrically opposed to each other as far as our political philosophies are concerned. However, I feel obliged to say that the hon. member made one of the most responsible speeches I have ever heard a leader of an Opposition party make in this House.

With regard to the budget, the hon. member also referred to the difficulty of the hon. the Minister of Finance and to the problem which South Africa is saddled with. The hon. member went on to outline the function of those of us sitting on this side of the House, and that of the hon. Opposition. He referred to the pressure which ought to be exercised by the West on the communist states. This is an aspect to which the hon. the Minister of the Interior also referred. I am pleased that the hon. member for Newton Park also stated clearly that when the stormclouds gather we should not sit down among the ashes. This is the NP. This is Afrikanerdom. This is the Government. We shall all follow that road.

Now, however, I want to come to the speech by the hon. member for Umhlatuzana. I remember that he and I entered this House together. While he was still a backbencher, he was the man who slandered the police of South Africa and besmirched their good name. [Interjections.] “Death by torture” is one of the things he mentioned. This is what he accused the Police of.

That is untrue!

It is in Hansard. The hon. member says it is untrue.

Just go and read Hansard!

It is in Hansard, and the hon. member knows it. [Interjections.] However, today the hon. member again makes the charge that the Afrikaans-speaking people regard the English-speaking people in this country as their enemies. It is disgraceful to allege anything of the kind. [Interjections.]

It was the hon. member for Prieska who said that!

That is not true. If we look at history, we shall note that the Afrikaner has always been the one that has extended the hand of friendship to the English-speaking people.

Did you listen to the hon. member for Prieska?

I need not even refer to history to reply to that hon. member. Up to the present the approach of the NP and the Afrikaner has always been one of live and let live. The Nationalist Government governs the country fairly and justly. What happened when the NP came to power in 1948? At the time the Opposition said that the NP were going to push the English-speaking people into the sea. However, what happened? We made friends with them. We befriended them to such an extent that the hon. the Minister of Finance today is an English-speaking person. The Afrikaner extends the hand of friendship to the English-speaking people. The NP is again extending the invitation today: Come! Do not come merely as an Opposition but as true citizens and as loyal South Africans, like the hon. member for Newton Park, someone who said openly this afternoon that we were working for South Africa.

I have now been listening to this debate for three days. I had expected the Opposition to come forward with positive and sound suggestions and with useful proposals. They maintain that South Africa is in crisis. We are not in crisis. When a country is in a crisis, things look very different to what they do now. We have become so accustomed to the years of prosperity, fortune, luxury and so on that we are really no longer capable of realizing that when we are merely moving on an even keel, we are really still doing very well. The hon. member for Constantia made some outrageous statements. He referred to a so-called crisis of confidence. Of all the hon. members who have spoken in this debate, who has created more of a crisis of confidence than that very hon. member for Constantia? [Interjections.] I quote what the hon. member said—

The hon. member says—

Initially I thought that this might have been merely a slip of the tongue, but the hon. member repeated it later in even more extreme terms. He went on to say—

Please note: “grabbing”.

Is that what the hon. member wants to tell the outside world? If the Government “grabs” these pension funds, grabs them illegally, and if this is what the hon. member wants to go and tell the outside world, what outsider would ever invest money in this country? I think that this statement which the hon. member for Constantia made is a shocking and scandalous one. He ought to show more responsibility than that. When the chief spokesman of the Opposition makes such accusations, I want to know where he gets the idea that the hon. the Minister is grabbing money from the pension schemes. All that happens is that that money must now be invested in a State fund. In any event, rent is duly paid on it. Does the hon. member perhaps want to suggest that interest is not paid on that money? Is that what the hon. member for Constantia wants to maintain? The hon. member is sitting there as quiet as a mouse.

The hon. member goes on to maintain that the State must acquire its money on the open market and that it must pay the prevailing interest rate. What are the prevailing rates in this country? If the State were to compete with the private sector on the open market, what this would really amount to would be that the State would have to pay a rate higher than the rate which the private sector would be prepared to pay. If this were to be done, when we had drawn all the money in the country, where would the private sector get its money from? The State is certainly not the only one which can obtain money for itself in this field.

The hon. member for Cape Town Gardens made a much better and more responsible speech than did the hon. member for Constantia; in spite of the fact that he said a few things with which I cannot wholly agree. The hon. member for Constantia and the hon. member for Johannesburg North made a big fuss about the fact that we have to get money from overseas. The hon. member for Umhlatuzana said—

The hon. member does not know the difference between capital and loans. We do not get capital from overseas, we get loans on which a vast amount of interest has to be paid. Never in my life have I heard as much contradiction as over the past few days. The hon. member for Yeoville rightly said that the interest on loans had sky-rocketed. He said that it was far too high. This is quite right and I shall come back to this aspect later. The so-called responsible Opposition only wants us to incur loans and then pump the money into the economy in order to provide employment. The State cannot survive solely on loans, any more than can a private undertaking. The day of reckoning inevitably comes. One has to build up one’s capital and the only way to do that is from the profits one makes. The hon. member for Constantia is just as aware of this as I am. He is a businessman who has been in business for years.

Let us take a further look at the budget. The hon. the Minister of Finance said—

This is the whole essence of the budget. It is true that if we were to pump in more money now in order to stimulate the economy, we would cause the rate of inflation to skyrocket. Where do we stand? Later in my speech I shall deal with the rates of inflation and so on.

I should like to give my opinion on the budget. When I look at the budgets over the past 30 years—I have been sitting in this House for 15 years and was in practice for 15 years—then if I were to award a prize for the most intelligent, most well-planned budget evincing acute political and economic strategy, by which a man has proved that he is an authority on State finance and has acted courageously and realistically, then I would have to award that prize to the present budget. I say this without any fear of contradiction.

What is the biggest problem of the budget? The hon. the Minister and various hon. members have pointed out that the most serious problem in South Africa is the balance of payments and reserves. We may never allow a cent of overseas debt to go unpaid. In the past South Africa has always paid every cent it has owed foreign countries. I think that we are perhaps the only country that has regularly redeemed its burden of debt without once defaulting and failing to pay its debts in full. The balance of payments and the reserve position in South Africa is undoubtedly the most important. Despite the tremendous increase in the gold price from 1971 to the end of 1974, and despite the succession of above-average export years due to good agricultural years, and despite the wave of prosperity in world commodities which took place in the early ’seventies, since the peak of 1,8 milliard American dollars was reached in June 1973, South Africa’s reserves in foreign exchange have for the most part been dropping, up to Friday, 4 March 1977. At that time they were as low as $735,7 million, viz. R693,7 million. Despite the fact that South Africa was one of the 16 major countries in international commerce whose units of currency are used to determine the special drawing rights of the IMF, South Africa’s foreign reserves are far below the average of the other 15 countries.

That is where the crux of the problem lies, and we must achieve this. It is quite wrong simply to criticize the Government and simply to plead for different things. Why are our reserves so low and why do we have a balance of payments problem? It is because we import too much. What is the Opposition doing, apart from pleading that we obtain overseas loans, to assist in our curbing this excessive importation? The total international reserves of the member countries of the IMF, including Switzerland, represent on average, between 26% and 43% of their total imports. This ratio includes the world’s gold reserves at the official price. It includes both the weak and the strong countries. The international reserves of some of the financially stronger countries often represent as much as half or even 100% and more of their annual imports. Switzerland’s reserves, for example, represent 70% of its imports. This shows us what a poor position South Africa is in as far as its balance of payments is concerned. I therefore think that it is the duty of the Opposition, just as it is the duty of the Government and of every South African to assist in combating this problem. We shall combat this problem. Furthermore, that is what this budget is now doing. The fact that South Africa’s reserves at present represent less than 10% of our annual imports certainly means that we shall have to give attention to this matter.

Even a revaluation of the gold component of South Africa’s foreign reserves would be inadequate. If we were to do the same as Italy did, namely to value its gold reserves at the average of the previous month and then reduce by a further 15% to provide for price fluctuations in the gold market, our reserves would still only represent 20% of our annual imports. This is far below the international average of 30% or more.

Our friends who have so much to say about loans from abroad should rather forget about that and see to it that we export more. The Opposition’s friends in the business world control 80% of the economy in this country as against the 20% controlled by the Afrikaans language businessmen. Our own businessmen can make a contribution by themselves producing and not relying solely on the domestic market, and by also trying to export.

A lot has been said here about labour. We have been told that we should stimulate the labour market and that we should see to it that unemployment does not occur in South Africa. Those who are so concerned about unemployment among the Blacks should think again. There are three concepts to which we can give our attention, namely employment, underemployment and unemployment. This also concerns the so-called wage gap. This, too, is something to which we must give attention. The Opposition wants this wage gap between White and non-White, this wage gap which is gradually being eliminated by the Government, to be eliminated at one stroke.

I now ask the Opposition what the cause is of the high inflation rate. It is to a large extent due to this “wage gap” which has been eliminated so suddenly because wages have skyrocketed without there being a corresponding productivity, and without anything being given in return to justify those extra wages paid.

In South Africa there is still a great deal of underemployment. By that we mean that one employs ten people whereas five could do the work in question. This is a way of life and a tradition in South Africa. It is also a way of life and tradition among our Black people; they are accustomed to it and they prefer it. It is simply impossible to provide sufficient work for all the Black people in South Africa. However much we spend, and even if we invest double the amount of capital we are investing at the moment, it would be impossible to provide so much employment. There is a structural problem in South Africa and the main cause of this is the vast rate of increase of the non-White population. There is not a developed country in the world which has a population increase of 3% plus as is the case here in South Africa. The Whites and the Government have to foot the bill for this. Since when has only the Government been responsible for employment? After all, this is undoubtedly the responsibility of the private sector as well. I think the time has come for us to look at the figures relating to the increase in population as well. South Africa’s resources are already wholly overloaded by the provision of employment, better training, better accommodation, better food, better health services and so on for the non-Whites in South Africa.

Another very important aspect is family planning. I want to make an appeal to the Black leaders of South Africa today to begin to educate people, not only in their own ranks, but also in the ranks of the Coloureds and the Indians, with regard to what must and can be done in connection with family planning. The Whites in South Africa apply family planning just as is the case throughout the world. We must request the Black people in South Africa to begin to look after their own interests now, because they simply cannot continue to increase if they themselves are not able to provide their own children with education, houses, schools, hospitals and so on. The Black leaders of South Africa have to point out to their people that if they bring a child into the world it is their responsibility as parents to make provision for the needs of the child and that it is not the responsibility of the White man. Is the Opposition also prepared to speak and to think along these lines? Everyone can contribute towards conveying the necessary facts to the people.

As far as the wage gap in South Africa is concerned, the attitude recently has been: double the wages of the non-Whites, but dismiss half of them. The same amount will therefore still be paid in wages, but they will only be employing half as many people. In other words, it will still be a case of a tremendous wage gap; one group will be earning everything and the other group, nothing. I think that the Opposition would do a great deal better if they were rather to advocate that everyone in South Africa should be employed, but at a lower rate of remuneration so that everyone can work and live. Over the past few years wages in South Africa have increased tremendously. They have increased to such an extent that many businessmen have no longer been able to pay the wages of their workers on an economic basis.

To come back to loans; we in South Africa have in recent years and as a result of the Opposition’s policy which they want to force on us, borrowed a great deal too much. This applies to the private sector, the Government, and everyone. I think the time has come for us to warn our people to be more careful in this connection. The total demand for loans in this budget amounts to R2 079 million today. This also includes the redemption of loans. However, the amount of R7 697 million in revenue also includes a loan levy of R462 million. If the redemption of the loan is regarded as an item of expenditure, viz. the R991 million which has to be repaid, this means that the total State expenditure which must be paid amounts to R9 776 million and that loans, including the loan levy, must finance expenditure to the tune of 24%. 24% is far too high and we shall have to consider this. I want to ask the Opposition to be responsible and not to ask that we should borrow more. Our loan account is far too high and they should rather assist the Government to borrow less, because then the burden of interest will be reduced and we shall be able to stand on our own two feet. Then we need never fear that some crisis might occur.

The hon. the Minister introduced a surtax and I want to thank him for that. It is true that this tax will cause price increases and it will also hit intermediary goods and the raw materials of certain industries hard. However, this is the only way to make import goods more expensive and by so doing to ensure that the balance of payments and reserves are rectified. If people have not listened to all the appeals addressed to them over the years, then this is the only possible solution. The surtax will result in raw materials becoming expensive, but goods will not be imported and local industries will now be able to develop further. Our industrialists will even be able to export if they really want to put their shoulders to the wheel. This will provide employment to both White and non-White here. These people have criticized this surtax instead of being grateful for it, because surely it is one of the methods of putting one’s industries on their feet, assisting them and stimulating them. Apart from the fact that the problems as regards the balance of payments can be solved, hon. members need only consider how easily we should be able to get by in the future if we did not need to borrow additional money. There is another aspect which I should have liked the Opposition to listen to and even to criticize. However, they did not do so and we shall therefore have to do so on their behalf. The issue in question is direct and indirect tax in South Africa. The State’s revenue is estimated at R7 697 million and revenue from direct taxation represents an amount of R4 803 million, or 62% of this. The revenue in indirect taxation contributed about 25% of the total. The percentage of direct tax is far too high and I think South Africa must thank the hon. the Minister for not having increased direct taxes further. They could still be reduced, but due to circumstances this could not take place. In spite of the R400 million included in the indirect taxation in the form of surtax, it is clear that the ratio of direct tax to indirect tax still leaves something to be desired. The tax basis will have to be broadened in future, apart from the R400 million. The retail turnover tax is the ideal way of assisting the hon. the Minister in this connection.

As far as the turnover tax is concerned, it has been said that this will be introduced if the necessary staff is available. I want to put it clearly that when the previous sales tax was introduced, the necessary staff was made available. I am of the opinion that this will not require a great many more staff, because due to the knowledge and experience of the staff we have this will not cause a great deal of pressure. However, if we think that more staff are necessary, they will have to be found.

However, I now turn to another aspect and it is one that affects both the State and the private sector. It has been said here that all of us in South Africa have learnt a lesson. Many in the private sector have paid heavily due to bankruptcies, but they have learnt their lesson. However, our people must put their house in order because manna does not fall from heaven every day. We cannot continue to live on a wave of the greatest prosperity, because one also has the upward and downward phases of the trade cycle. The people must put their house in order and the State can set an example in this regard. I ask myself whether it is not time for us to endeavour to have a smaller public service.

Hear, hear!

I make no accusations, but as a production leader I have done so myself in my time. One must continually and unhesitatingly look for opportunities to bring about savings and to do better. We should even go so far as to consider whether we could not do away with or combine departments. My friend the hon. the Minister of Sport and Recreation is not present at the moment. I even want to go so far as to ask whether we could not do away with the Department of Sport and Recreation. The R2 705 000 spent in that regard could then be spent on national education, training, etc. I have looked at this critically, I have nothing against the department as such, but every R1 million in South Africa can be well spent in all respects. If that hon. Minister would like to expand national education and other technical services further, then this could only be to the benefit of South Africa and to every man in South Africa. Even if that department were to be abolished, sport could nevertheless be played over a very wide field. I know that the Department of Sport and Recreation has existed for a number of years, but the Department of Bantu Administration and Development, for example, has its own sporting facilities and the Department of Defence also has its own facilities, etc. I am merely mentioning an example which we could consider and which could be further developed. We heard a remark made here by the hon. member for Yeoville because the hon. member for Bethal said that he had no complaint about these subsidies which were being done away with. In order to assist the poor, we in South Africa have introduced subsidies over the years. On the one hand one has to impose R20 million in direct tax, for example, in order to pay out R20 million in subsidies. This is madness. It is an artificial increase in expenditure on the one hand and revenue on the other. Both can be done away with.

I want to touch on a further point relating to the subsidies on transport. The losses in regard to the conveyance of non-White bus passengers amounts to R39 million. The losses in Railway operating costs in regard to non-White passenger services to and from non-White townships amounts to R37,4 million. This amounts to a total of R76 400 000. This is R32 700 000 more than the previous year, an increase of 75%.

That is what apartheid costs us.

No, it is not apartheid. Is it possible for a man to make such ridiculous statements? Does he want the whole of Soweto to live in his backyard? Has the time not come for us to do away with these subsidized services? Should the employers themselves not pay for those services? Let them pay for them. It is not right that taxpayers throughout the Republic should pay for workers in the metropolitan areas. Our taxpayers throughout the country are paying enough for things like defence, housing, education, hospitalization, homeland development, etc. I think that if we consider that aspect, it will make matters far easier for the hon. the Minister.

In the three minutes still at my disposal, I should like to look at the year 1980. I have in mind for example everything that has happened over the past four years. On 12 March 1973 the London gold price was $81,75 per ounce. That same afternoon it was $82,5 per ounce, after having been fixed at more or less $65 per ounce for the previous three months from the beginning of the year. At that time one of the greatest experts estimated that the price would perhaps be $80 per ounce by 1980. [Time expired.]

Mr. Speaker, for quite a number of years it was my task to act as the first critic in respect of the Foreign Affairs Vote. The hon. member for Vasco once told me in a debate that he was still waiting for the day when I would have something positive to say about the work done by the hon. the Minister, who has just retired, and by his department. In actual fact, this is not the case. There have been several aspects of the Government’s foreign Policy which have enjoyed not only my open support, but also that of the Opposition as a whole. We have gladly given credit where we believed it to be due from the viewpoint of the interests of South Africa.

Over the years, we have repeatedly pleaded that we should move away from our blind adherence to Westminster customs and that we should follow the European example of having a standing parliamentary committee on foreign affairs, so that there could be a greater and freer exchange of opinions between the Government and the Opposition than a few debates in the House of Assembly allow us, especially concerning the more delicate aspects of our international position.

But not about internal security.

Unfortunately, the hon. the Minister would not accede to this request. For years we proposed that the question of South West Africa should be solved in good time on a basis of self-determination and that this should be done in co-operation with the major Western powers. With considerable reluctance, the loss of vital time and under considerable pressure, the Government eventually arrived at the Turnhalle, in its 29th year in power, but not before resistance from outside had assumed such proportions that we are actually faced with the position today that no matter how radical the results of the Turnhalle may seem to many people within the context of apartheid politics, they will not nearly satisfy the political and social aspirations of the non-White population groups in South West Africa.

The Prime Minister made a start with that years ago. Therefore you are talking nonsense.

At best, it is regarded by the leaders who took part in it and who supported it as being only the point of departure for a further and complete revolution. It has no hope of gaining the support of the Western powers. Nor, unfortunately, will it serve in any way to ward off the military onslaught which is building up against us beyond the borders of South West. In other words, we are still very far from a peaceful and generally acceptable solution to the problem of South West, and there is no sign that the Government has realized this. We shall have to discuss this matter at much greater length, but I hope that we shall have an opportunity later during this session to consider this problem in greater detail.

Before the hon. member for Beaufort West, who has been Minister of Foreign Affairs for so many years, retires as a member of this House, I should like to address a few words of farewell to him on behalf of the Opposition. We have always considered him to be an able diplomat. We appreciated the fact that he did not conduct a diplomacy of bombast and aggressiveness in our foreign relations.

In the vulnerable position in which South Africa finds itself today, that form of diplomacy does not hold the solution for us. However, we have always regarded him, as we shall regard any person who holds the office of Minister of Foreign Affairs, as the man with the impossible task. In our foreign relations he has to pursue a policy of co-operation and friendship between people, while representing a Government whose internal policy is one of separation and alienation between people, mainly on grounds of race and colour. This is a contradiction which even the best diplomat in the world cannot bridge or gloss over. No matter how able the diplomat, that contradiction cannot be bridged by anyone.

In our opinion, the hon. member for Beaufort West performed this difficult and, I believe, impossible task with great dignity. I think I can say that hon. members on both sides of the House respected him, and this is something unusual for any politician. It can be said of him that he was always a good advertisement for his country. The same applies to his wife. With these few words I want to wish him and his wife everything of the best on behalf of the Opposition. I wish them joy in the intellectual activities which they will now be at liberty to pursue in peace.

The hon. member has been succeeded by an hon. member who is not yet sitting in this House, but who is giving rise to great expectations outside. In Westdene, where he is the parliamentary candidate, he is singing the best political music that has ever been heard from the Government benches. “Who wants to die on the borders for apartheid in lifts?”—that is his message. That is his appeal. His appeal is that if there is no apartheid in the kitchen, why should there be apartheid in so many other places? Even if he did not say this in so many words, it was at least the purport of his first election speech. We support those sentiments wholeheartedly. All we hope and expect is that his words outside this House will be followed by actions inside this House once he has taken his seat here. However, it is not only a question of dying for apartheid in a lift. Who wants to die for the Immorality Act? Who wants to die for the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act? Who wants to die for such a colourless document as this pathetic White Paper on the Theron Report which the Government has tabled? Physically speaking, apartheid may still be a factor, but it has long since lost the moral struggle. There is no way in which it can be saved in the long run. It would be much better for us to step in now and to act and to bind all the population groups together in a common loyalty and action against the enemies that threaten us.

In spite of the onslaught made by the Russians, our greatest enemies are not those outside the country. The Russians are all over Europe. They surround Berlin, but they cannot do whatever they like. Indeed, our greatest enemies are not people outside the country. The greatest enemy of South Africa is the division and confrontation between the chief population groups inside South Africa, which is a direct consequence of the racial policy of the Government.

To the new Minister of Foreign Affairs I want to say that he will have to steel himself against attacks from his own side to the effect that he is a liberalist.

I listened to the hon. member for Rissik yesterday. I have oftened listened to him, so I know the technique. I know the technique which has been developed into a fine art, especially under Dr. Verwoerd and by men such as Dr. Albert Hertzog. We have been seeing it for years in this House. The hon. member for Rissik is not really concerned about so-called Afrikaner liberalists on the Opposition side; that is just a bluff. The technique is to single out one or two and to pretend to address them. But his speech is really aimed against people in his own kraal, people whom he regards as liberalists and whom he considers to be dangerous. It is the Wimpie de Klerks who worry him. It is the writers of Rapport, who openly accused the hon. the Minister of Water Affairs of being just as liberalist as the Sunday Times. In addition, there are the writers of Die Vaderland, the Pik Bothas and the Louis Nels, people who speak of an open society in South Africa. These are the people, inside the kraal, whom he considers to be a danger for the status quo and the injustices of apartheid and whom he is really trying to get at in a subtle way. For this reason I want to say that his remarks do not bother us, because we actually know the pattern behind them.

The hon. member for Johannesburg West once took me to task here in this House for still using the term “apartheid”. If I remember correctly, he implied that the word had unfavourable connotations, that it had an emotional content and that consequently I used it on purpose in order to be difficult The hon. member is wrong. I would be as glad as anyone else to have the word “apartheid” and the things it stands for disappear completely from our vocabulary. But it is no use trying to destroy the word if the content is retained. This is precisely my difficulty. That hon. member, as well as other hon. members, would like us all to speak of “separate development”, as if this would make the Government’s politics more acceptable to anyone than they are at the moment. I shall tell him why I do not use it In the first place, the term “separate development” is a contradiction in terms. No individual, no nation, can develop in isolation. There is no such thing as separation and development.

Where would the Afrikaner nation have been today, economically and otherwise, if it had not had an open society, unrestricted scope, in which it could learn from others and could develop freely? Never in the history of the Afrikaner has there been a single restriction on his economic or cultural development as a nation. If there had been, it is unlikely that the Afrikaner would ever have achieved what he has achieved in the economic sphere today. [Interjections.] As an Afrikaner, it worries me that we are doing this to others. I would regard myself as a poor Afrikaner if I did not object to this. Apart from that, I would like hon. members on the Government side, if they want to be honest, to say whether, when there is a sign to indicate that Whites should go to one side and non-Whites to the other side—usually it indicates that Whites should go to the front and non-Whites should go round the back—it can be claimed that there is an element of development in that kind of apartheid. What element of development is there in that kind of apartheid? Could one call it separate development? What element of development was there in Worcester recently, when a few non-White children were banned from a mixed ballet class, a ballet class which was held in private and which was accepted by those who took part in it? Do hon. members on the Government side think that these educated young non-White children—and tomorrow they may be among the leaders of the Coloured community—will forget such a humiliation inflicted upon by them by a White authority at this stage of their emotional life? The tragedy is that all White people are blamed for the blunders committed by the Government. I want to ask quite honestly whether the Government want us to call this kind of thing development—separate development. If this is so, what element of political or any other kind of development does it contain? Is this the way in which the Government believes it should protect the future of the White man in this country? Is this their idea of patriotism? Is this their idea of their responsibility to the future interests of the Whites?

We are always hearing about patriotism, but we see no sign of it in practice. A true patriot will do nothing which could harm his country and his people in the future. Day after day hon. members on the Government side are engaged in actions which will boomerang against the White man and against South Africa. [Interjections.] And anything of this kind is apartheid pure and simple.

You are good at speaking Helen’s language!

I speak the language of the truth … [Interjections.] … and if anyone else also speaks the truth, I approve of it. [Interjections.] Anything of this kind is apartheid pure and simple, apartheid as we have known it since 1948. No other term is applicable to it. The same applies to measures such as the Immorality Act—section 16 of the so-called Immorality Act—and the restriction on people’s freedom to marry whom they please. These are discriminatory measures, measures which are only concerned with compulsory separation on grounds of colour. They have nothing to do with anyone’s development. They are a standing insult to the dignity of man. I am glad that some of the most influential members of the Erika Theron Commission reject these things in the same way as we do.

I notice in the Government’s White Paper on the Theron report—on page 7 of the White Paper, dealing with the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act and section 16 of the Immorality Act—that the following is said—

I ask you—

I have never encountered such a misleading argument in any official document. These two measures are as discriminatory as can be. They are discriminatory, and for two reasons. In the first place they are not concerned in any way with the recognition, or even the protection, of peoples. Not that this would have made the situation any better. There is no people on earth, apart from the governing White group in South Africa, which relies for its protection and survival on coercive political measures of this nature, and these measures are totally undesirable. However, these two measures are not concerned with peoples. They discriminate entirely on grounds of colour, between White and non-White. For this reason alone they are discriminatory. However, there is another respect in which they are highly discriminatory. It is no use saying that the measures also apply to Whites. The discrimination lies in the fact that these two measures have been forced upon the Coloured population group by the unilateral will of the White political body, without any regard being had to their wishes in the matter.

It is not the wish of any of the non-White peoples of South Africa that an intimate relationship with a member of a different population group should be regarded as a criminal offence and should be punished. As long as these medieval discriminatory measures remain on our Statute Book, we can forget about ever having normal relations with the rest of the international community. The tragedy is that two years ago, when the Government undertook in the Security Council to do everything in its power to abolish measures which discriminate on grounds of race or colour, and when the hon. the Prime Minister said, “Give me six months to a year and you will not recognize South Africa,” a Black hand of understanding was immediately extended to us from various parts of Africa. The Prime Minister was invited to several African countries to discuss a new future for all of us in Africa. Since then, not six months but five times six months have passed, and unfortunately the Prime Minister has failed in the undertaking which he gave to the Security Council. It would have been better if he had never made the promise. The Government has now lost all credibility, and several of the Black countries that showed themselves willing to make peace with us at the time have been driven into the arms of those who regard violence as the only solution to the problems of Southern Africa. The hon. the Minister of the Interior tried to lecture us on communism today. But who does not know these things? Who on earth does not know the dangers of communism? What we want to know from the hon. the Minister is what the Government is doing to counteract this threat. We cannot change Russia. Nor can the West. Russia will remain dangerous. Our duty is to act in such a way that we can effectively resist Russia and its plans. That is what we ought to do. The only way in which we can do this is by consolidating our own people against the danger of communism. We must create something better here: A better life and a better ideology than communism holds out to them.

Secondly, we must not only consolidate our own people, but we shall also have to ensure that we have allies. [Interjections.] It is not the fault of the West that Russia has become a danger. However, we must realize that since the Second World War, the emphasis in the world has fallen heavily—and this is not the fault of the West either—on matters of discrimination, race domination and colonialism. We have to face these facts, and if we are not prepared, in the light of them, to put our own house in order, the dangers which threaten us will multiply and become chronic and anyone can see what the final consequences will then be. [Interjections.] The Government has not only lost its credibility abroad, but inside the country as well, among the population as a whole, and this in spite of fine speeches made by people such as Mr. Pik Botha and others sitting in this House. We have had it again this afternoon from the hon. member for Moorreesburg. He began by saying that the Opposition was “sterile”, but then he proceeded to express subtle criticism of the Government, point by point. He has been making that kind of speech ever since he came to this House. He says he wants clear borders. The old Sabra advocated this years ago, when the hon. member for Edenvale and I were still members of that body. It was not accepted. He wants recognition for Black people who have become assimilated in South Africa. But his own leader says that he “has said what he wanted to say” about the political position of the Black people. He does not want to discuss it any further. However, the hon. member still hopes. He says the Coloured people still belong with the Whites. Of course they do! We support him in that. But why then did he vote for the law which removed those few Coloured representatives from this House? I am sorry that the hon. member for Moorreesburg does not realize that it is his party’s policy that has become sterile and that that policy does not have the ability to solve our major problems. For this reason I say that in spite of all the fine speeches made by hon. members, it is clear to me that the Government simply does not intend to abolish the measures which lie at the root of colour discrimination. I am afraid that over the years the Government has walled itself up inside a system from which it is now unable to escape. Nor is it going to escape from it. Here in the White Paper on the report of the Theron Commission lies the latest proof of what I am saying. In every important matter the Government is retaining the status quo: We are staying where we are. This is their decision concerning the population group which is closest to us and which belongs on the side of the White man, as even hon. members on that side of the House concede.

We have often debated apartheid, its meaning and its definition in this House. In my opinion, apartheid is the policy which insists on separation between people, on whatever level …

That is your opinion.

Everyone who speaks here gives his own opinion. That is what Parliament is there for. It is the policy which insists on separation between people on grounds of colour, on whatever level, and which then enforces this by law or regulation, made by Whites only, but applicable to all population groups. This is apartheid. It is clear that the Government does not intend to do away with this policy in any basic respect or to lead the elect to an acceptance of a new attitude.

For this reason, I am sorry to say that as long as this Government is in power, we shall be in a chronic state of conflict, conflict between South Africa and the international community and between the Whites and the other population groups in South Africa.

May I ask you a question?

I am afraid my time has almost expired. The unfortunate logic of events since 1948 is easily spelt out. It is a story of action and reaction, for action always leads to reaction. White supremacy—White Power—which was the policy for so many years, found its counterpart in Black power. Excessive White nationalism found its counterpart in excessive Black nationalism. The militant White consciousness which we found on the side of the Government found its counterpart in militant Black consciousness. Anyone could have for seen that logical development. The foundation was laid for it by the Government’s deliberate policy of race and colour polarization. It is not the Opposition that is seeking polarization. We seek co-operation on a basis on which there will be no domination. The hon. member accused the Opposition of polarization, but polarization was created by and is inherent in the policy of apartheid. As it was systematically enforced over the years, it was bound to lead to confrontation, and this is where South Africa finds itself after all the years of NP Government. We are faced with increasing internal confrontation, while the powers of communism around us gain a little ground every day, coming a little closer and outwitting us every time, with tragic consequences for us. By neglecting our duty to put our own house in order, we are allowing our people to regard the communists as liberators, instead of taking steps to gain for ourselves the reputation of being the liberators of the Coloured people, the Indians and the Black people who have become assimilated in South Africa. We must act in such a way that they will look to us as their liberators and not to the diabolical communists.

I concede that the Opposition is divided at the moment and that it is certainly not playing the part which it can and ought to play. [Interjections.] I believe it is our duty to rectify the position as soon as possible. I believe that this can be done in spite of the multiplication of parties inside and outside Parliament. There are two main camps in White politics, and at the moment they are cutting right across the existing party lines. On the one hand there is the group which wants to retain the status quo, the sterile policy of the Government, or to preserve most of it, no matter what the consequences for South Africa may be. On the other hand there are those who are prepared to work on a system of an open society with free development for all, freedom for all in the economic and social field, and citizenship and cooperation in the political field between all groups for whom South Africa is their permanent fatherland. Prof. Degenaar of Stellenbosch called it “die middelgroep van alle kleure”. Not the centrist group in White politics, but the centrist group of all colours. It implies a rejection of the idea of Black domination, a rejection of the idea of White domination and a total rejection of forced apartheid or forced separation as well as forced integration as well as forced integration, otherwise an open society cannot exist. It implies recognition of the right of every individual and of every group to be itself and to build upon its cultural heritage. If the Opposition can mobilize a movement in this direction, an important role in the politics of South Africa awaits it.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Bezuidenhout made a fuss in his usual, now very well known to us— I can almost say reckless— manner. Once again it is the NP who are responsible for “Black Power” because we purportedly follow a blatant policy of White supremacy. “White consciousness” is now the direct cause of “Black consciousness.” We are thoroughly aware of the fact that the hon. member for Bezuidenhout has for many years made a fuss in the House in this manner. In his speech he made a few parting remarks about the hon. member for Beaufort West, the retiring Minister of Foreign Affairs. But typical of the hon. member, there was also a sting in the tail of his remarks by saying how sorry he was that the hon. the Minister had had such a hard time and could not do good work because he had had to implement NP policy. Moreover he made a plea to his usual way for a commission on foreign affairs so that we can all have a say. After all these years the hon. member is really very keen to have a say in the government! But when a decision has to be made on a commission for internal security, for which hon. members on that side of the House also made representations to the Government, that hon. member is one of those who says he will leave if such a commission is appointed.

That is not the same.

Of course it is not the same. But the hon. member is not interested in South Africa’s internal security. That is why he is sitting where he is. The hon. member again referred to what the hon. the Prime Minister said, viz.: “Give me just six months and then see where South Africa will be,” and the hon. member coupled it to discrimination, etc. That quotation of the hon. the Prime Minister had nothing to do with discrimination. That was not the question. [Interjections.] If that hon. member knows nothing about politics, he must keep quiet. It related to the hon. the Prime Minister’s detente efforts in Africa and he announced that in Nigel, his own constituency. That is what it was about.

Was it not about Sunday observance?

Keep quiet, man! It had nothing to do with discrimination and Mr. Pik Botha’s speech. I can continue in this vein. Similarly there is the polarization between White and non-White. It seems as if the hon. member thinks he is dealing here with a school debating society. He carried on in that same vein and caused trouble wherever he could and that is also why he is sitting over there. That is why the UP looks so tattered. I have asked myself why those people really look like that. I must begin somewhere. This matter has a long preamble, but one cannot start from the beginning, because time does not allow one to do so. However, the UP was dealt a mortal blow when, in the Sunday Times one morning, on 25 September 1973, we read the report “Thirteen reasons why Graaff should go-”

Fourteen!

The Sunday Times gave 13 reasons, but Die Vaderland later added one and made it 14. I went to see what those 13 reasons were as to why the Leader of the Opposition had to go. They make interesting reading. The first reason is that Sir De Villiers Graaff has lost four elections for the UP. They were in 1958, 1961, 1966 and 1970. After that there was the 1974 election as well as a number of by-elections. The second reason is that the chances of a UP victory under his leadership are remote. That is correct, because they are remote and are becoming progressively more remote. By this time he has realized it himself and he has dissolved the UP. The third reason is that after the 1953 election Mr. Strauss had 61 members of his party in the Assembly. Under the leadership of Sir De Villiers Graaff the number of members has however decreased until this evening there are only 30. At that stage they objected very strongly to the fact that the Press has turned against Sir De Villiers Graaff and wanted to write him off. However, when he became leader in the early ’fifties and the Press turned against Mr. Strauss in the same way, nothing was said about that.

The fifth reason is that Sir De Villiers Graaff has not been successful in holding the attention of the Assembly, and he still cannot hold their attention. The sixth reason is: The federal plan of the UP … [Interjections.] … is one of the best things they have achieved during 25 years, but Sir De Villiers Graaff could not put it over. However, he is busy now with 14 new points. The next reason is a real gem. The argument used that if Sir De Villiers Graaff goes there will be nobody to take his place is a serious reflection on the leader. Mr. Japie Basson is the obvious leader. Now the obvious leader has resigned as a leader of the party in the Transvaal. [Interjections.] The obvious leader now no longer wants them. He has fallen flat. This reminds me of the man who knocked over and killed a few chickens while he was passing an asylum. He felt very badly about it, picked up one of the chickens and walked over to a man who stood at the fence. He told the man that he was sorry that he had knocked down and killed one of their chickens. The man, however, looked at him vacantly and said they did not have such flat chickens. The UP also does not want such flat leaders as Sir De Villiers Graaff. I do not mean flat in the literal sense but in the figurative sense—a flattened leader.

Now by-elections have been held and the results are more damning for the UP.

Your leader does not even know the difference between a lottery and a bonus plan!

All I can recommend to the hon. member is to buy them.

How does it work?

Does he really not know how it works? I cannot help it if he is stupid, because then it is his own fault.

Order!

Elections have again been held. The election results reveal current processes and subsequently they stimulate those processes further. Sir Div saw the straws in the middle of the stream here, but then went in a still more fatal direction. The whole of Opposition politics became so confused that the voters had to have an opportunity to express themselves. This was done in the Transvaal and the Cape, and the Cape, and the agreement in the decisions in fact brought the Opposition to a halt. I am especially referring to the decision in Durbanville. The official Opposition had 3 314 votes during the previous election. However, they had a meagre 1 280 during the recent election.

You sound like an old grammophone record.

Strangely enough, some old grammophone records are rather interesting. They left that place and all that remained were only the “tackies”. Now people are trying to make do with the PRP. That is the straw at which the hon. leader is clutching. Why has the hon. leader not come to an agreement with the PRP? The PRP says he brought the wrong man along with him. He should have brought the hon. member for Bezuidenhout along but he brought the hon. member for Umhlatuzana along. The hon. leader however let the cat out of the bag at a meeting of the women’s council of the UP in the Peninsula. He said Mr. Cadman had agreed with him and they did not differ. Mr. Cadman was not the stumbling-block. The PRP refused to acknowledge the protection of group identity. That is what the hon. the Leader of the Opposition said, and it is very important. He said they refused to acknowledge the protection of group identity. Secondly, there was the unrealistic attitude towards the formulation of a new constitution which is necessary to prevent White or Black majority government becoming dominant. That is how the report reads. I do not blame the hon. Leader. One cannot agree with such people.

Thirdly, there were basic differences on the question of whether the South African community is being treated realistically as a plural community, as it is now. That is very clear. It is according to recommendation. This is also how this side of the House regards the South African community, i.e. as a multinational community. That is, however, the problem of the hon. member for Bezuidenhout in all his arguments. To him, in all his arguments, there is no plurality in the population as a whole. There are no different nations at all. It is complete discrimination by one against the others. That is why he gets up here and tries to make a laughing-stock of separate development, as if this were a school debating society. It is absolute nonsense!

He is much better than you are.

From the nature of things it failed. Only a year ago even, co-operation between the UP and the NP in Johannesburg would have been regarded as unthinkable by most people. There are also those who have lost their leadership because of the fact that they think this is impossible. The decision of the electorate in the municipal election however, upset established political patterns and set forces in motion which ensured that Johannesburg now has a UP mayor and a NP deputy mayor, although the PRP has the majority on the council.

If the UP are so bad, why did you form a coalition with them?

The co-operation did not come about simply because the UP has a minority on the council. It was as a result of the utterly objectionable politics of the PRP and nothing else. The UP members do not even want to be associated with the PRP on local level and would rather run the risk of crossing swords with their leader. Two came to blows and one fell. If people who have for years enjoyed the confidence of the electorate now see their way clear across language barriers as well to throw in their weight with the NP, even if it is still to a limited extent, this can open the eyes of many of the politically naïve electorate on the Reef. Their political choice was made in the national interest and for no other reason. That is the problem of the UP. Even in Johannesburg the UP did not see its way clear to fight under its own colours.

The leader of the UP in the Johannesburg City Council saw fit to announce his own programme of principles in the newspapers, and he joined issue accordingly, and therefore he was more successful than he would have been with the programme of principles of the UP. Thereafter he came to blows with his leader in the Transvaal. The leader in the Transvaal, however, was the man who fell. He fell because he did not want to give up any of his principles. As far as principles are concerned, one must not have one’s feet so firmly on the ground that one cannot get one’s trousers on. This is a sad day for the UP. At the beginning of the year an hon. Deputy Minister said to the Leader of the Opposition by way of an interjection: “How can one begin a year with a closing down sale?”

On the day Mr. Ian Smith said that he was prepared to accept a majority government he also accepted it. After that it was only a question of how. Sir, on the day the Leader of the UP said he was prepared to dissolve the party it had already been dissolved.

For bigger and better things.

You have a surprise coming.

I am eagerly looking forward to it. I have only one word of advice for the hon. the Leader of the Opposition: I think he must now shut up shop. I see no other solution for him.

As far as the PRP is concerned, I want to say that the PRP is not a party of or for the future in its essence, in its composition and in a large part of its attitude and thinking, but is rather a follower of the past. That party was born and grew from the frustration of a moneyed, suburban English-speaking public because of the UPs impotence over three decades. It was born of that. Its coming into being can be ascribed to the fact that the UP was unable to grant them the share in the political say that my friend Japie so urgently desires and to which, according to them, they have a natural right. Inspired by the newspapers, they allowed themselves to be mobilized for the destruction of the UP. This may perhaps prove to be the greatest stupidity that has ever been occasioned in Opposition politics. They were going to bring about a new dimension in the opposition thereby, which would move outwards from its urban basis to find rapport with the tens of thousands of verligte Afrikaners. Mr. Joel Mervis with his spectrum of possibilities possibly hoped quite rightly to see a great and wonderful Opposition. But when the Progressive Party, the possibly effective Opposition, came here after the first election, they were actually ridiculous as against the official Opposition. I wonder whether Mr. Mervis at that time foresaw in his spectrum of possibilities the total disintegration of the Opposition that he can see here today.

Those hon. members can say what they like, but I want to say that without Afrikaner support—I am, as far as that is concerned, no racist—they have no future. They realize that. They also have no Afrikaner support. They have less Afrikaner support than the UP. That is their problem.

You can say that again.

From the UP side—the hon. member for Umhlatuzana did it again today—the Afrikaner is now being reproached for standing by the NP. The Afrikaner welcomes at his side any English-speaking person who also loves this country, but I have reservations about whether any of those people, as they are sitting there, have any love for South Africa.

There is a difference between loving South Africa and loving the Nationalists.

The hon. member for Johannesburg North often speaks of “this country” as if he is a man who is in any event only here temporarily. One can elaborate on this for a long time, but I only want to say that these people have no appeal for the Afrikaner. They have no rapport with the Afrikaner and therefore there is no hope for them in the future. The sooner they vacate their ruined castles in the air, the sooner they will realize that they have to investigate themselves.

There are many English-speaking people who support this party.

Yes, many. The Argus recently made a survey in which they asked how will the Prime Minister act as Prime Minister. They asked: “Is he excellent, or is he good?” Sir, 83% of the English-speaking people said he was either excellent or good. Now the hon. members on the other side have the temerity to tell us that we are exclusive. I want to tell the hon. members of the PRP that they have no future with a Helen Suzman, a Colin Eglin, a Waddell and a Boraine. They have no future with a Bamford and a Winchester. The PRP may have money and they may have some influence among a small number of people in Houghton, but they cannot attract the Afrikaner. [Interjections.] Do not worry about Harry; he will look after himself. In any event he will go when he has to go. That party has no future because it cannot attract Afrikaner support. They can have the support of the world, they can have as much support from the Press as they want, they can have the support of money and of organization, but they cannot win because they cannot attract any Afrikaner support, and they know it. What concerns me is that, although they know this very well, they sit here boldly because, I think, they have great plans at the backs of their minds to get rid of this Government in an unparliamentary manner. They have already said so.

Are you afraid?

The hon. member for Bryanston said so at the meeting he and the hon. Leader of the PRP had at Jan Smuts Airport with the homeland leaders. He said to the Black people there: “You must help us to get rid of this Government.” Mr. Speaker, you will forbid me to say that these people are busy with revolutionary ideas. Yet you will not blame me if I have such thoughts. The PRP want to convene a conference of Whites and Blacks. There are a few questions I should like to put to them. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout also wants to convene Turnhalle type conference. If a Turnhalle type conference is to succeed—as it has in fact succeeded—there are two requirements. The first requirement is that the need should be very great, and the need is in fact very great. The second requirement is that there should be unity among the Whites or else it will not succeed. Now the hon. members are saying that they want to convene a Turnhalle type conference in this country. They cannot even find unity among themselves. Those hon. members must spell out to us what they seek to achieve by means of such a Turnhalle type conference in South Africa. Who do they want to invite to attend it?

Not you.

You need not invite me; in any event I am not interested in attending anything to which you are invited. I should like to know from the leader of that party who they will invite to that conference. Will it be the leaders of the different population groups? After all, they do not acknowledge the fact that there are different population groups in South Africa. Will Mr. Sobukwe be among them? Will Oliver Tembu be among them. I accept that Mrs. Suzman will be among them. What proposals will be made there? Those hon. members do not accept the fact that we have plurality in this country. They do not accept the leaders who are in fact here. Have those hon. members thought what will happen if they cannot find consensus there? What then?

I will tell them what then. Then half of those hon. members will emigrate.

Just as happened during the Second World War.

Yes, just as happened during the Second World War. I think the first one to go should be “Horries”, the hon. member for Bryanston.

Attention is already being given to the Westminster system. It is very clear that the Westminster system no longer worked properly in this country. The two primary requirements of the Westminster system are in the first place that there should be an Opposition which is more or less an acceptable alternative government and has an alternative policy. However, that is starting to disappear now. Mr. Speaker, do you realize that the electorate are moving towards a one-party state? We are going to have it for all practical purposes, whether we like it or not. Nobody sought it. The electorate of South Africa are establishing a one-party state because the Opposition has frustrated them for 30 years by not establishing an acceptable alternative Government. Moreover the policy of the PRP is so unacceptable to the electorate that nobody wants to know anything about it. It may well be that additional members of the PRP will be sitting here after the next election. But how will they get here? I am prepared to guarantee that not one of them will come here except as a parasite of the UP. They will represent former UP seats. In other words, at best the combined opposition will not have more than those few members sitting over there now some of whom will in any event cross over to the UP. I do not know whether they want “Japie”. [Time expired.]

Mr. Speaker, I should have liked to dwell at length on the tirade by the hon. member for Houghton, but perhaps tomorrow would be a better occasion to deal with her. The hon. member for Fauresmith referred to people who wanted to, and ought to, find their bearings. I happen to have before me a copy of the statement made by the hon. member for Bryanston with reference to the remark about the Afrikaner made by Prof. Dreyer Kruger. When the hon. member for Fauresmith referred to the possibility that at a given stage the hon. member for Bryanston might emigrate, I asked myself whether it would not be desirable for people who say this kind of thing perhaps to emigrate before that stage, because they do incalculable harm in South Africa to sound human relations, including relations between the White people. In our country it is not merely the relations between White and Black and between White and Brown that are important The relations between Afrikaans-speaking and English-speaking people is also important I now quote him as an Afrikaansspeaking person because they refer to him as the “Afrikaans-speaking Mr. Horace van Rensburg”. He uttered these words in the report—