Mr. Speaker, I move—

1. (a) the necessity and desirability of the retention of the provisions of the said section 55(d);
2. (b) the form that such provisions should take; and
3. (c) the application thereof,

the Committee to have power to take evidence and call for papers and to have leave to bring up a Bill.

Agreed to.

Mr. Speaker, in the speech which the hon. member for Houghton made last night, she emphasized three things. The first is that she emerged as a big promoter of the propaganda campaign which is being waged against South Africa. [Interjections.]

You are talking utter nonsense! [Interjections.]

Recently, prominent people in the world have been saying favourable things about South Africa. There are also positive signs that the majority of the American population does not believe and accept without question the propaganda campaign which is being waged against South Africa. This is what forced the hon. member for Houghton last night to rehash the hackneyed story which was dished up to the world last year in a distorted way, without perspective, merely because she is afraid that the campaign against South Africa will slacken off. She would like the campaign to retain its fire and power. Her objective is to promote that campaign. [Interjections.] The hon. member used the old arguments from last year once again. This year, however, far-reaching changes have taken place both inside and outside South Africa, changes which have been to the detriment of the Marxist world and its lackeys, while at the same time they have been to the advantage of South Africa and those in South Africa who are loyal towards the country. However, the hon. member made no mention of that. Of course she does not want to serve the interests of South Africa. [Interjections.]

You are talking unutterable nonsense! [Interjections.]

The second aspect which the hon. member emphasized in her speech last night was the fact that there are deep-rooted differences in the PFP on many cardinal, fundamental aspects. [Interjections.] I want to refer to three of them only. The first is the question of sanctions against South Africa. Last night the hon. member indicated that she was concerned about sanctions against South Africa. However, what does she do?

More than you have ever dreamt of doing!

The hon. member outlined to us the prevailing mood in America. She put it as follows (Hansard, 3 April 1977)—

This is what the hon. member says. [Interjections.] According to her this is the mood which America is in. Then she enlists a country in a mood like this as an ally against South Africa. [Interjections.] This is the attitude which the hon. member confirmed once again last night. She went on to say (Hansard, 3 April 1978)—

That ally of the hon. member, an ally which she herself has proved to have one objective only, viz. the isolation of South Africa, is the ally which she enlists against South Africa. In doing so, she is indicating … [Interjections.]

[Inaudible.]

In doing so, the hon. member is indicating that she is prepared to use influences outside South Africa to intervene in South Africa’s domestic affairs. [Interjections.]

However, the hon. member for Houghton is not the only one who says things like this. Last year, the hon. the Minister of Finance presented evidence of interviews conducted with the hon. the Leader of the Opposition and published in Business Week. These were interviews in which he invited American businesses to exert pressure on South Africa, interviews in which he said by implication that South African companies could not withdraw their investments, while this was in fact possible for American companies. This is what the hon. the Leader of the Opposition said. We are all aware too, of the now famous statement by the hon. member for Parktown which appeared in the same edition of Business Week. This is when he said that, taking a clinical look at South Africa, he would not invest in South Africa nor advise foreign investors to invest here.

Let us now take a look at what the hon. member for Yeoville says. On 13 February this year the hon. member for Yeoville said the following here in the House (Hansard, 13 February 1978)—

That statement which the hon. member made, applies to members of his party.

There is a second point on which there is a radical difference in that party. It concerns the question of majority rule. In Australia, during the course of a TV interview, the hon. member for Houghton said it was a question of time before the Black voters in South Africa were in the majority.

The election is not over, it seems.

She said this. The hon. member for Groote Schuur, who was an hon. Senator at the time, said exactly the same in the Other Place. He said there would be a Black majority of voters, a Black majority government and a Black Prime Minister. However, what does the hon. member for Yeoville say? He says precisely the opposite. He says—

This gives us a clear indication that there is a difference. However, the hon. member for Yeoville is not the only one who said this; last year the hon. member for Rondebosch wrote an article in Die Vaderland in which he also said that it was not the objective of his party’s policy to have a Black majority government in South Africa.

You are fighting another election. [Interjections.]

This is not, however, the final point; there is a third point of difference in the ranks of that party. We have already heard that a former member for Durban North, Mr. Pitman, said that other methods might be used. He said that some people in South Africa might perhaps be forced to use other structures than the present ones. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition said similar things.

When?

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition is pretending that he does not know about it now, but I shall tell him what he said. He said—

He is therefore actually saying that other methods will be used.

I ask hon. members of that party—the hon. members for Yeoville, Rondebosch and the others—whether they are prepared to bring about a change in South Africa in any other way than in a democratic manner. [Interjections.]

Order!

I want to know who is gaining by the campaign which is being fanned by the hon. member for Houghton and who is suffering as a result of it. We have had statements by prominent figures in all population groups of South Africa in this regard. We have had Chief Buthelezi, Chief Sebe, Mr. Reddie and Dr. Bergins. They are people who say that sanctions against South Africa will hit the Black people the hardest. We have seen an estimate by Prof. Spandau of the University of the Witwatersrand which indicates how much unemployment there will be and by how much the income of the people of South Africa will drop if the sanctions take on certain dimensions. That hon. member knows about it. The inhabitants of South Africa will be the first to be hit by sanctions. The second group to be hit will be the neighbouring States of South Africa and the third will be South Africa’s trading partners in the world. Those who will gain are the Marxist world and its lackeys. However, the hon. member prefers to wage a campaign which is to the advantage of those people.

You did not understand one word that I said; you were fast asleep.

I want to make the following statement: That party has already reached the stage where it has broken with democracy and it has already reached the stage of being prepared to make outside powers their ally in order to bring about a change in South Africa. It has already reached that stage. They had a policy when they were still the PRP, but now they are afraid to come up with a policy. However, I do not want to deal with their policy. I just want to establish one thing. By means of that policy they have proved irrevocably that they have broken with democracy. This does not only hold good for the White people and the Black people. It also holds good amongst the Blacks themselves.

The policy which according to you we do not have!

Their policy that certain constituencies are granted to a State on a constituency basis and a similar number on a party basis, will result in practice in the Black people obtaining 56 seats in a Parliament of 200 in White South Africa. On the other hand, the self-governing States will obtain only 12 seats in that Parliament, and this in spite of the fact…

[Inaudible.]

No, that hon. member can work it out for himself. The hon. member for Florida worked it out very neatly for him last year. [Interjections.] It was based on the 1970 census figures. Since 1970 some territories have become independent, and if they are not in favour of that federation, the self-governing territories may receive fewer than 12 seats, while the population in those territories is equal in number to the Black population in White South Africa. The principle which they are therefore establishing here, is that they are prepared to favour one group above another in an undemocratic way within the ranks of the Black people.

They are also prepared to accept help from outside in order to bring about change in South Africa. My question is: Who is benefiting by it? There is only one party which is benefiting, and this is not South Africa, not the majority of Black people in South Africa, nor South Africa’s Western allies. The only ones who is benefiting are the Marxist world and its allies.

We cannot compete with a verligte like you.

If those hon. members are concerned about the welfare of South Africa, however, there are many things which they can do. The hon. member for Houghton says she cannot argue the case for South Africa. I want to refer her to an article in the Christian Sciences Monitor of Thursday, 21 April 1977. This concerns the development and also the improvement of the position of Black people in the Southern states of America. They appointed a committee to work on this, and it is said—

Then it states that certain proposals have been made to bring about that development, including—

1. (1) Creating a national rural development bank;
2. (2) launching a programme to provide adequate housing;
3. (3) establishing a new federal agency to take responsibility for rural development.

Then the article goes on to say—

If she does not know what to say, why did she not rather say that, while the Black Americans of the South have lost 400 000 acres of land, the Black people in South Africa have gained 1,3 million hectares of land in the same period? Why did she not tell Mr. Carter that when he, still as a private individual, suggested to the Federal Government that a Black bank should be established, something of the kind had long been in existence in South Africa? Why did she not say that the type of agency which he suggested there to bring about development existed in South Africa in the form of corporations which do fantastic work and achieve fantastic results? I should like to read what was said—

These instruments which have already been implemented in South Africa, and are functioning well, are as popular in America as a swarm of bees at a picnic! I want to ask the hon. member why she has not mentioned those things. Since hon. members of that party as well as other hon. members say that corporations are being established in South Africa to promote socialism, I want to ask her why she does not come up with the true facts and indicate that corporations operating in the self-governing territories of South Africa are in fact primarily aimed at expanding and promoting the interests of the Black entrepreneur? Why does she not indicate that the corporations only create infrastructure, grant loans and assist businessmen with advice, etc. to enable them to become independent entrepreneurs? Why does she not say that the corporations are going to spend R132 million in the self-governing territories in terms of the present budget and that this is expected to create 18 000 employment opportunities? Surely this is positive propaganda. Why does she not say that the amount which is going to be spent by the corporations this year is almost double the amount invested by the corporations in the self-governing territories during the first 15 years of their existence and that this is therefore a demonstration of the momentum of the growth rate and development which is taking place there? Why does she not say that by 1975, 11 000 trading licences had already been issued to Black traders in these territories?

Last night I asked the hon. member why, if she does not know what to say, she does not say that here in South Africa we have more of the spirit of free enterprise than in any other place in Africa or in the communist world. Why does she not say that there is more democracy here? For her sake, I want to draw a small comparison. Amongst the 48 member States of the OAU in 1977, there were 16 military dictatorships and 22 civil dictatorships. I read in The Argus last night that only two democracies were left in the OAU. Why does she not say that since self-government was granted to territories in South Africa for the first time in 1963, 16 free general elections have been held in these self-governing territories, and that this year alone, four free elections are being held and that no more than five years have elapsed between elections in any one of those States? And why does she not tell the world at the same time that between 1971 and 1975 the Soviet Union spent $2 000 million—these are American dollars—on war aid in 11 African States and only $600 million on economic aid? Apart from the free general elections which take place in South Africa, school boards and school committees are also elected by the parents on a democratic basis. Advisory boards and urban councils are also elected, and the same applies to community councils as from 1978. However, the hon. member is not interested in that.

I am not your Minister of Information.

Why does she not say that there is more freedom of the Press in South Africa than elsewhere? I want to quote what Mr. Frank Barden, Africa director of the International Press Institute, said on one occasion. He said the following—

He also said that there had been 240 daily newspapers in Africa in 1963. This has dropped to 130 today. [Interjections.] Yes, there are still the 48 members of the OAU. In 28 of these 48 countries, the newspapers belong either to the State or to the governing party. In only five of the 48 States may the Opposition parties publish a newspaper. On the other hand, there is total freedom of the Press in South Africa, in the self-governing territories in South Africa as well as in the independent States which have been born from South Africa. Why does she not say this?

Tell us about the banning of The World.

That is one newspaper and it does not yet mean that there is no freedom of the Press in South Africa. Why does that hon. member not tell the world that the growth rate of the self-governing territories of South Africa is one of the very highest in Africa? Their growth rate is one of the very highest. Indeed, the positive growth rate is higher than the economic growth rate in South Africa. I shall tell you why she does not do that, Mr. Speaker.

[Inaudible.]

There is another aspect too. Why does she not tell the Western world that almost 70% of the Black people of South Africa consider themselves to be Christians? I shall tell you, Mr. Speaker, why she does not want to make that propaganda [Interjections.] I shall tell you why she does not want to broadcast those things: because it will create confidence in South Africa. It will create confidence if the world knows that democracy prevails here in South Africa, that a spirit of free enterprise is being maintained in the economic sphere in South Africa, that there is freedom of speech in South Africa and that the large majority of the population of South Africa adheres to the Christian faith. It is these very things which are an antidote to communism, which are a thorn in the flesh of communism. [Interjections.] That is why we must ask where that hon. member and some of her party really stand. Whom do they want to benefit and whom do they want to put at a disadvantage? I can come to one conclusion only, and that is that the acts performed and the words spoken by that hon. member are to the disadvantage of South Africa as well as to the disadvantage of the large majority of Black people in South Africa.

Your usual silly insinuations.

The Black people in South Africa who believe in national government…

Are you speaking on behalf of them?

I am not speaking on behalf of them; I am simply stating a fact. I say that the Black people who believe in ethnic rule will not obtain support and assistance from the Marxist world. One can see examples of this in Africa, because Black majorities are not supported by the communist world. They prefer to support militant minorities. The Black majority in South Africa which believes in national government will not obtain support from the Marxist world. As the matter stands at present, the West has not yet come forward to support Black majorities in favour of national government. Those people cannot depend on the PFP either. They are therefore thrown back upon themselves to promote what they believe in, to expand it and to fight for it.

I want to conclude. The hon. member says she does not know how to defend South Africa. The other night I listened to a foreigner, an American. I think it was Prof. Lefever. He said South Africa must do what is right, fair and good for South Africa. He said this would engender respect for South Africa. I want to tell that hon. member that this is precisely what this side of the House is doing and what we are going to do and what we are not prepared to deviate from. We believe it is our vocation, and we are going to do what is right and good, and we will not be forced by those hon. members, or by any other power, to capitulate or to abdicate.

Mr. Speaker, for any newcomer in this House it is a great experience to be able to be here, because there are so many aspects of the House which make a deep impression on one. I have gained the impression that the hon. members who are here, are people who are richly endowed with talents and that they are using those talents in the interests of South Africa. Or at least, so I thought. But now the previous speaker, the hon. Deputy Minister of Development, has confused my thoughts a little. I suppose in many respects one becomes disillusioned in this House. Since I am now referring to people who use their talents in the interests of South Africa, I should like to mention the name of my predecessor, Mr. Joos le Roux. Over a long period he rendered excellent service in the Natal Provincial Council and also in this House. A person who is prepared to use his talents to the utmost, is the person who is useful to this country. In the light thereof then, I should like, in all humility, also to express my willingness to use my limited talents in the interests of South Africa and her peoples.

I sincerely thank the hon. members who gave me such a friendly welcome here. Almost all of them came and shook hands with me and I have been received in a very friendly manner. That was different to what I had expected would happen, because outside I was told that Parliament was a leveller. It appears that it is indeed a leveller where a person is uncouth, but if one does not have a higher regard of oneself than other people have of one, then there are really no problems here.

The budget debate made a great impression on me and I should like to add my congratulations to those conveyed to the hon. the Minister of Finance by other hon. members for the excellent piece of work which he has presented. It appears that he renders the same good service here which he renders in Natal, and we are very proud of him on that account.

I should like to devote a few moments to the aspect of defence. I was particularly struck by the positive attitude to defence of all hon. members in the House. It is true that the dangers threatening South Africa are increasing in intensity although we have no aggressive designs. In this connection I should like to mention a few facts to indicate why we find ourselves in such a position today. Africa occupies 20% of the earth’s surface, it is 40% larger than the Soviet Union, more than three times the size of the USA and has 10% of the world population. It is a generally known fact that if the mineral wealth of Russia were to be added to that of South Africa, they would together have a monopoly in this respect. The strategic position and value of South Africa on this continent is widely known. There is nothing we can do to prevent the onslaught on our country. All we can do, therefore, is to get ready to defend ourselves. The events in the rest of Africa and the build-up of a Red arsenal in Mozambique shows us that the Russian fist is already clenched. Since we all know where the onslaught will come from, we can, in my view, do a few things by way of preparation.

It is known that the country areas are slowly being depopulated. Since 1930 the number of farms in South Africa has decreased by 20%, and since 1971 alone, by 15%. It is a normal process. But what is disconcerting, is the acceleration of the process. One must ask oneself: Can we afford this process to continue in the districts which border on our neighbouring states? One could talk about the farmers in these districts as frontier farmers. Should we not try to have all the farms in the strip which I am referring to, inhabited? Personally, I should like to see young farmers, beginners, receive preferential treatment in these areas—I realize that it cannot be done throughout the country— when it comes to Government loans for the purchase of land and the acquisition of working capital, on condition that an applicant should already have completed his military service and should have joined the local commando. These farmers could then form the first line of defence against the onslaught. It would not be easy to find better people for this task. History has taught us that the farmers of South Africa are not people who are unwilling to make sacrifices. They have proved themselves willing to defend the country and have not had conscientious objections. They are not the people who flee the country or attempt to smuggle money out of the country.

We are aware of the fact that the infiltration of terrorists over the borders should be limited to a minimum. It is imperative that our borders with the African States to our north should be safeguarded, and I cannot imagine a better method than this of ensuring that we know at all times precisely what is happening in this strip. I would also support the view that State-owned land which is situated in this area, should be made available to these young farmers as soon as possible in order that the land may be inhabited, occupied and safeguarded. I am of the opinion, however, that it would not be conducive to the safeguarding of the country to give State-owned land in my province to the Natal Parks Board. I am thinking of the Hluhluwe area, for example. I feel that, just as in the case of very large farming units in the border areas, such a large area should not lie unguarded. It cannot be conducive to our country’s safety.

We could perhaps also lay claim to preferential treatment in regard to police activities in these areas. In Natal, for example, there are two police divisions which each serve five districts. In my view there ought to be a third police division to serve the districts bordering on Swaziland, Mozambique and Northern Zululand. Vryheid is a border district. Yet police housing there is critical. There are no police houses in the town and it is impossible to rent homes for the police. With the advent of the Richards Bay railway line, the mines in the district have sprung up like mushrooms. The mines now provide their staff with housing in the town closest to the mine and no longer, as in the past, on the mine premises. Their policy is to convey the people from the town to the mining area. These mining companies are willing to rent houses for their employees at rentals varying from R200 and R300 per month. I can give the assurance that houses are almost unobtainable. Where they are indeed obtainable, the rent is absolutely beyond the means of the policeman’s salary. At night a candle or a lamp is actually still used in police outposts. I want to advocate that the farmers living in the border districts and the policemen who work in these districts should receive preferential treatment in this respect. With the close cooperation that exists between the hon. Ministers involved and the hon. the Minister of Finance, I am confident that it will be possible to find the funds so that we may be prepared in this dangerous part of the world.

Unlike the case of Rhodesia, there is no natural barrier which makes infiltration difficult. Every good farmer knows what goes on his farm. As soon as a strange animal or person enters upon his land, he knows about it. Provided there is also an intensifying of police activities, the border districts could form a buffer zone to limit infiltration to a minimum.

In the first place, Mr. Speaker, it gives me pleasure to convey my congratulations and those of my hon. colleagues to the hon. member for Vryheid on his maiden speech. It was a well-constructed speech. He paid an apt tribute to his predecessor, Mr. Joos le Roux, our late colleague in this House. He made some interesting remarks and furnished some facts about a matter of general interest, i.e. the defence of South Africa. Now that the hon. member has cleared his first hurdle in this House, we are looking forward to further positive contributions from that hon. member. I know I am speaking on behalf of all hon. members when I wish him a happy term of office in this House.

†Mr. Speaker, we listened with interest to the speech of the hon. the Deputy Minister of Development, who is charged with a very important portfolio, dealing with some 18 million people in South Africa. On this occasion we would have expected from him something positive, specific, directly relating to his portfolio and what he intended doing about these 18 million South Africans. We would have expected him to deal with consolidation and how long it is going to take to consolidate in terms of the money available in this budget and previous budgets. We would have expected him to deal with housing and the removal of Thornhill and places like that. We would have expected him to deal with urbanization and jobs. We wanted to hear about all these things because these are the matters entrusted to the hon. the Deputy Minister. Instead of that the hon. the Deputy Minister went back to the notes and the pamphlets he used for speeches he made during the general election prior to 30 November. These pamphlets trotted out tendentious, selected quotations in order to discredit hon. members on this side of the House. He is not going to succeed. The division is not in our ranks but in the ranks of hon. members on that side of the House. [Interjections.] The divisions are there. I can see them directly in front of me. There are those people who want to move towards a mixed and a shared society and those who say that in principle that is wrong.

The hon. the Deputy Minister spent a fair portion of his time trying to denigrate the hon. member for Houghton. I am quite sure that after 25 years of service in this House and to South Africa the hon. member for Houghton can look after herself, certainly in relation to the hon. the Deputy Minister. Let us make it quite clear that on the issue of sanctions all hon. members in my party, including the hon. member for Houghton, have repeatedly stated that as a matter of principle we are opposed to economic sanctions against South Africa or against other countries.

Having said that, it is also appropriate that we should warn the people of the reality and the danger of sanctions. The hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs in the Part Appropriation debate said that we face the danger of economic sanctions. This is a reality. We have got to take it into account. We have to decide how we are going to counter what could be a threat to our economy.

The difference is that we fear it and you welcome it.

The hon. the Deputy Minister makes selected, tendentious quotations about “Black majorities”. There are more Black people than White people in South Africa. What are we talking about? Let us make it quite clear, that as far as this party is concerned, we reject the concept of Black racial majorities, we reject the concept of White minorities. We accept the concept of shared, multi-racial government. Hon. members will say it will not work. It is not going to work under the Turnhalle concept in South West Africa? Why should it not work? There are many ways of dealing with this problem, but as long as we see this either in terms of White domination or Black domination, we shall get no further towards a solution of our problems. Then, this hon. gentleman had the effrontery to suggest that the PFP was moving away from a democratic process, because I at one stage said if we could not get rid of the Government, we would influence their policies in our direction in any case. Later I am going to quote instances to show that hon. members opposite, in a complete reversal of their previous policies, are now applying the policies which have been called for by the hon. member for Houghton over the past 15 years. We are going to continue to do this and we are going to succeed. But when it comes to democracy, then we hear about it from a Deputy Minister in a government which believes in detention without trial and in the banning of newspapers. And, as far as the sovereign Parliament of this country is concerned, it says it is available to only 18% of the people.

I want to leave the hon. the Deputy Minister because it is necessary to come back to the budget and the circumstances in which this particular budget is presented to this House. There are two ways in which we can look at the budget. The one is to look at it as an exercise in fiscal housekeeping. The other is to look at it as a fiscal back-up for the Government’s socio-economic and political programme. Let me say immediately that if one sees it only as a bit of fiscal housekeeping, it is tidy, it is neat, it looks as though there have been solid, sensible and competent back room boys working on the mechanics of this budget. There has been an adjustment of our household expenditure, and easing of the financial shoe where it pinches and no doubt creating new places where it is going to pinch in due course. But, viewed as a fiscal back-up for the Government’s socioeconomic and political policy, I believe it is a dismal failure, because it gives no indication of any new, bold, imaginative planning from that side of the House. Perhaps it is not the fault of the hon. the Minister of Finance. Perhaps the Government has no such plans.

To look at one or two aspects of the budget other than the general sales tax which breaks new ground, the hon. the Minister has taken modest steps and he has made very modest predictions. In reviewing the past year, he has conceded that the inflation rate is up again, this time to 11,3%. He has conceded that unemployment for Coloureds, Asians and Whites is up 61% over the year. He has also conceded that one in eight of the relatively economically active Blacks in South Africa are today without work. He has conceded that the GDP is down to a ½% growth rate, which means a minus growth rate of more than 2% if established on a per capita basis. He has also conceded that the South African economy did not in the last year benefit from the modest cyclical upswing of the main industrial countries.

Wisely the hon. the Minister does not claim that the steps he has proposed can really cure any of these economic ailments. What he has done, as we see it, is that he has pointed to a direction of growth, but he has not taken the steps which are in themselves adequate to push the economy into a new growth cycle. If I might look at an analogy, the hon. the Minister of Finance does not emerge as the captain of an ocean liner who sets course and then calls for power from the engine room. He looks more like a yachtsman who has set his course and then looks around and hopes that some favourable wind is going to fill the sails. We, because of our interest in this country, would hope that favourable winds are going to fill the sails.

The steps proposed in this budget are, however, by themselves not going to propel us forward. Each year’s budget is shaped to a very considerable extent by the circumstances, not only economic, but also political, racial and international, in which we in South Africa find ourselves. Last year’s budget was framed against the background of months of urban unrest in Soweto and around the country, unrest which spread from Soweto to the Black townships and which brought us face to face with an incipient conflict situation, not only amongst the urban Blacks, but—and to the surprise of many people— amongst the Coloured people in the Eastern and the Western Cape. We all know that this urban unrest had a disruptive effect on production. It sapped investor confidence. It resulted in the drying up of long-term investment capital and in a significant outflow of short-term capital. That was the background to the last budget.

The hon. the Minister, in introducing this budget, referred to the international gale-force winds. These had not reached us a year ago. However, already when we were framing the last budget, there were the early warning signals. The hon. the Minister, I believe, realizes that the cyclical upswing in the economies of the major industrial countries was already showing signs of faltering. The imbalance in the Free World money supply, due mainly to the vast sums being paid for oil, was already starting to play havoc with Western currencies, and in particular, with the dollar.

In the political field, we all know that Governments of countries who were our main trading partners have reacted unfavourably towards our internal situation. The Geneva talks on Rhodesia failed. This resulted in increased terrorism and violence in our neighbour country. There were terrorist strikes across the border into South West Africa. We also realized that Mr. Kissinger, former American Secretary of State, was on his way out, and the new United States Administration had made it clear that it would review USA strategy towards Southern Africa. The attacks against us in the United Nations and elsewhere continued.

If the scene against which last year’s budget was set was largely a situation of internal unrest, the scene for this year’s budget is dominated by the international situation in which we in South Africa find ourselves. Let us look at it for one moment. Whether we like this or not, we are being increasingly isolated from international organizations and agencies. Pressures of various kinds are being applied on foreign companies not to invest in South Africa, or even to withdraw existing investments from South Africa. Since November 1977 we have been subject to a UN mandatory arms embargo. The hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs has said we run the risk of economic sanctions. The danger of a conflict of an international nature developing in Southern Africa is much closer to us today than it was a year ago. Indeed, we have to contend with a situation of violence, either on or close to our borders. Statements and incidents point to an increase in tension between South Africa and some of her neighbours.

I do not want to deal with all of these incidents at this stage. However, I should like to refer to incidents in two countries in particular. One occurred in Botswana, and the other in South West Africa, a territory for which we in this House, and the whole of South Africa, have a special responsibility.

First of all, as far as Botswana is concerned, it is common cause that there have been a series of incidents which have increased the strain between South Africa and that country. I believe that both these incidents and their consequences are to be regretted on both sides. I believe it is important for the future of both South Africa and Botswana, who occupy key positions in Southern Africa, that we realize that each of us is part of a different international community. Yet we have a common border, we have common economic interests, and we belong to one Customs Union. It is important that we should live together in harmony. Nevertheless these incidents have been impairing our relationships. The latest of these was the killing last week of two South Africans, Michael Arden and William de Beer, and a Briton, Mr. Mike Love.

I want to say immediately that the statement which was issued by the Botswana authorities on the incident is, as far as we are concerned, utterly unconvincing. I know that the Foreign Office has been in touch with the Botswana Government, and all I want to say at this stage is that I trust that our Government will do all that it can to persuade the Botswana authorities to have a thorough inquiry at which the families of the dead men are properly represented. We believe that this is the least that should happen in this unfortunate set of circumstances.

Secondly, Sir, there is the question of South West Africa. We know that the protracted negotiations on settlement have reached a very critical stage. I believe that in the circumstances it is entirely inappropriate to have a full scale debate on the matter in the South African Parliament, while this sensitive round of discussions is taking place and while the issue is being considered, not so much by the South African Government, but by interest groups in South West Africa and the Administrator-General of South West Africa. Perhaps next week, when we discuss the Prime Minister’s Vote, it will be a more appropriate occasion to have a debate on the South West African issue. One cannot, however, ignore the tragic event which took place recently, i.e. the brutal killing of Chief Clemens Kapuuo of the Herero community. This was a tragedy not only in the personal, but also in a national sense. At the very time when South West Africa was needing moderating influences and moderate leaders of stature, the people of South West Africa have been deprived of his leadership. This was a man known to some of us as well as to some of the hon. members on the other side personally. He was known to have a deep sense of commitment to South West African independence. Indeed, so deep was that commitment that he fought the South African Government for many years on this particular issue. He was no yes-man; he was no stooge. For many years he was chairman of the Namibian National Council, an umbrella organization of nine South West African organizations, including Swapo, until it broke away in 1973. Clemens Kapuuo was a man big of stature and big of spirit; he was a conciliator. I believe it is appropriate to pay our respect to this Namibian patriot.

But, Sir, his death and the series of assassinations that have taken place, bring to our attention the important role of the police to protect the lives of innocent people in a fiercely partisan situation. If there is to be an electoral process, it is essential that this electoral process succeeds. If there are going to be elections in South West Africa, three conditions have to apply. Firstly, the leaders of the political movements have to be free from the threat of assassination. You cannot have elections under the threat of assassination. Secondly, the voters have to be free from coercion from wherever that may come. Thirdly, there has to be trust in the effectiveness and the impartiality of the Administration. I do not underestimate the difficulty of the role which the police have to play ib that area, but to ensure on the spot direction and maximum respect for impartiality in what is a difficult situation, I want to suggest that consideration be given to transferring the police to the control of the Administrator-General as soon as it is practically possible. I say this because I believe, from personal observations and from discussions and investigations we have made, that the Administrator-General, Mr. Justice M. T. Steyn, is doing an outstanding job of work in South West Africa. He has a total commitment to his assignment. He seems to have a very real grasp of a most important and difficult task. He is moving forward firmly and he is moving forward unostentatiously. I believe that he has generated confidence and that he is engendering trust and respect. I think he is the appropriate man under whom the police should fall in these circumstances.

Mr. Speaker, when one looks at this budget, framed against the background of external affairs, one comes to the realization that in the past, for many years, it has been the Government’s internal policies and actions that have been the cause of the deterioration in our international affairs.

Nonsense!

I expected that. Those members all know that their policies have alienated and embarrassed our traditional allies in the West. They have disillusioned our potential friends in Africa and on many occasions, I believe, the actions of hon. members opposite have played into the hands of our opponents and detractors. [Interjections.] Yes, that is what I believe the situation to be. Having said this, let me add that I believe that the situation which has developed is so serious, for all of us, that recriminations about the past are less important, at this stage, than consideration of how we should act in the future. It is against this background, therefore, that I want to discuss this problem.

The fact is that the focus of international attention, and the arena for international action, has moved with dramatic speed to Southern Africa. Added to this, the nature of the problems and the issues in the Southern African region have changed. They have become to a lesser extent regional issues; they have become, to an increasing extent, international issues. The result is that we who live here in Southern Africa have to attempt to solve our problems at a time when our part of Africa is caught up in both an East-West and a North-South international power-play. The attitude of the major powers towards the problems of this region are influenced, to an increasing extent, by their bearing on the one hand, on the Communist-Free World conflict and, on the other hand, on the interplay between the developed countries and the underdeveloped countries of the so-called Third World. So we are caught up in what is an international power-play between two axes of conflict which are world-wide and which have now beamed their focus on us in Southern Africa. This makes it more difficult for us to solve our problems. International relationships are no longer a set of factors to be played off against one another in Africa, Asia or America, or beyond some colonial buffer state elsewhere in Africa International factors in Southern Africa have become of intense and immediate importance. They are on our doorstep and they have to be taken into account in framing our budget and in deciding upon a course of internal action. As I said earlier, in the past our external relationships were affected by our internal policy. To an increasing extent, however, we are going to find that our internal policy is going to be affected by the external situation that has developed round about us.

In these circumstances, therefore, I believe that there should be three critical policy objectives. Firstly, we in these benches believe that South Africa must be strong, must be as self-reliant as possible and must be ready to meet any act of aggression from whatever quarter it may come. I say this, not in defence of Government race policy, but in the firm conviction that only if there is peace inside our country will we be likely to make the social, economic and the political reforms which are so essential if we are going to have long-term stability and if we are going to generate the confidence which is vital to our economic progress.

Secondly, we believe that South Africa must aspire to be associated with the community of free nations centred on the Western World. It can be argued—and it is argued— that the West needs Africa. This may be so. I have no doubt that South Africa could be of immense strategic importance to the West, but in the end it is the West that must decide that for itself. What is important for us to decide is whether or not we need the West. We in these benches believe we do. We need the West for our economic prosperity. We need the West as trading partners, as sources of foreign capital, modern technology and cultural stimulation. I believe we need the West for strategic reasons as well. This does not mean to say that we must go cap in hand to the West. It does not mean to say that we must kow-tow to the West or accept being dictated to on matters which we believe are our own preserve. Nor does it mean that we will not be irritated or angered by some of the statements by Western spokesmen on the affairs of South Africa. It does mean, however, that we should be prepared to give serious consideration to the views of those of our friends who are genuinely concerned about the direction in which our policies are taking us.

I believe we must avoid becoming, as there is a risk of us becoming, the victims of an isolation psychosis or a suicide syndrome. I doubt whether we are helped in our actions if we hold the view expressed by the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs that a so-called friendly country like America is at present a greater enemy of South Africa than Russia. That is all very well at election time but, if this is so, what is the hon. the Minister of Finance doing coupling the rand to the dollar? What is he doing coupling the rand to the dollar if America is a greater threat to South Africa than the Soviet Union?

I believe that we should have, as one of the clear-cut objectives of overall policy, improved relationships between our country and the countries of the Free World. One thing I must add, and that is that we must avoid becoming defeatists in so far as our ability to improve our relationships with the West is concerned. We believe that the very steps we should be taking to gain the sympathy and understanding of potential friends in the West and in Africa are no more and no less than the steps that we have to take in South Africa if we are going to get the cooperation of our Black and Brown fellow South Africans.

The third object of policy is that I believe that never before in the history of our country has it been more necessary to find a basic unity, a common loyalty, a shared patriotism between Black, White and Brown South Africans. I am not wishing away the diversity which is an essential element of South Africa, but I am thinking of a unity, a loyalty, a common bond which can unite all South Africans so that they can meet the dangers facing South Africa as a single nation. On this depends our survival as a developed society. I think that many hon. members opposite have come to realize that we cannot achieve this unity within the framework of the policy they have had for the past 30 years. I think they all admit that recent reversals in Government policy are a recognition of this.

[Inaudible.]

I want to list them for the benefit of the hon. member for Von Brandis: The normalization of sport, to allow mixed sport even down to club level; the opening of live theatre to mixed audiences; the dropping of the colour bar on Blacks using church facilities in White areas; the admission of Blacks to White universities and to White private schools; the repeal of the discriminatory Bantu general tax; the plan announced by the hon. the Minister of Education and Training to scrap the very concept of Bantu education.

Where did you get that from?

These are all reversals of National Party policy. Every one of them is a step which we on this side of the House, and the hon. member for Houghton in particular, have been asking for. They are steps in the right direction, but considering the time scale in which we have to operate, they pale into relative insignificance because none of these involve rights. They all involve exceptions, they involve permits, they involve turning a blind eye, but none of them really come to grips with or go beyond the fringes of our co-existence problems.

If this is so, let me with all the ability at my command persuade the hon. members on the other side of the House that the one thing that we cannot ignore in this new set of circumstances is the tremendous impact which the developments in Africa close to us are going to have, as to an extent they already have had, on our Black and Brown peoples’ expectations and frustrations. One recalls, two or three years back, with the independence of Angola and Mozambique and the end of White colonialism, the impact that appeared to have on the young people in the urban areas. Soon Rhodesia and Namibia are going to join a constellation of Southern African states with Black majority governments. Black and Brown South Africans are going to watch this and I believe they are going to be profoundly affected by what they see.

What they will see is other people living without compulsory racial apartheid. Already they can go to South West Africa, which is administered by this Government, to find there that we have got rid of apartheid. We have got rid of apartheid and it works. I believe it is already having an effect on Black and Brown South Africans who go to that part of the country.

Secondly, they will see political systems operating, and although many of them are inadequate, in all of them Blacks are participating in the decision making process.

Thirdly, they will see economic systems operating which, while they are less developed and less prosperous than those in South Africa, are going to be more radical and are going to be less racially discriminatory. This is the reality of what they are going to see on the other side of our borders. Whether we like it or not, in this coming year Black South Africans are going to be brought into closer contact with the economic philosophy of the under-developed Third World. Added to this there is no doubt—and one can see it already—that Marxist strategy will be to exploit the economic and class disparities which exist in South Africa in order to gain the ear and try to gain the support of the masses of our South African people. Already surveys made amongst members of the urban Black communities show that to an increasing extent these people—and the hon. the Minister read out a survey to this House some time ago—the Black people in the urban areas and the young people in particular, are tending to see their grievances and frustrations largely in economic and largely in class terms. They are going to focus attention on the fact that despite the wealth that our economy is generating there is a tremendous disparity in wealth and assets and effective opportunity between the Blacks and the Whites in South Africa. I say this because it is going to have an impact on the people with whom the hon. the Minister of Plural Relations and Development is going to deal. I believe this is an added reason to reinforce the reasons given by the hon. member for Yeoville yesterday why we should be examining the performance of our economic system in relation to the needs of all of the people of South Africa. I believe that we must ensure that our mixed economic system with its combination of State involvement on the one hand and free enterprise on the other is geared to eliminating the wage gap and the wealth gap far more effectively than it has done hitherto.

Those of us who have seen the series of films on America produced by Mr. Cliff Saunders—whether they are propaganda films or not is another matter—will agree that they gave to us a message which is summed up in these words: It is one thing to remove obstacles which decades of apartheid have placed in the way of economic progress of sections of the people; it is another thing, once the obstacles of apartheid have gone, to implement positive programmes which will enable these people to make practical use of the opportunities available to them. We should be moving into this phase. As we eliminate apartheid, so we should be implementing positive programmes to see that the people who have been deprived in the past as a result of apartheid can make full use of the new opportunities available to them.

What will we have to do? First of all, a larger slice of the economic cake comprising the public sector of our economy will have to be made available to Black South Africans. Secondly, the Government and the private sector combined will have to ensure that the free enterprise sector of our economic system, which we believe provides the essential thrust to our economic development, establishes ways and means of replacing race with merit as the dividing line between the haves and the have-nots. Thirdly, the Blacks will have to feel in tangible terms the benefits for them of our economic system. They will need more training and educational facilities than have been provided for in the budget. It will have to be possible for them to be part of our economic system, not only as workers, but as home-owners, landowners, managers and entrepreneurs and owners and co-owners of businesses. I believe it is unforgivable that this Government has dilly-dallied as long as it has on the simple issue of whether Black people and how Black people can own their own homes. There was an appeal from Mr. Sam Motsoenyane, a prominent Black businessman, last week who asked why we do not open the business sectors of South Africa and the business areas of South Africa to Black entrepreneurs. I hope that this will be done. If it is good enough for the Blacks to go there to spend their money and to do their work, surely it should also be good enough for the Blacks to own businesses in these areas.

Mr. Speaker, if one looks at the incidence of events developing around us, the tensions, the international situation, the currents and the trends which are running there, the basis of our policy today should be that Black, White and Brown people in South Africa are recognized as citizens of this country. I believe this brings us to the divide in our South African politics, i.e. the divide between the Government on the one hand and we in these benches on the other hand. We say, without any reservation, that whether we are Black, White or Brown, we are citizens of South Africa and that as citizens of South Africa we are entitled to certain basic rights. Hon. members opposite say that it is not so. That is the divide between us in these benches and hon. members on the other side of the House who say to the Coloureds and the Indians that they are citizens, but that their basic political rights will always be subordinate to a White Parliament.

Nonsense!

The hon. member can call it nonsense, but it is the divide between us in the PFP and those on the other side who say to the 20 million Blacks that they are not true citizens of South Africa, that they are only citizens by the grace of the White man, citizens by permission, a permission which will be withdrawn when their policy has been implemented. That is their approach. The hon. the Minister of Plural Relations made it as clear as daylight in one of his first speeches in his new post. I quote him from Hansard (col. 579)—

It is ridiculous.

That hon. member says it is ridiculous, but it is still the policy of the NP. Does the hon. the Minister realize the enormity and the full consequences of this point of view in the light of the situation in which we find ourselves? Does the hon. Minister really believe that he can promote loyalty towards South Africa with this kind of policy? How can we defend South Africa against the onslaught of our enemies today without the loyalty of the Black citizens of South Africa? Does the hon. Minister realize what he is saying to a population group which already constitutes 71% of the de facto population of South Africa? They represent 70% of the economically active population; 56% of the labour force in the manufacturing industry; 64,4% of the labour force in the textile industry; 62,7% of the labour force in the electricity industry; 27% of the labour force in the Post Office; 47% of the labour force of the Railways and almost 62% of the labour force of local authorities. That is the present situation, and in 12 years’ time, in 1990, the Black people will constitute 1½ million of the so-called white-collar workers, the office workers, out of a total of fewer than 2,8 million. In addition they will perform most of the semi-skilled work. There will be no fewer than 180 000 Black technicians and professional workers. To these Black workers the hon. Minister is saying that they are South African citizens only on sufferance, because the White man allows it, and that one of these days they will no longer be South African citizens. We as White South Africans are dependent on these Black South Africans for our large-scale progress and our survival. We cannot deny from that.

You are a stupid leader.

Stupid or not, what I am saying is that the NP is driving the Black people away, thereby making a common loyalty towards South Africa impossible. In the light of the present circumstances that should be the most important aspect of Government policy.

And I am succeeding in spite of that.

I would like to ask the hon. the Minister a few questions. Look for a moment at the question of homeland consolidation, the 1936 settlement. How much time do you think we have to implement this plan? Is it two years, three years, five years, ten years or twenty years? Are we going to tell the Blacks during all that time: “You are only here temporarily; you are not really permanent citizens of South Africa?” Let us be more specific. How long can we afford to consider Black South Africans as citizens on sufferance? On behalf of five million Black South Africans the voters of kwaZulu gave a massive vote to Inkatha, thereby totally rejecting the concept of loss of South African citizenship. How long does the hon. the Minister anticipate are Zulu South Africans going to be satisfied to be citizens on sufferance? Let us consider Qwaqwa where there are 1,5 million people in a homeland which cannot possibly accommodate even up to one tenth of their number. I want to ask the hon. the Minister: How long does he anticipate are the people of Qwaqwa meekly going to accept being citizens on sufferance? [Interjections.]

The hon. the Minister has spoken about his five year plan and I presume that under his five year plan a million or more Blacks will within five years be living in a beautiful city of Soweto. Many will be living in their own homes. Their children will be attending non-ethnic schools. Many of the men will have fixed jobs in commerce and industry. Some will have their own businesses. How long will these people be treated as citizens on sufferance in South Africa? No, Mr. Speaker, let the hon. the Minister look at the GDP, let him check the development of the homelands and let him look at the income per capita being generated in those homelands. Then he will have to realize that he cannot possibly implement this plan. With 69% of the population being citizens of independent homelands, comprising 13% of the land, generating less than 4% of the GDP, the hon. the Minister is going to find that his policy, far from getting rid of discrimination, is merely going to entrench the existing discrimination on an international basis with all the potential for conflict.

The hon. the Minister has the flush of newness and enthusiasm in his new post. I want to appeal to him to look into the future, to look at the ongoing process of urbanization, to look at the impact which a decent education is going to have on the Black community, to consider the changed pattern of employment which is going to arise, to consider the rise in the Black consumer market, to consider the breakdown of the racial barriers which are taking place in the cultural, economic, religious, sporting and other fields, and to think of the fact that our key industries, our army and our police force are to an increasing extent being manned by Black South Africans. How can we place these key industries and these key elements of government in South Africa in the hands of people who we say are Black citizens on sufferance who one of these days will cease to become citizens of South Africa? I can think of no one statement of a political nature made in South Africa this year which was more damaging to confidence in the long-term future or confidence in the development of South Africa than the statement of the hon. the Minister of Plural Relations and Development that one day there will be no Black South African citizens.

I believe the moment of truth is at hand, not merely for the Government, but for all of us in South Africa. All of us, Government, Opposition and beyond this House all the people of the wider South African society, men and women of all races who care for this country and for its future, must grasp a single nettle, i.e. whether we like it or not, we are all South Africans and we are going to remain South Africans. Because we are citizens of this country all of us are entitled to basic rights of citizenship of the country to which we give our loyalty.

I want to spell out what we in the PFP believe these basic rights of citizenship to be. We believe, firstly, that the basic right of citizenship for Black, White and Brown in this country must include the right to live a life free from statutory discrimination, to associate with whom one wishes in an open society without dictation or coercion by the State. This is a simple, basic premise.

Secondly, we believe a basic right is the right to lead a normal family life. This is fundamental for any stable society. Thirdly, we believe it is the right to a decent education, to take up employment in the private and the public sector, to own property and to participate in the economic system without any restriction based on race or colour. Fourthly, we believe that any basic right of citizenship must include the right to participate in the decision-making process at all levels of government. Fifthly, we believe in the right of the protection and the development of the various cultural, language and religious heritages which are part of South Africa. Finally, in a situation of growing authoritarianism, we believe that the basic right is the right of the protection of one’s life, liberty and property, and the access to the judiciary in the defence of these rights.

When we in South Africa can agree on a single basic premise, namely, that we are all citizens of South Africa, then we will all find ourselves in this difficult, dangerous and exciting situation together, I believe can go forward together. However, until we can agree and as long as we have policies based on division, we are going to have to endure the dangers, both of division and of conflict. What is more, until we recognize that we are all South Africans and we cross that one simple Rubicon, we shall not be able to plan positively for the future.

We want to debate with the Government. Let us admit that we may differ on policy, but let us try to find consensus on the simple philosophy that we are in difficulty, that there is tremendous potential in South Africa and that if we are going to surmount those difficulties and exploit that potential, we have to find unity between Black, White and Brown, a unity which can only be found on the basis of a common citizenship in a common fatherland.

This budget reflects the dilemma of a Government which bases its policy on a myth in a situation which is dominated by the harsh realities of South Africa today.

Mr. Speaker, before I reply to some of the things which have been said by the hon. Leader of the Opposition, I should just like to say a brief word of appreciation for the statement which has been made by the leader of the NRP, the hon. member for Durban Point, when he spoke about the wars South Africans took part in on the side of the West. He implored those countries who had experience of South Africa’s friendship during the world wars to remember those times and the old loyalties. On the other hand, yesterday and today I listened to the speeches of hon. members of the PFP with increasing incredulity. From the hon. Leader of the Opposition we had an absolute welter of words, covering practically every aspect of public life in South Africa, superficial, glib and meaningless words. Mr. Speaker, we have heard it all before.

I remember first coming to this House as a little boy; later in life as a provincial councillor; and now as a member. I remember a time when the hon. Leader of the Opposition of those days would rise during a budget debate and the House would be hushed, the galleries would be packed, the ears and the eyes of the nation would be centred upon him and the hon. the Prime Minister would be in his bench. Today when the hon. Leader of the Opposition rises, it amuses me that all we have is a titter through the House, which breaks into raucous laughter after his first few statements. It is scandalous. Yesterday the hon. member for Yeoville quoted from the New Testament. I thought that was rather amusing. He finally broke all the barriers of credibility when he tried to present himself as a spokesman for the poor people—“die arm mense van Suid-Afrika”.

Then we had an even more amusing spectacle from the hon. member for Houghton—and I say this with respect to her position as a senior frontbencher—when she gave us a lecture on patriotism. Essentially, what the hon. the Leader of the Opposition told us here this afternoon is what the HNP, too, always tell us, namely “daar is Swart gevaar. Ons is omsingel deur Swartes. Daar is ’n Swart meerderheid in ons midde”.

“Ons moet nou gou oorgee sê die Progs”. We must take South Africa, put it on a silver platter, surround it with watercress and hand it to these people speedily so that they will be kind to us. That is exactly what we hear from the HNP, only they put it differently. They say that if one gives an inch, all will be lost. Unfortunately, neither of these two alternatives are practical or real alternatives for South Africa, in spite of the fact that the hon. member for Yeoville yesterday pictured us as a beleaguered nation, boycotted and surrounded on all sides. He painted a black picture for us. However, there are aspects of the budget which I know, from reading previous debates that have been called for by members of the Opposition; in other words, these aspects are felt to be necessary by both sides of the House. When this happens, what do we hear from the PFP? While those aspects are supported by every financial observer in South Africa, including those who support that side of the House, even then those aspects are poorly received by the members of the PFP. That makes a mockery of their stance, which is supposed to be that where the Government does the right thing, they will support it, and where the Government does the wrong thing, they will oppose it. But when the Government comes with the very things for which they themselves have called, they receive them very poorly and even criticize them. They remind me of those people who see in every silver lining, a dark cloud.

It is true that the hon. member for Yeoville has a constructive and fertile mind and often comes to this House with constructive, interesting and positive proposals. But when one considers that in respect of this budget he was unable to offer any valid criticism or offer any alternative proposals, proposals that can bear any examination, I think it is a reflection of the excellence of the budget.

Hon. members of the PFP have attacked the budget very insincerely. Because they have a few grounds, as I have mentioned, for criticizing the budget With their tongues in their cheeks and with smiles on their faces they offer all sorts of mock criticizm. The tragedy is that the man in the street does not see them. He cannot see the smile and he cannot see the tongue in the cheek. He simply reads the cold print.

What I find most interesting is the fact that the Opposition appeared to be unable to judge the situation in which South Africa finds itself. Funnily enough, I was reading a History of South Africa by Lacour-Gayet the other day and a particular passage struck me. It reminded me that the members of the PFP are nothing new to us in South Africa. As a matter of fact, they are the oldest political manifestation that we have had in South Africa. They are jingo liberals such as we had at the time of Rhodes and in the time of Jamieson. Some of them who are presently in this House are simply people like Van der Kemp and Phillips. I thought of them when I read this passage on page 51 of Lacour-Gayet’s book, where Dr. Phillip talks about Van der Kemp and says—

I would implore hon. members opposite to reflect on this. I hope and trust they will not live to regret their mistakes. [Interjections.] They should learn the lessons of recent history. The other day I happened to find a note on Angola. I have kept it and it was most interesting to me when the hon. the Leader of the Opposition spoke today about the constellation of states in Southern Africa, that he also mentioned Angola. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition advocated here a serious political philosophy which would inevitably send us in the same direction in which Angola has gone, simply compounding the error of Africa, simply going along the same road which has been tried and which has failed time and time again. If one looks at the Financial Mail of 26 April 1974, it is interesting to note what was said there, especially if one bears in mind that this was said just before the collapse of Angola. This is what that Paper had to say—

The publication goes on to say that Angola believes in rising living standards, in equal education and job opportunities and in the total absence of race discrimination, and that they will create a harmonious and non-racial Angolan state. It goes on to say—

It was a salutary lesson indeed, but for entirely different reasons. No sooner was this written when Angola exploded in the face of the world.

A leading Banker wrote at the same time in the Financial Mail—

The political situation which these people assisted in bringing about was the very antithesis of what they expected it to be, and there is a lesson in that. There is a lesson to all of us, and a lesson, especially for hon. members of the PFP. That lesson is that they should not act as the Spinolas of Southern Africa. [Interjections.]

Another attitude which is prevalent from the speech of the hon. the Leader of the Opposition is his emphasis on the clock pointing at five minutes to twelve, that we must change now and that, if we do not change now, it will be too late. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition says time is running out. However, he and hon. members of his party ignore the fact that this Government is committed to constructive and dynamic change, that this Government is committed to moving away from discrimination, that this Government is committed to closing the wage gap, that this Government is committed to uplifting people and to expanding freedoms in South Africa. There is no other part of the subcontinent of Africa where one can see expanding freedoms in the same sense as it is seen here in South Africa. Here we see rising standards of education, rising standards of liberty, etc. When I speak of rising standards of liberty, I think of it also in the sense of freedom of shelter, freedom of speech, freedom of the Press, the freedom of living under an independent judiciary …

Tragedy, not freedom! [Interjections.]

These things are not tragic. Of course, they are not. We will all concede that everything is not perfect, not even in that great bastion of liberty—as it is called—Great Britain. I can remember how South Africa was criticized when I studied there in the 1960s. One of the things for which South Africa was severely criticized then, was for its system of detention without trial. Now, they themselves have had to revert, due to circumstances in Northern Ireland, to a system of detention without trial. I am not trying to justify detention without trial. It is not something which societies easily choose to do, but the fact of the matter is that in Southern Africa, and in South Africa in particular, a situation of increasing freedom and expanding and rising standards obtains. It is not only the members on this side of the House who say this, but hon. members can consult the work of Freedom House and other experienced observers. Here, on a continent of diminishing freedoms and of diminishing standards, we find exactly the opposite in South Africa. One only had to listen to the words of the hon. the Minister of Plural Relations and Development during the present session and to the words which the hon. the Minister of Defence used during the censure debate when he discussed the new constitutional proposals to have realized that full citizenship would be extended to the Coloured and Indian people.

The new constitution will lead up to that. If one listened to the words used by those two hon. Ministers, one would realize that we live in a dynamic situation, in a country of which one can say that if our history says anything at all, it tells the story of a country that has lived with, has understood and has been able to control dynamic change. We live in a country which has moved, in so short a time as my father’s lifetime, from a nomadic community often of primitive agriculturalists, in many instances, to our present society, a post-industrial society. That is the story of South Africa. It is a story of rising standards and expanding freedoms. It is also a story of dynamic, but controlled change.

If you remain in power … [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, do you know what worries the hon. member for Bryanston most? What concerns that hon. member most is the fact that South Africa, after the psychological war, the hot war, the cold war and the abuse which also he has manufactured and has given to our enemies, stands solidly and steadily, in a balanced way, looking confidently into the future. The hon. the Minister of Finance has come with an exemplary budget, but the hon. member for Bryanston sits there disappointed because they have not been able to overthrow the existing order in South Africa.

The hon. member for Bryanston reminds me of the benevolent visitor who used to visit patients in hospitals, especially seamen who landed here and found themselves in hospital. He visited an oriental patient and while he leant benevolently over the patient, the patient, to whom he was very kind, lay there, very weak, and muttered: “Oof long yeng tim.” He kept repeating this statement, but the benevolent visitor told him not to worry. The benevolent visitor tried his utmost to ensure that the patient was comfortable, but the patient got weaker and weaker and ultimately died. This worried the benevolent gentleman very much, and when he met one of his Chinese friends a few weeks later, he told him about the patient who had died in hospital and also asked him what “Oof long yeng tim” meant. “Oh,” said the Chinese gentleman, “it means: You are standing on my oxygen tube.” [Interjections.] I would suggest that the hon. member for Bryanston is trying to stand on the oxygen tube of South Africa.

The members of that party are being kept together quite artificially. Certain English-language newspapers act as a megaphone for them and they have magnified their views out of all proportion in relation to the number of voters they represent. They are here as the Official Opposition by the skin of their teeth with majorities of 50 and so on. I think seven of them have majorities of less than 500.

What about the majority they obtained in Bezuidenhout?

Even the hon. member for Falconetti… [Interjections.] I am sorry, Mr. Speaker, I should have said even the hon. member for Bezuidenhout obtained a majority of less than 100. I know that many Pressman are extremely disappointed with the quality of the Opposition. They came here and all expected them to be vigorous, effective and dynamic—one can use virtually all the adjectives in the dictionary—but they have failed South Africa miserably. I would suggest to those Pressmen that they now remove the oxygen tent from the PFP and allow them to stand on their own feet. Let us see whether they can survive without the aid of a kind of political hothouse. I am afraid that their slender majorities will diminish and that many of them will disappear from this House. I say this because I do not believe that many of the things they say have any validity. The hon. member for Pinelands spends his life “walking about” South Africa trying to give South Africans a guilt complex. [Interjections.] Let the hon. member for Pinelands know, however, that South Africa needs no guilt complex. South Africa does not consist of fat cats like the members of the PFP. South Africa does not consist of people who are grinding the faces of the poor.

The hon. member for Pinelands would do well, not only to read and understand his history, but also to propagate it. His country is under assault, if he does not know that, and I think he would do well to try to disseminate opinions abroad which would reflect the correct perspective of what South Africa is and who South Africans are. The hon. member for Pinelands’ view of history and of the politics of South Africa is one-dimensional. He associates with people who came to South Africa and caught the post-war boom, who have made some money in a hurry and who, in a spasm of guilt, now want to hand over control of South Africa in order to appease some forces which they believe, by appeasement it, will give them peace for a few years. That, however, is a very short-term view. South Africa expects more from the members of the Opposition, especially from the Official Opposition.

The hon. member for Houghton’s speech yesterday would look good in Pravda. I recently read a book by Ché Guevara, a book called The Anatomy of Revolution, and many of the things said by the hon. member for Houghton are akin to the threads running through Guevara’s book.

Let me come back to the hon. member for Pinelands. He is a man who invites the likes of Andrew Young to South Africa.

I do?

Yes. I understood that he was involved in inviting Andrew Young when he last came in South Africa. [Interjections.] Certainly they are the apologists for the likes of Carter and Young in South Africa, and they must stop it. Even Harold Wilson has rejected the rantings of Andrew Young.

He is the White smile of Black Power in South Africa.

Say something positive for a change.

I shall say something positive. What is, in fact, a fundamental truth in South Africa, something hon. members on that side will have to realize, is that ethnicity, embracing the organic and the traditional community, must be placed at the centre of our concern in South Africa for the human condition. That is vitally important, and in saying that I am not saying anything unusual. We are not saying anything original in propagating the ethnic concept.

Mr. Speaker, may I ask the hon. member to what ethnic group the Coloured people belong?

The Coloured people are identifiable as a group of people who are different to all the other groups in South Africa. [Interjections.] They are an identifiable group in South Africa. [Interjections.] I accept the fact that they are a distinct group with their own language and culture … [Interjections.] … with many similarities.

What language?

By way of example, let me say that after 500 years of union in Great Britain, the British Parliament only months ago was discussing devolution for Scotland and Wales. One might ask the question: What is the difference between a Scot and an Englishman? The fact is that the Scot and the Englishman see themselves as being different. If we look at Spain we see that, when Franco died after ruling Spain for 40 years, Taradellos, who had been in exile for 38 years, returned; Catalonia got self-government; the Canary Islands are to get self-government; the Balearic Islands are to get self-government; Aragon has got self-government; and the Basques have been fighting for independence and blew up Bianco not so long ago in their effort to get independence for themselves. The fact of the matter is that ethnicity is a fundamental human force which we cannot ignore. We do not say it is either good or bad, but it is a reality. Even the hon. the Leader of the Opposition is propagating a Turnhalle-type solution for South Africa. I do not agree with him, but the fact of the matter is that the Turnhalle was based upon an ethnic reality and differences between sixteen groups.

They have had to abandon it.

But they have not had to abandon it because of the internal situation: They have had to abandon it because of Marxist pressure.

What happened to your party in South West Africa?

In closing, I should like to illustrate what I have been saying. Mr. John Papworth, the adviser to President Kenneth Kaunda of Zambia made an interesting observation the other day. He said—

He went on to say—

We do not disagree with the aspirations of people, even many of the aspirations of the hon. the Leader of the Opposition. We do not disagree with many of the aspirations of President Carter. All we say is that any freedoms which are extended in South Africa must be extended on a lasting basis that can stand the test of time, that are in keeping with the historical, cultural and political realities of the region in which we live and that has regard to the facts. We say that where we, who as a free people have always believed in freedom, both for ourselves and other people, are to uplift people, we must do it in such a way that we know it will stand the test of time. We share the ideals many people put forward to us. We feel that in a sense we do not so much have an argument with the ideals people propagate, but with the structures they propagate in order to achieve those ideals.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Maitland is a young man and like many young men he is observant. I entirely agree with what he said when he recalled the great occasions in this House in the past where, when Leaders of the Opposition stood up, they had the rapt attention of all the hon. members of the House. The Press Gallery was full and the public was expectant. Those days have gone; they happen no more in this House. Those who are responsible for that state of affairs are the people who sit up there in the Press Gallery and the people who sit on my right in the benches of the PFP. [Interjections.] It is a tragedy that has happened in South Africa in recent years. When the hon. the Leader of the Opposition says this afternoon that he wants to debate important issues in South Africa with the Government I am afraid his offer falls on deaf ears because he has no contribution whatsoever to make to constructive debate in South Africa. He is not listened to and his contribution is entirely irrelevant. What I am going to say now may seem harsh because he has only been here as Opposition leader for a short while. However, let me say this to him: He has already lost the ear of this House and he is rapidly losing the ear of his supporters in the Republic outside. This is what happened because we had a change of Opposition purely for the sake of change, not on the basis that a better Opposition would replace the old Opposition, but an artificially contrived change of Opposition. It was not a change based on merit—which was at one time the favourite expression of hon. members on my right—but simply a change which came about as a result of the machinations of the Press, the PFP and the liberals in South Africa who decided that they would have a revolutionary change. We now have to witness in this House the result of that revolutionary change.

Without going into much detail about the matters canvassed by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition, allow me to refer to just two. He dealt with a most burning issue, namely the question of the killing of South Africans by the Botswana Government. He said that there were a series of incidents that had preceded the killings and he said that these were regretted by both us and by Botswana. When he climaxed his remarks about Botswana and that incident he called for a thorough inquiry! That is as far as he went. He said he thought there should be a thorough inquiry! I shall move on to the question of Botswana later in my speech. He then dealt with the tragic death of Chief Kapuuo in South West Africa. He rehashed all the tributes and the comments which there have been about Mr. Kapuuo in the Press during the last few days. He then came with a momentous suggestion …

He praised only the corpse.

He referred to the possibility and made the suggestion that the Police in South West Africa should be transferred to the control of the Administrator-General! That was the most momentous statement he was able to make about the death of Chief Kapuuo. He said nothing about the terrorists that murdered him. There was no condemnation but only a suggestion that the police should be controlled by the Administrator-General. I want to say—and I say this advisedly—that if the Progs want to serve South Africa at this particular stage of our history, and more particularly if they want to serve South West Africa and the peoples of South West Africa, my advice to them is to keep away from that territory. If one could find out the number of times that many of them have visited South West Africa during the last six months I think it would be interesting and revealing. I think it would be far better for them to leave the solution of SWA problems to the people of South West Africa without them having to do some of the spadework for the West. [Interjections.]

There is a loose end that I would like tidy up in this House today and then I would like to move on to one or two other matters. In the Part Appropriation debate I referred to an article which appeared in the Sunday Times on 5 February. In fact, it appeared in the Business Section of the Sunday Times under the heading “50 Large Firms are Facing Financial Troubles”. Only some of the copies appeared on the streets as my hon. friends know because Sunday Times employees worked night and day to destroy the top half of the page of the Business Times before it could reach the public. At that time I dealt in some detail with that remarkable story and in particular with the amazingly different reasons given by the editor and the senior members of his staff for what had happened. The hon. the Minister replied that he viewed the whole matter in a serious light and that he had in fact written to the Chairman of the Johannesburg Stock Exchange. Last Friday, in reply to a question, the hon. the Minister said that he had received the written reply from the Chairman of the Johannesburg Stock Exchange and, inter alia, he stated that the committee is not happy about the impression which the original report in the Sunday Times created and states that in its view the responsibility for any embarrassment caused, lies fairly and squarely with the newspaper concerned. He then said that he continued to take a serious view of the matter, but he felt that it could be shelved. He said that in view of the fact that publicity had been given to the matter, the Sunday Times had been taught a salutary lesson and I am very much inclined to agree with him. The newspaper has been quite clearly exposed for all to see that it is a sensational newspaper and that it very often publishes completely irresponsible things. The companies mentioned in the original report have their own remedy in that they can sue the newspaper concerned for libel. What is even more important, however, is the fact that because the matter has been ventilated the public is now able to judge for itself the sense of decency and responsibility of a newspaper that publishes, on the front page of its Business Times, an article sent out by a firm of brokers to its clients, marked “confidential and for the information of clients only”. Secondly, the public has been given the opportunity to judge the credibility of the editor of the newspaper, who first stated that the destruction of the top half of the Business Times’ front page was due to a technical problem, and also the credibility of a senior member of his staff, who said that the top half had been destroyed as a result of mutilation in the printing press. They can also judge the credibility of the editor of the newspaper concerned who, on the Tuesday, publicly undertook to publish the original article the following Sunday, which of course he did not do, but instead published a completely different article, both in respect of heading, presentation and content; much being omitted and much being added.

In so far as the hon. the Minister is concerned, the matter has been left there and that also would have been my view; I would happily have left the matter there had there not in the meantime been a seemingly uncalled for intervention by an hon. member of the House. This hon. member is apparently no ordinary hon. member of this House if one judges by what he has to say of himself. Hon. members will remember that the hon. member for Parktown, in the censure debate, said the following in connection with another matter into which he had put both his feet: “I want to ask in all humility in this respect…” —he was referring to the other matter— “… that one should remember who and what I am”. On 20 February, when the hon. member quite deliberately and quite specifically entered the Third Reading of the Part Appropriation debate, he resurrected the issue of the Sunday Times article saying, of course, that it had been blown up out of all proportion and importance by The Citizen, by the hon. the Minister and by myself. He accused us of having destroyed the confidence of people in the South African economy by raising this matter in the House. The hon. member then referred to me as a fanatic. He said that it had once been said of a fanatic that he is a man who cannot change his mind and will not change the subject. He meant, of course, that I have for a long time raised matters in this House dealing with certain English language newspapers. Hon. members will now realize why the hon. member for Parktown had to take part in this debate. He is, of course, an executive director of the Anglo-American Corporation. Anglo-American, through its numerous subterranean tentacles, has a majority holding in the Argus Company which effectively controls the Saan Company, and the editor of the biggest Saan newspaper. When his bona fides and his article are questioned here in the House, who springs to his aid? Hey presto! No one else than the Anglo-American executive director, the hon. member for Parktown. If ever what has been said before in this House about the monopoly of the Press needed just a final little bit of extra proof, then the hon. member for Parktown has provided it and in doing so he has again put both his political feet into it. I want to conclude my remarks about the hon. member by just saying that he should be reminded that whoever he may think he is and whatever he may be elsewhere, here in the House he is very small beer indeed. [Interjections.]

I was not present last night when the hon. member for Houghton made her speech, but I have read her Hansard. She was heckled, but what she said of the mounting outside pressures is quite true. She moves in those circles and she knows what she is talking about, and hon. members ignore the hostility of the outside world towards us in the Republic at this moment at their peril. I do not agree with the hon. member’s statement that the United States will ultimately wash its hands of us. I do not believe that for one moment. I believe instead that the United States is committed to a course of action against us, the end of which will be South Africa being declared a threat to peace and ultimately the possibility of the use of United Nations force against us. That, in my opinion, is the road which the United States is following. Hon. members should not regard these thoughts as being impossible. It has been on the cards for many, many years. As I see things all the present indications point in that direction. Our best hope in this country is to be strong and united, and to do what we know has to be done to bring about a better climate of race relations amongst all the many people of South Africa. During that process of transition and period of change, it is to be hoped that the outside world will accept that South Africa, with all her warts—as the modern expression is—by comparison with those that the West is seeking to curry favour with, is a veritable social, economic and political haven.

However, South Africa will not remain a haven if conditions on our borders deteriorate into the chaos which exists in Mozambique and Angola. This chaos must not be allowed to spread to us or to other bordering countries and that is why I want to refer briefly to what has happened in Botswana. South Africans have read with anger and dismay of what has happened to our fellow countrymen in Botswana. I am referring to the death of two game rangers, apparently lawfully in Botswana and in possession, I believe, also of work permits. It is not possible for us to pass judgment in this House as to exactly what happened; more especially as the hon. the Prime Minister has already said that he has called on the Botswana Government to give a full explanatory report on what happened.

We must therefore wait for that report, but what can and must be said today is that there have been previous incidents in Botswana relating to South Africans and Rhodesians, Rhodesians who are friends of South Africans. This has created a climate of anger, mistrust and resentment amongst all South Africans.

It seems to me that the regime of Sir Seretse Khama has either lost control of the situation in Botswana or, alternatively, a blind eye is being turned to what is being done by his subjects to our friends, the Rhodesians, and to ourselves. I think we should remind the Botswana Government that it has an elementary duty in international law to protect the citizens of our countries lawfully working there and, of course, also the visitors to Botswana and those passing through it. The first statement issued by the Secretary to the President gives anything but the impression of accuracy and alleged eye witness accounts confirm this impression.

Sir Seretse Khama should remember that South Africa has not only been a hospitable host to himself and his family and a friendly neighbour to his people and many of his subjects in time of need, but also that South Africa has made available to Botswana much material and physical aid in times of trouble. I think it is very much in South Africa’s interest that Botswana should conduct herself towards us and towards our friends in Rhodesia in such a way that our vital interests are not adversely affected. In the event of the report being sent to us by the Botswana Government not being satisfactory to us in every possible way, both as to content and effective action, I believe South Africa should approach the Rhodesian Government with a view to joint action against a neighbour whose attitude towards us is anything but friendly and co-operative. My experience is limited, but my experience of Black African countries is that they do not respect weakness. Our withdrawal from Angola—to put it very lightly—has been entirely misunderstood. The dragging out of the South West Africa negotiations is causing scorn among many who would have been impressed by firm and decisive action at the right time.

The matter of South West Africa will no doubt be debated next week, but in conclusion I just want to say about Rhodesia— and this is also a matter which will probably be debated next week—that South Africa has made a very considerable contribution to get the negotiations going in Rhodesia. Without our help I do not believe that they would ever have got off the ground in Rhodesia. Now an internal settlement has been arrived at by all the recognized Rhodesian leaders, but not even that satisfies the Western countries. I do not believe that the West deserves a further opportunity to have negotiations with the Rhodesians and others interested in the fate of Rhodesia. I think the time has come for us to say that we stand by the settlement which has been arrived at by the Rhodesian people themselves and that as a country we shall do everything in our power to see that chaos does not develop in Rhodesia such as has developed in both Mozambique and in Angola.

I want to say to the Government that I believe that it must now give a strong lead. Many people think things are being dragged out too long, that the initiatives of the Government, which were taken wisely and well, are losing impetus and that we must assert ourselves. We are, as I have said before, a small, and in many respects, a developing country, but we are a strong country and we are in a position to make our presence felt in Southern Africa. This is the time it should be asserted.

Mr. Speaker, I hope the hon. member for Simonstown will excuse me if I do not continue in the vein of his speech at this stage. I should like to talk about other matters.

Yesterday I listened with a certain amount of surprise to the speech by the hon. member for Houghton. I quote from her unreviewed speech (Hansard, 3 April 1978)—

By this, the hon. member creates the impression that virtually all banks are no longer willing to lend money to South Africa. I think the hon. member has badly misrepresented the matter here. She stressed only the one aspect. It is indeed only half a truth. Does the hon. member for Houghton agree with the New York Times, or is she prepared to repudiate the New York Times on its stand?

If you take the right action I have no doubt that the New York Times will revert to its original stand …

No, that was not my question. My question is whether the hon. member for Houghton is prepared to repudiate this point of view of the New York Times or whether she agrees with it.

Just make your own speech.

I am not now addressing the sacked former Whip of the PFP; I am addressing the hon. member for Houghton. It is very clear to me that the hon. member for Houghton, because she will not talk now, is not prepared to adopt a pro-South African patriotic viewpoint in this House.

I am not prepared to back the Government’s actions.

The hon. member for Houghton talks about “the Government’s actions”.

Do you agree with the New York Times?

I do not agree with their stand, but I do not agree with that hon. member either.

But you backed the New York Times.

No, I did not.

We are back to the New York Times. In other words, I must now assume that the hon. member says: “I am not prepared to repudiate or disassociate myself from the point of view of the New York Times.”

I said I was not prepared to defend this Government. I do not agree with the New York Times, but I also do not agree with you.

Oh! You do not agree with the New York Times? I see. The hon. member is now beginning to show a little progress, because she has brought herself to say that she does not agree with the New York Times.

Nor with you.

Order!

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member must stop asking me questions if you do not want me to interject.

I should like to know from the hon. member for Houghton whether she is prepared to issue a statement, to take up a standpoint and to say openly that she does not agree with the attitude of the New York Times about the application of trade and arms sanctions against South Africa.

She will never do that.

That is what we are seeking from the hon. member. We would like that hon. member to take up a pro-South African standpoint at some time or another.

She cannot.

She further says in her speech—

That is a fact.

Is that a fact?

That is a fact.

In other words, the hon. member agrees wholeheartedly with the enemies of South Africa.

You are now talking nonsense.

Because when we make adaptations, when we remove racial discrimination, when we move with the Black people on the road to full human rights, then she agrees with people who say that it is merely “cosmetic”. Now if that is cosmetic, I ask the hon. member whether she agrees with the Marxists that the internal settlement which has now been reached in Rhodesia is also purely cosmetic. I should very much like the hon. member to answer me on that.

Here we have the situation in South Africa where there is a nation—not merely a Government, but a nation—which is moving away from discrimination and which is, not without difficulty, taking positive steps to establish a dispensation in South Africa which is defensible and which conforms to the requirements of fairness and justice. But then the hon. member for Houghton, who is a member of this Parliament, says that she agrees with the outside world that it is purely cosmetic.

Where did she say that? That is an untruth.

The hon. member for Houghton answered my question affirmatively a moment ago, saying that she agreed that it was cosmetic.

She did not say that. It is a lie. [Interjections.]

The hon. member said she agreed that it was cosmetic. [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: Is the hon. member for Bryanston entitled to say to the hon. member for Lydenburg that it is a lie? That is the statement which he makes.

Order! The hon. member must withdraw that.

I withdraw it.

It is a lie.

Order! The hon. member for Houghton must also withdraw that.

It is untrue.

Order! The hon. member must withdraw the allegation that it is a lie.

I withdraw that.

It is a blatant untruth.

Mr. Speaker, may the hon. member for Bryanston say that it is a flagrant untruth which I have uttered? [Interjections.]

Order! The hon. member for Bryanston may not say that. In saying that, he is alleging that the hon. member for Lydenburg has deliberately told an untruth. Is that what the hon. member for Bryanston means?

I shall withdraw that, Mr. Speaker. [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, I can understand that the hon. member for Bryanston, on account of his political impotence, is not really able to make a worthwhile interjection. [Interjections.] Still less can he make a positive contribution to a debate. [Interjections.]

Order! The hon. member may continue.

The whole dispute started when I asked the hon. member for Houghton, in a very reasonable way … Actually I read her speech to her from Hansard, in which she says (Hansard, 3 April 1978)—

It is a fact that it is dismissed as being in fact meaningless and merely cosmetic! [Interjections.]

With respect, Mr. Speaker, may I ask the hon. member for Houghton whether she also regards this as cosmetic? I am referring now to the changes in our sport policy, in international hotels, etc. I want to ask the hon. member for Houghton directly whether she regards these as real change or as merely cosmetics?

Come on, answer the question! [Interjections.]

Order! The hon. member for Houghton cannot conduct a dialogue with the hon. member for Lydenburg. [Interjections.]

[Inaudible.]

Mr. Speaker, what I really want to say is, that…

Almost cosmetic! [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, we have now progressed somewhat. The hon. member for Houghton says: “It is almost cosmetic.”

And almost meaningless! [Interjections.]

Well, if something is virtually cosmetic, then it is surely cosmetic. [Interjections.]

I said it was almost meaningless!

Mr. Speaker, we have now progressed to the point where we have recorded the fact that the hon. member for Houghton says of honest and genuine efforts to bring about change in South Africa … [Interjections.] Well, let us be honest. These things …

Superficial!

Superficial? [Interjections.] Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Houghton tries to belittle everything which the Government does. I know why she belittles it. She does it because in her heart, in her instincts, she is against South Africa. She hates this country and she hates this Government. [Interjections.] She cannot say a good word about South Africa. The object of her affections …

South Africa and the Government are not one!

After quite a few years in this House I am beginning to wonder whether the object of her affections is not perhaps Peking or Moscow. [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: Is the hon. member for Lydenburg entitled to imply that I am communist-orientated in that my heart, as he puts it, is towards Peking or Moscow? [Interjections.]

Order! What does the hon. member for Lydenburg mean when he says that he wonders whether the heart of the hon. member for Houghton is in Moscow or in Peking?

Mr. Speaker, I shall say what I mean by that. Because it is clear to me that the heart of the hon. member for Houghton is not in South Africa, it is evidently with those who attack South Africa. I might just as well have asked whether her heart was not perhaps in North Korea or elsewhere. [Interjections.] However, I am not implying by any means that the hon. member for Houghton is a communist. I merely meant that the hon. member’s loyalties were elsewhere. [Interjections.]

Order! The hon. member for Lydenburg can choose his words better if he does not mean a specific country.

Mr. Speaker, what is absolutely clear to me in any case is that the hon. member for Houghton’s loyalties, her allegiance and her love, are not in South Africa, because she can never say anything good in connection with South Africa [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: Is the hon. member for Lydenburg allowed to say that the hon. member for Houghton’s loyalties lie outside South Africa? [Interjections.]

Order! If the hon. member for Lydenburg is insinuating that the hon. member for Houghton is disloyal towards South Africa, I shall ask him to withdraw that.

Mr. Speaker, I am not implying that she is disloyal towards South Africa.

But surely that is how we understand what you have said.

Order! The hon. member for Lydenburg has said that that was not his intention, but I nevertheless wish to advise him to choose his words carefully.

Mr. Speaker, may I address you on this? The hon. member for Lydenburg is continually sailing close to the wind, attempting to smear other hon. members … [Interjections.] … and he continues to do this.

Order! No, the hon. member for Orange Grove cannot say that, but at the same time the hon. member for Lydenburg could choose his words better.

Sir, it is my honest and genuine conviction that the hon. member for Houghton does not love South Africa. I shall not say that she hates us. I know she hates the Government, but she does not love South Africa. The language and the idiom in which she speaks make it very clear to me that she does not love South Africa.

However, I want to continue. The hon. member also said (Hansard, 3 April 1978)—

That is right.

The hon. member says it is right. But she continued—

The word is not “practical” …

Order! The hon. member for Houghton should now keep quiet.

Mr. Speaker, on a point of personal explanation: That Hansard copy of my speech has since been corrected. The word “practical” should have been “political”. That is what I said and a later paragraph shows that that is so.

Just let me find the correct place in her speech.

Lower down you will see it.

Order! The hon. member for Houghton must now stop her interjections. I shall maintain the order in the House.

Mr. Speaker, I have checked the particular part of her speech in the meantime. The sentence should read—

Yes.

I now want to put a few questions. The hon. member says she can show no political advancement for Blacks in South Africa to the people abroad. It seems to me that she prefers to be deaf and blind and that she lives in a cocoon of her own.

She is getting old.

Can the hon. member not tell the outside world that there is a place like the Republic of Transkei? Is that “cosmetic”? Are those not “real achievements”? Could the hon. member not tell what happened in Bophuthatswana on 6 December? Is that not political advancement for the Black man in South Africa? If that is not advancement, then the hon. member is not interested in orderly, evolutionary political advancement in South Africa, because those are orderly, civilized political evolutionary processes which have been launched in South Africa. They have given people freedom and the highest from of self-determination. Is that not advancement? So the hon. member goes abroad and says there that there is no political progress in South Africa. What about the self-governing territories created by the Government? What about the Venda with its Chief Minister? What about the citizens of Lebowa? What about the Ciskei? What about Qwaqwa?

And kwaZulu?

Yes, and there is kwaZulu as well. I am proud of the progress which has been made in kwaZulu. They have now accepted chapter 2 rights under self-government. So I do not know what the hon. member for Houghton is seeking. I hope she is not seeking blood in South Africa. I hope that she is not seeking revolution in South Africa, but if a person does not recognize the progress which has been made in South Africa, he stands totally apart from South Africa. In that case I question that person’s love for this country. Every hon. member in this House could spend many hours telling the outside world what progress has already been made. Just look at the institution of the community councils. Is that not progress which has been made? Does this Government not do everything in its power to accommodate the Black man politically and otherwise in this country? Let there be no doubt about that. There is something which nobody must doubt, and that is the sincerity of the Government’s effort to establish an orderly dispensation in South Africa, a dispensation which will give everyone a place in the sun and which will make possible a dignified existence for every person in this country, regardless of his language, culture, creed or colour.

You live in a dream world!

Is the new dispensation on which we had an election, the dispensation for Indians and Coloureds, not progress? Is this not an honest and genuine effort on the part of the Government to establish a dispensation which will satisfy everyone? But then that hon. member says that she agrees with our enemies who say that we can show no political progress for people of colour in South Africa. [Interjections.] It is scandalous that some of this country’s M.P.s—it does not matter what party they belong to—are not prepared to give South Africa credit for the progress which is being made. We are not concerned here with credit for the NP only. It is not only the NP Government which is being attacked in the world. Surely it is our fatherland, South Africa, which is being attacked. Therefore it does not matter what party one belongs to. Surely one defends one’s fatherland in any case. I am sure that most of the hon. members will defend South Africa’s case at any price in the world. I am sure the hon. member for Rondebosch will do so, and I have no doubts at all about the hon. member for Yeoville. But the hon. member for Houghton sees no progress or improvement in South Africa on which she can report. She says she can no longer go and ask for loans abroad, and now listen to her motive for the loans from abroad—

I thought one sought investment for the promotion of the welfare of all our people, to improve the welfare of all the people in this country, regardless of colour. But she seeks loans to effect “reform in South Africa”. I do not know what type of “reform”.

Progressive reform!

But the reform which we are bringing about, she does not recognize. That she does not talk about. She says the progress in the field of sport, the opening up of theatres, “is dismissed as cosmetic”. After the dismissed previous Chief Whip had tried to protect her here, she admitted that it was “virtually” altogether “cosmetic”. I now want to go into this matter. We do not get recognition for what we do in South Africa. There is no recognition for what this Government does. If a Black man can wear the green and gold of this country today, and can represent the country on the sports field in whatever form of sport, must I say to that Black man that it is only cosmetic, that it is nothing?

Superficial!

Yes, “superficial”. The hon. member for Houghton mocks at what is sacred to many people in this country.

What?

Let us look at what has happened in the field of sport. What discrimination is there today in the field of sport? The hon. member wanted to know where discrimination had been removed. We can mention sport as an example. What discrimination is there in the field of sport? What person cannot make it to the top in sport? I am proud to be living in a country which has a policy in terms of which every man can make it to the top. It is high time those hon. members also became proud of the country with that policy. All they can do, however, is to belittle and criticize what we are trying in all honesty and sincerity to create and bring about in this country.

What has the Government done in respect of the opening of the hotels and eating places?

Very little.

Oh, Sir, I shall not even reply to that hon. member. We have started opening the channels in South Africa. We have created routes which people of colour who are moving through our country can use so that they can travel through the country with dignity. Show me another Government which, in these circumstances in South Africa, would have had the moral courage to do all these things, often in face of the opposition of its own people, as our hon. Prime Minister and the Government have done. We have the courage of our conviction to do what is in the interests of the country.

Hertzog!

We have the courage of our conviction to serve this country, but everything we do for the benefit of South Africa, those people try to belittle as “cosmetic”. Because they do that, I do not believe that they can really love this lovely South Africa as we love it.

As I have said, the hon. member said in her speech that she could report no progress to the outside world as far as the Black man in South Africa was concerned. That is really an absolute tragedy. Sir, the average income of Whites in this country rose from R2 096 to R5 358 between 1965 and 1976. As against that, the average income of Blacks in the public sector rose from R395 to R1 285. If that is not phenomenal, dramatic progress, then I do not know what progress is. Let us look at the percentage by which salaries of Black people have been increased. I do not want to burden the House with the whole row of figures. Let us just look at the position in 1974. In that year the salaries of Whites rose by 14% and those of Blacks by 30%. This is in respect of the private sector. In the public sector the salaries of Whites rose by 10% and those of Blacks by 17%. We see that the Black man’s salary is continually being increased by a much larger percentage to bring him into line, to achieve parity and to obtain equal pay for equal work. Let us just look at the figures for 1970 and 1975 in respect of the income of Black households in South Africa. If the hon. member wants facts in order to show to the outside world what is being done to improve the Black man’s welfare in South Africa, let us see how the incomes of the Black households have increased during that period. In Pretoria, the income per Black household rose from R935 in 1970 to R1 991 in 1975.

Over a period of five years, therefore, it more than doubled. In Johannesburg, it rose from R1 043 to R2 273 per household; in Durban, from R933 to R2 100; and in Port Elizabeth, from R905 to R1 900. In each case the incomes of Black households in the urban Black residential areas in South Africa more than doubled during the period from 1970 to 1975. That is progress of which the hon. member for Houghton can tell her friends abroad.

I have many more impressive figures here which one can look at. Let us look at the expenditure on Black education. That rose from R39 million in 1970 to R165 million in 1976-’77, a more than fourfold increase. If we look at the Black children in South Africa as a percentage of the total Black population, we see that Black children attending school account for 21% of the total Black population. I want to go further and express the number of school-children as a percentage of the total population. Just in the homelands of South Africa, the number of children at school, as a percentage of the total population, is 23,7%. We can compare that with Malawi with its 8%; Zambia with 18%; Botswana with 14%; Swaziland with 19%; Somalia with 2%; Uganda with 8%; Zaire with 17% and Tanzania with 6%. These facts the hon. member must show to the outside world, because surely they are excellent and wonderful achievements, incontrovertible proof of what we are doing and how we are progressing in South Africa. One can also look at the number of students at Black universities. They have increased from 481 in 1960 to 5 200. We can also look at the steady increase in the number of graduates in South Africa. In 1960, we had only 1 961 Black graduates in South Africa. In 1975, as against that, there were 6 300. Where could one wish to find more dramatic and real progress than precisely in this connection? Let us look at the per capita income of Black people in South Africa. In 1974, the figure was R253 per capita. One can compare that with Malawi, where the figure is R89; in Botswana it is R198; Lesotho, R95; Uganda, R164; Tanzania, R109; Zaire, R102; and in Nigeria, the rich country, it is R191. If we draw these comparisons, then surely we have no reason to be ashamed of the progress which we have made in South Africa. Surely we need not be ashamed to tell the world what is happening here. We need not be on the defensive. We can attack. Surely we have the results in black and white and they are incontrovertible facts. But the hon. member for Houghton tells us—she also tells it to the outside world— that she does not know what to tell them about the progress which we are making in South Africa in respect of the political rights, in respect of the elimination of discrimination and in respect of the improvement of the standard of welfare of the Black man in this country.

I want to make an appeal to those hon. members. South Africa is being attacked and the world is closing in on us. We cannot deny that, because it is a fact. Now the question of patriotism must also come into the picture. But that is not what is happening, for it appears to me as if those hon. members are lying down, as if they actually welcome the pressure. I get the impression that they believe that the pressure which is being applied against our country will become so bad that we shall be compelled to accept a dispensation which they actually have at the back of their minds, namely a Black majority Government in South Africa. Only they are afraid to say it openly. I want to define those people as a party which is drawing up a programme for selling out South Africa in instalments, and the size of the instalments depends upon the intensity of the pressure which the outside world exerts upon us. But they can sleep peacefully, because we are in power. We have an hon. Prime Minister, a Government and a party which believe in what we are doing and which believe in the future of South Africa. We are people who are also prepared to make sacrifices for the future of South Africa. We shall take our people with us; nobody need have any fears about that. We welcome the few crumbs which fall from the table, the few crumbs which might have fallen to their side and the one which indeed fell over. We shall stand firm, because our cause is right. We have the facts on our side and we can prove that our policy is not a policy of oppression. It is not a policy which is directed at depriving the other people in South Africa of the good things. On the contrary, it is a positive policy which is directed at ensuring freedom, welfare and prosperity for all in South Africa.

Mr. Speaker, this is the first budget debate in which I have participated in this House and it has struck me that people who have listened to the debate so far must wonder if in fact we are discussing the budget.

I can see quite well what the hon. member for Lydenburg, who has just sat down, used to do as a young boy: He used to listen to a quiz programme called “Twenty Questions” broadcast over Springbok Radio. This afternoon he has tried to emulate the quizmaster of “Twenty Questions”. [Interjections.] He has done nothing but ask questions of the hon. member for Houghton. I remember that the people who were quizzed in that programme were able to win either a big prize or a booby prize. Quite frankly, I do not really think the hon. member for Houghton won the big prize.

The hon. the Deputy Minister of Plural Development has also taken part in the debate and, quite frankly, I have to agree with the hon. Leader of the Opposition that he hardly made a positive contribution to the debate. He made a purely reactionary speech, reacting, once again, to the hon. member for Houghton. The best thing that we can perhaps say about the hon. Leader of the Opposition’s speech is that, at least this time, he did not have to start his speech with an apology.

We also had a maiden speech by a new hon. member who has taken his seat since the Easter recess. I would like to congratulate him, on behalf of this party, for making a good contribution in his maiden speech. I think it noteworthy that he has made his maiden speech within a short time of having taken his seat in this House and I wish him luck here for the future.

The hon. member for Simonstown once again made a very good speech. I always enjoy listening to the hon. member for Simonstown, but, his speech did not really have too much to do with budgetary matters as he talked predominantly about an article in the Sunday Times and then went on to deal with the issue of South West Africa. I do not want to react to what he said, because our leader has already given our party’s view on this last night in the House.

Was he replying to the budget?

I am replying to those speakers who have supposedly been talking about the budget.

A very great Prime Minister, Sir Winston Churchill, said many years ago that never in the history of mankind had so much been owned by so many to so few. This is almost the story of our financial and fiscal arrangements in South Africa. One can say that it is the story because, quite frankly, so few have always been taxed so heavily, but one wonders if so many have benefited. Who in fact benefits from the heavy taxation we have in this country? Do the poor, the old or the sick benefit from it? Do these people benefit in relation to the heavy taxation that is crippling our economy and has crippled our economy for a number of years? These people benefit to a relatively small extent and they certainly do not benefit in a manner which would be fitting in relation to the high amount of taxation which is taken away from the people of this country. Why is this so? It is because the Government has to spend a great deal of its revenue on defence. We in this party agree with this; we believe that it is necessary to defend ourselves against force from outside—and a synonym for force is pressure, because force of arms is, in fact, only the utmost manifestation of pressure. There are, however, many other pressures that can be brought to bear and that is why I wish, here and now, to dissociate myself totally from the remark made by the hon. member for Houghton when she said: “I welcome the United States’ pressure for change.” I believe we should have change and I shall welcome change, but I shall never welcome pressure for change brought to bear from outside South Africa.

We agree that we have to spend these moneys on defence, but why do we have to spend these moneys on defence? The reason is that South Africa has, without any doubt, become the polecat of the world. Everybody hates us and I believe this is caused by the policies of the Government sitting on the other side of the House and primarily by the policy of apartheid. [Interjections.] It is apartheid that has caused many of the problems that face South Africa in the outside world today. That great man, Jan Christian Smuts, foresaw this in 1948 when the Nationalists were elected and he said then that they would live to regret the day that apartheid was their platform. [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, may I ask the hon. member a question?

Mr. Speaker, I am not prepared to answer questions. [Interjections.] The word “apartheid” has done South Africa more harm … [Interjections.] One must realize that apartheid has done South Africa more harm than any Opposition politician, be he Black or White. Apartheid has been rejected by the East and it has been rejected by the West. The countries to the north of us are basically conspiring against us and to the south of us there are only the cold, grey wastes of the Antarctic. There is nought for our comfort at any point of the compass. Why is this? It is because a White minority is imposing its will on an entire population.

Now you are talking like a Prog!

Every time one opposes the Government’s policies, the hon. members start shouting that one is a Prog. [Interjections.]

It is a great compliment.

I do not accept the fact that to be called a Prog is a compliment. [Interjections.] We in this party believe in pluralism. We believe that no one group should dominate any other group. We do not believe that a White group should dominate a Black group, nor do we believe that any Black group should dominate any White group. We reject White minority Government and we also reject Black majority rule.

Discrimination on the grounds of colour is part of our everyday life in South Africa. It is written into our Statutes and we believe this policy should be done away with. We in the NRP believe in the elimination of inequitable forms of statutory and administrative discrimination on the grounds of race. This is what we stand for. But we do not wish to substitute forced integration. We believe that that is every bit as great an evil as the policy of apartheid, or separate development, or segregation—call it what you will.

In order to govern this lopsided arrangement there has been a proliferation of Government departments and Government corporations. These departments and corporations have gobbled up our resources, both human and financial, and like any other monster they have multiplied and grown fat. In excess of 40% of our White workers today work for the State or for State-owned corporations. Basically this is unproductive. How many embryo industrialists and entrepreneurs live out “nine to five” lives in the safety of some Government Department people who, if put to the test, could make a positive contribution to the production capacity of South Africa and who could have the potential to turn South Africa into a stronger economic country than it already is?

I want to refer to an editorial in The Cape Times of Monday, 3 April 1978, concerning the cost of bureaucracy. It reads—

This is according to the Bureau of Census and Statistics—

This is where our human and financial resources are going today.

What are those figures as percentages?

I have already said that the White workers employed in Government Departments and State-owned corporations account for more than 40% of the population. I am sure the hon. the Minister of Finance has more statistics at his fingertips than I have. He has a big department and a big staff, a very efficient and good staff, to help him.

Where does South Africa stand today? We have a recession that has lasted for 42 months. Right now there are more unemployed than at any time in South Africa’s history. We have a growth rate which is falling dangerously short of the rate required to employ our increasing human resources. Our foreign reserves have been adversely affected by political considerations. We have a negative immigration rate. Finally, we have double-figure inflation.

One must look at the budget proposed by the hon. the Minister of Finance in the light of these facts—and these are facts. What is the Government’s remedy for this? The political policies, an notably the policy of discrimination, have basically remained unchanged. Despite, presumably, the efforts in the caucus of the NP by those members who have said they wish to change the party from within, we have a policy that is unchanged. The State expenses in the budget are being increased by 9% and, while direct taxation has been somewhat reduced, indirect taxation has been increased by far more than the reduction. We believe that the imposition of a general sales tax is a step in the right direction. In due course there should be even more of a balancing out between direct and indirect taxation. We believe that one should have a mixed basket of means of collecting tax. One should have direct taxation, which should reach certain limits. One should also have an equal bag of indirect taxation. This balance should be sought by the hon. the Minister of Finance. He has made a start towards it and one hopes that he will continue in this vein.

I want to consider what the situation is at the moment. If the man in the street, who earned R18 000 in 1970, earned an additional R100, he was left with R57,40 to spend. Today, he is left with R56, i.e. less than he was left with in 1970. With that R56 he is left with today, he can only buy what approximately R25 would have bought for him in 1970.

That is a stupid argument.

That is not a stupid argument as suggested by that hon. member; that is fact. It is a fact that he is left with considerably less money, because the inflation rate has caught up with our taxation situation, and where our taxation laws were originally intended to tax the rich, the middle class and the poor have seen their incomes rise more and more because of inflation. They are now being taxed on rates that were never envisaged when those tax rates were introduced. I believe that we cannot entirely blame, as some hon. members would like to do, the hon. the Minister of Justice for our negative immigration figure. I believe that we must to some extent blame the high tax figure in this country, a figure concerning which the hon. the Minister himself has said in his budget speech that to an extent it has stifled enterprise. Those were not his exact words, but they were words to that effect In his budget speech the hon. the Minister said—

This is true.

I went on to say that I thought it was exaggerated.

Yes, the hon. the Minister did go on to say that it was exaggerated, but he did not deny that there was an element of truth in it and I do not believe that he would want to deny now that there is an element of truth in that statement. Assume that a man reaches his maximum marginal rate, which today is 66% if one includes the loan levy, after nine months. Thereafter for every R100 he earns, he has only R34 to spend. Can one blame him if he would rather go fishing than go to work? This does not do South Africa any good. That man should be encouraged to work more productively rather than to catch a few fish in our rivers.

The next point with which I should like to deal is the income of married women. The situation in this regard remains unchanged. I agree there has been a slight improvement of the situation in that marginal rates have come down. But if a man earns R25 000 and his wife earns a further R5 000, taxes will take about half of what she has earned. I believe that the Government is actually encouraging people to live in sin. It pays handsomely in terms of the tax laws to live in sin. Otherwise the White wives, the Black wives and the Brown wives of our country find that it does not pay them to go out to work.

One must also think of the entrepreneur. If he invests R100 in a company and he makes a good profit of say, 30% before tax, which would then represent R30, R14 of that goes to the Government and, because of the inflation of 11%, he needs an extra R11 to be able to trade at the same rate next year. What is he left with? For an investment of R100, he is left with only R5 to pay himself a dividend, and on this he still has to pay tax. Perhaps he would rather put that money into bonus bonds where he would perhaps have more chance of getting rich quicker.

My time is running shorter than my notes are at this stage. I want to recommend to the hon. the Minister that the marginal rate of tax should be no more than 50% for individuals and 40% for companies. This country and every country needs a Government which will tailor its expenditure to its revenue and not vice versa. It is too easy to put up taxes; it is a lot more difficult to cut expenditure. But this is what is necessary. Lord Nuffield said that a fool can increase the price of a car by £10, but it takes a genius to reduce it by one penny.

What have we been doing for three years running?

Not enough.

The hon. the Minister asks what we have been doing for three years running, but he has just told us that expenditure in the budget will be going up by 9% this year. I do not believe …

What about in real terms?

Mr. Speaker, the hon. the Minister talks about real terms, but in fact the last quarter of last year inflated by about 9% in comparison with the same quarter of the previous year.

Oh, nonsense!

This is the hon. the Minister’s own figure which he gave us. From the hon. the Minister of Finance we in this country need a reduction of inflation. This is a precondition for a return to full employment. Secondly, we need a reduction in direct tax, a further reduction of direct tax which, after all, increases take home pay without increasing industrial costs, and thus inflation. Thirdly, we need a far improved taxation situation for married couples who both work. Fourthly, we need a planned reduction over the next five years in Government employment. Let me repeat that. I do not think that hit home. We need a planned reduction, over the next five years, in Government employment.

We need a new Government!

Fifthly, we need a better balance between direct and indirect taxation, and I will grant the hon. the Minister that one of the good features of this budget is that he has already started to move in that direction. Finally, we need from the hon. the Minister’s colleagues assistance in fighting inflation. Some of his colleagues have been giving him their assistance, and I refer particularly to the hon. the Minister of Posts and Telecommunications who has just retired. Other hon. Ministers have not been helping. In fact, they have been hindering his efforts. In this respect, of course, one must refer to the hon. the Minister of Transport. [Interjections.]

We also need the help of the hon. the Minister’s colleagues in getting a planned reduction in the number of Government departments, because we have a proliferation of Government departments which is virtually unequalled in the Western World. We need the placing in the hands of private enterprise of any State concerns which are able to stand on their own feet and to reward an investor. Above all we need the creation of a political climate which will encourage foreign investment in South Africa, which will encourage foreign loans to South Africa and which will result in a reduction in the inordinately high interests which are currently being charged to South Africa. We need, once again, to see that African countries import goods from South Africa, because in 1971 they bought 18,6% of our exports and in 1977 this had been reduced to only 9,3%, exactly half of the 1971 figure.

We have the capacity to be the bread basket and the supplier of industrial goods and know-how to Africa south of the equator. Let us follow policies that will allow us to fulfil our true role in Africa and to become once again a respected nation among the nations of the Free World.

Mr. Speaker, it seems to me as though the hon. member for East London North is somewhat confused in more than one respect. I thought he was a member of the NRP but now I see he has become a champion for the Official Opposition. [Interjections.] At the start of his speech he said that our expenditure on defence was due to the policy of the Government which he called apartheid. Is there any country in Africa which spends a smaller percentage on defence than South Africa does? Is that perhaps because of apartheid? He pointed out that in terms of the taxation proposals the lower income group would not receive its rightful share, but then he proceeded to devote his speech mainly to the people in the higher income brackets.

Like other hon. members before me, I, too, should like to express my disappointment about the fact that the hon. member for Houghton used this very budget, which is ushering in a new phase in our economic development, as a launching-pad for her anti-South African attack. Since she was unable to criticize the budget, she tried to sabotage its positive objectives. It is clear that since Mr. Donald Woods’ departure from South Africa, she has acquired a new source for obtaining the poisonous venom from the political gutters abroad which she uses here. One gained the impression that she derived sadistic pleasure from certain quarters venting their spleen about South Africa. It was notable that two of the members of her party left the Chamber immediately after she had spoken. Fortunately we on this side of the House know that the distorted image of our country which she and those of a like mind try to create here and abroad, does not agree with what balanced people have to say about our country. I want to quote one example only. In The Citizen of 24 March of this year, we read the following about what the chairman of the Midlands Bank in London had to say about the financial position of South Africa—

If people of this calibre can say this about the economic position of South Africa, one wonders how an hon. member of this House can say the things which the hon. member for Houghton has said.

As the hon. the Minister correctly pointed out, this budget is not a mere exercise to balance Government income and expenditure. Its ramifications extend much further than to the tax-payer alone. A strong, stable Government is a prerequisite for sound economic development, while a strong economy is just as important a pillar for a stable Government. In South Africa, particularly in the difficult political and economic times in which we are living, we have been fortunate in having leaders in these two spheres who surpass the rest of the world in stature.

The budget tells the outside world that South Africa is prepared in the political, military and economic spheres. The R100 million reduction in the cash requirements of the Department of Defence in the midst of the arms build-up in Mozambique and the presence of communists in Angola, clearly indicates that South Africa does not envisage any aggressive action against any of its neighbouring States. At the same time, the hon. the Minister’s assurance that the importance of military preparedness will always receive the necessary priority, should serve as a warning that our striking power must never be underestimated. Those who believe that an arms embargo will weaken South Africa in the military sphere, should therefore listen to what the hon. the Minister’s budget has to say.

The budget also tells the outside world that South Africa has the ability not only to keep its financial position sound under the greatest pressure, but even, as the hon. the Minister indicated, to strengthen it. It is only from a position of economic strength that the hon. the Minister could tell us that we shall not allow ourselves to be forced by high interest rates to obtain loans abroad. If we request loans abroad, we are not doing so because South Africa is requesting them from a position of weakness. He is doing so because he wants to give those friends of ours abroad, those who have confidence in our country, a sound investment at a reasonable interest rate. This is something which our country has always been proud of.

This budget appeals to our industrialists in particular. A great deal is being said—quite unjustifiably—about creeping socialism in our country’s economy. This budget ought to refute that falsehood once and for all. Although the hon. the Minister made it clear that the budget was aimed at economic growth, it is noticeable that there is in reality a real decrease in Government expenditure. Therefore it now depends on the private sector whether they are going to use the unutilized production means in the months ahead to bring about that envisaged 3% growth.

The budget also appeals to the tax-payer, and in particular to people like the hon. member for Yeoville. On 23 February he said the following (Hansard, col. 1732)—

The hon. member for Yeoville is a man who knows his finances. And if the hon. the Minister was able to limit the marginal rate of taxation to a figure which would sound like a fairy-tale even to him, I think it is no surprise that we received all the praise we did receive for this budget.

Considerable concessions have also been made in particular for those people whom Mr. Odendaal, the Administrator of Transvaal, once referred to as those who live in a sort of no-man’s land, viz. our indigent aged. I do not think the hon. the Minister wants us to thank him for this, because being the person he is, I believe he did it out of faith and conviction. However, there are still a few bottlenecks which we have already discussed many times, and which I believe have become more urgent under the present circumstances. There are some of these people in my constituency. They are not asking for alms. They have simply given up hope. One of them said to me recently: “No matter how hard it may sound, if my wife has another stroke, she will just have to die here at home because I do not have any more money to take her to hospital.” This man receives a pension of R177 and therefore does not qualify for a social pension. In the meantime, with the increased rates for hospitalization in the Transvaal, it cost him and his wife R6 each per day to make use of the hospital doctor and his income is R7 per day. Apart from that there is still the high cost of medicines, and while I am on this subject, I just want to refer briefly to the Snyman Commission report of 1962 which stated—

I wonder whether we are doing enough research in this sphere to establish whether we can find or develop the raw materials locally. Since this report appeared the position has not improved at all. On the contrary; my information is that it has deteriorated. Some of these medicines are in fact manufactured under licence in South Africa, but I think it is just as essential for us to obtain these raw materials locally as it is to find the energy resources for which we are seeking.

As regards the aged who can no longer afford the cost of medicines and hospitalization, I want to ask the hon. the Minister to consider whether it would not be possible for the person or family that does not qualify for a social pension or does not belong to a medical scheme, to at least be accorded a higher notch by means of which they may qualify for medical services. This will help them a very great deal in obtaining medicines and district surgeon services. I do not believe that such a concession like this will entail a great expenditure for the State.

There are also those elderly people who own property, especially in urban areas. When those people purchased the properties—this has been said repeatedly—the price was very much lower than the valuation today, and since the valuation has increased, they do not qualify all that easily for a pension either. On the other hand, the increased valuation has also caused property tax to increase.

I know that we cannot ask the local authorities, as has already been requested, to forego that tax in the case of elderly people. However, it is a direct expenditure from the income of the elderly people. Therefore, it is income which they never see. I want to ask whether it is not possible, when calculating the income of these people, to deduct this real tax which they have to pay. I am not talking about water and electricity, because they can save on that. They can use candles if they cannot afford electricity, but the taxation which they have to pay, is deducted directly from their income, and since provision can be made for any bond payments on the property to be deducted when the income is calculated, I believe that it is not wrong in principle to deduct this essential tax from their income in this respect.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Losberg commenced his remarks this afternoon by following the example of two of his colleagues, the hon. the Deputy Minister of Development and the hon. member for Lydenburg, who expressed their disappointment at some of the remarks made by the hon. member for Houghton in her speech last night. In fact, I wonder what hon. members opposite might have done for speeches this afternoon had the hon. member for Houghton not participated in the debate last night Both the hon. members to whom I have referred seemed to have nothing else to do than to take her speech and endeavour to misrepresent it and make political capital out of it. As has been indicated this afternoon, the hon. member for Houghton does not need any defence in regard to what she said last night. The fact is that the whole tenor of her speech was to warn South Africa about the danger of increased hostility by way of sanctions and other actions against us. It was a warning about danger and it was in no way an indication that she welcomed that danger. She was hoping that there would be a change.

I want to deal briefly with the hon. member for Lydenburg’s remarks particularly. He seemed to take offence at any suggestion that the outside world viewed the changes that were taking place in South Africa as cosmetic or superficial changes. He singled out matters such as sport and hotels as an indication of a move away from discrimination on the part of the Government. He seemed to suggest that there should be some excitement at or some indication on the part of the Opposition of these steps being taken by the Government. I would like to tell the hon. member—I am sorry he is not in the House now—that I happened to sit in this House during the 1950s, when I saw all the shutters of discrimination being put up by this same Government, all these things being created year after year: the attitudes of discrimination, the separation of the races, separate amenities, the enforcement of separate notices on park benches, the enforcement of separate labels on lifts, to which the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs seems to have had some sort of a change of heart. This is what one spent one’s time on doing during the 1950s, during the regime of this Government. Therefore the hon. member for Lydenburg must forgive us if after 20 wasted years of this sort of legislation, we do not get excited when this selfsame Government starts taking down some of these shutters, after 20 wasted years during which South Africa became the laughing stock of the civilized world because of the measures adopted by this Government. Therefore we cannot be excited about these peripheral changes which the Government may now be making, although they are, at last, changes in the right direction. But it is a tragedy that over 20 years or more tremendous harm and damage have been done to South Africa as a result of these things.

I want to deal briefly with the background against which the budget of the hon. the Minister of Finance must be viewed. The hon. member for Yeoville in his opening remarks said that the budget was something like a curate’s egg: good in parts and bad in others. I intend to be very charitable towards the hon. the Minister of Finance. It could be said that he has made the best of a bad job, a bad job in the sense perhaps not specifically of his own making, but a bad job in respect of the policies in terms of which he has to operate in guiding our fiscal and financial policies in South Africa, policies which are so often very out of touch with both the economic and the human realities of life in this country.

In the time at my disposal, I want to deal specifically with matters relating to the hon. the Minister of Plural Development, matters relating specifically to the announcement which he made earlier this session, and to which the hon. the Leader of the Opposition referred earlier this afternoon, relating specifically to the question of citizenship for Black people in South Africa and also to this link with the entire homelands concept and the aspect of the consolidation of the homelands. When one talks about stability I want to say that there can never be any long-term stability in South Africa until such time as the Government moves away from race policies which are manifestly unjust in their intent, because they can never achieve the objectives claimed for them. That is why I want to say that the hon. the Minister’s announcement that South African citizenship is eventually to be denied to Blacks in exchange for some spurious form of citizenship in homelands created or to be created, is a disastrous act of intended piracy in the worst traditions of “baasskap” apartheid.

You could have fooled me.

We shall see who the fool is. When the hon. the Minister took over the reins of his new portfolio, he gave us some encouragement and hope that we might be moving towards a new dispensation.

Are you worried about my new success?

We have not yet seen evidence of the hon. the Minister’s success, but perhaps he is talking before time. I shall be happy to acknowledge success when I see success. I do not think that the hon. the Minister should anticipate that too early. With regard to the question of citizenship of the mass of the South African population, whatever hope there might have been for a more progressive and enlightened view on his part, he has really gone back to the situation of the mid-fifties in South Africa. This was exactly the same sort of ideological argument used during the debates which took place in those days.

The vision.

Yes, the vision that suddenly, by a stroke of the ministerial pen, millions of Black South Africans are simply going to be deprived of their citizenship rights while in exchange they are going to be given something of a lesser right in a smaller part of South Africa.

May I ask the hon. member a question?

No. My time is very limited. The argument has been used—the hon. the Minister used it in a previous debate—that this would be a quid pro quo in that while they were going to be denied their rights of citizenship in South Africa, they would be allowed to stay here and, in addition to that, would get full rights of citizenship in the homelands from which they came. This is the sort of argument which has been used. If the Government persists in this matter, it will deprive millions of people in South Africa of their birthright in South Africa, in exchange for rights of questionable extent and questionable value over fragments of South Africa. I believe, further, that it will also be creating a unique situation in which South African citizens remaining in the common area of South Africa, will for ever be heavily outnumbered by people in their own country who will be foreigners. This is the sheer arithmetic of the situation which will obtain and which does obtain at the present time. The whole concept of the hon. the Minister is thoroughly alarming in its implications and its proportions, and I believe it can have very far-reaching consequences for all of us in South Africa To substantiate some of the things which I have said and to see the hon. the Minister’s speech and attitude in proper perspective, it is necessary for us to look again at the entire homeland concept and what it has to offer to people.

After all, the hon. the Minister is saying to Black South Africans that he is taking something away from them in South Africa, but is going to give them something—in the hon. the Minister’s view it is something better—in the homelands. This is, to my mind, the hon. the Minister’s case for the step which he has announced. I think the time has come for the Government to come clean with South Africa in regard to the whole question of where the homelands are going, the area, the extent, of the homelands and, therefore, also the question of the consolidation of the homelands. So far there has been a very strange silence in Government benches on this issue throughout this session. The Government has repeatedly stated that the basis of land allocation, in terms of its homeland policy, is still the Bantu Trust Land Act of 1936. This has certainly been the attitude of the hon. the Deputy Minister of Development, who, I see, is shaking his head. He has stated at NP congresses and from public platforms that the basis of the whole question of allocation of land in terms of the Government’s homeland policy is the 1936 legislation to which I have referred. We know that that legislation—perhaps for the record one should be reminded of it—of 1936, i.e. over 30 years ago, provided for a dispensation in terms of which the Black people in South Africa were to have an extent of land somewhere in excess of 16 million hectares as against some 106 million hectares allocated to the White people in South Africa. Percentages have been used freely in this regard. In fact, the Blacks would occupy some 15,4% of the land area of South Africa as against some 84,6% by the Whites.

The Blacks happen to have the most productive land.

It does not matter whether the land is the most productive or not; that is a matter of opinion. The hon. the Minister might be correct or he might not be correct. I think it is arguable that some of that land is perhaps more productive than other, but I do not want to get involved in that sort of argument at this stage. It is interesting to note in passing that at the time when that legislation was passed the estimated cost of the programme was somewhere between R20 million and R30 million. Now more than 30 years have already elapsed since the Act was passed and we are now told and we know that something in excess of 1 million hectares have still to be acquired. The situation has been aggravated in the 1970s, in recent years, by the Government’s recognition, following its ideological policy, of the need to perform some sort of consolidation of these areas. We know how Black spots have had to be removed and how areas described as badly situated Black areas have had to be removed and provision made for its replacement by other land. We also know that this has committed the Government to purchasing some additional 1 million hectares in order to provide for that sort of replacement. According to surveys that have been undertaken, the additional extent of land to be acquired is something like 2% million hectares at an estimated cost, as given in 1976, of R417 million. It is interesting to note, in terms of the acquisition of land and the cost of acquiring land, that during the 26 years from 1949 to 1975 only R201 million was spent by the Government for the purchase of land by the Bantu Trust. We know that in this budget, as in that of last year, an amount of approximately R30 million is being set aside for this purpose. One then wonders, in support of the questions put by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition, just how long it is going to take, in terms of Government policy, to acquire the land necessary even to provide the limited consolidation proposals presently envisaged by the Government.

Forty years have elapsed already.

This is only part of the story, because we know it is not simply a question of acquiring land and consolidating in the limited way that the Government envisages. There is also the question of the moving and resettlement of the existing population. Again the estimate is that in terms of the Government’s consolidation proposals some 175 000 families—more than 1 million people—will have to be moved at a cost of some R380 million. Apart from the cost of compulsory removal and resettlement of people, we know to our cost that this is a highly emotive issue, because it can lead to serious hardships and often to a very dangerous confrontation situation. Yet all these things are planned in the name of the Government’s policy consolidating the homelands. At the same time they say to the bulk of the people of South Africa that their citizenship in South Africa will be taken away and that they will get citizenship in the homelands.

However, at the end of this consolidation, what will we have in South Africa? After the expenditure of millions of rand, after the acquisition of millions of hectares of land and after the removal and resettlement of over a million people, we will still have homelands, many of which are going to be hopelessly fragmented. We have a kwaZulu which, even after the plans of the Government have been put into operation, will still be left with 10 fragmented pieces, scattered all over the map of Natal, and we have a Lebowa which will be left in six pieces and a Gazankulu in three pieces.

We must ask ourselves to what extent these homelands are capable of catering for the economic needs of their people. Let us look at the present urban population of South Africa. Figures given for 1975 indicated that in the urban areas of South Africa there were something like 3 768 000 Whites as against 6 240 000 Africans. These figures refer to Africans in urban areas, let alone the Africans who are living in the rural part of so-called White South Africans. If one puts the Whites, the Coloureds and the Asians together, one finds that in 1975 they totalled some 6 million people, against 6 million Africans living in White South Africa at the present time. In terms of the hon. the Ministers thinking, taking this figures into consideration, he is really saying that half of the urban population of South Africa are potential foreigners. Looking at 12 million South Africans, the hon. the Minister says 6 million are potential foreigners in terms of the Government’s scheme of things.

There is no indication, of course, that this trend will in any way be reversed. In fact, the opposite is the case. If one looks at surveys which have done, one knows that Benbo, for example, quoted a figure of 100 100 as the average annual increase in the supply of Black homeland labour in the years 1973 to 1975. During the same period the average increase in demand in the homelands for labour was something like 28 000, i.e. some 28% of this average annual increase in the supply of labour. If one adds, to be generous to the hon. the Minister, the near homeland areas, this figure will go up to 65%. However, this will still mean that during this period some 35% of the increased labour available will be migrant labour which will have to go to the so-called White areas of South Africa. The figure was given that in the Transkei—the worst example—84% of the average increase in labour supply could not find work opportunities, whereas in Lebowa some 42% of these people could not find work. Let us look at the situation in kwaZulu. I want to quote from a report of a survey undertaken by the University of Natal in which one finds the following comment—

This is the sort of process of urbanization which is taking place despite the policies of the Government. If one takes the gross national income of the homelands, we find that this was given as a figure of R1 599 million, of which commuter workers contributed R318 million and migrant workers, more than R856 million. This is the trend, the pattern, despite the homeland policy of the Government. Yet these are the homelands of which millions of Blacks will have to seek citizenship in exchange for their existing South African citizenship. So much for the present and the immediate future. Let us now look to the more distant future in terms of projected figures given for the year 2000 in regard to the population of South Africa.

I want to quote from a paper read by Prof. Sadie entitled “The Demographic Forces in South Africa”. I must say that it quotes figures which percentage-wise are not dissimilar in any way from the official figures in the Official Yearbook of South Africa which has recently been published. These projected figures for the year 2000 should give South Africa some pause to consider the implications of the hon. the Minister’s statement on citizenship more forcibly. We are told that by the year 2000 there will be some 5 900 000 Whites, 1 215 000 Asians, 4 890 000 Coloureds and 37 293 000 Blacks in South Africa, a total projected population of some 49 308 000. It is estimated that of this figure for the year 2000 the African urban population will be in the region of 15 million as against some 6 million Whites. I almost described those 15 million people as being potential foreigners. However, I am now talking about the year 2000 in terms of remarks made by the hon. the Prime Minister during the censure debate, viz. that in five years or so most of the homelands would be independent. One must then assume that by the year 2000 we shall, in terms of Government policy, have a country which will have 6 million Whites in the urban areas and that they will be outnumbered by 15 million foreigners who will be living in the same part of a common South Africa, shared by Black and White, but who will not enjoy citizenship. This is the sort of ludicrous situation which arises out of the concept of the hon. the Minister of saying to these people that they will work here, but will not enjoy citizenship rights here. They will enjoy such rights in the homelands from which they come. As I have indicated, there is no way, in terms of the projected population figures, in which that comparatively restricted area of land can cater for this tremendous increase in the Black population of South Africa, whatever the development in these homelands may be and whatever optimistic view is given of this development. In terms of Government policy there must surely be some need to rethink this entire attitude. I want to ask the hon. the Minister whether he is firmly committed to abide by the 1936 legislation, legislation which has been passed in entirely different circumstances for an entirely different purpose? In 1936 it was never said to the Blacks that the Government would demarcate areas in which they would enjoy their rights of citizenship. Circumstances have changed entirely. Even within the confines of Government policy, with which we in these benches obviously disagree entirely, it seems totally impractical that the Government should say that we are firmly bound by the confines of the 1936 legislation. That is the one point I want to raise.

One also wonders whether the Government, in terms of its programme of consolidation, can say that it is wise to exclude the possibility of including presently White-owned land in the consolidated areas, because if, on the basis of costs, practicability and everything else, the Government is going to persist with some meaningful consolidation, it should also take into consideration the possibility of including existing White-owned land in these areas.

I think these are some matters which deserve the attention of the Government. In looking at more realistic boundaries, even in terms of Government policy, the Government should have regard to the attitudes of the Black people themselves. I want to ask the hon. the Minister specifically what his attitude is with regard to, for example, what has taken place in kwaZulu. After the elections which have recently taken place, kwaZulu has given the Inkatha movement of Chief Gutsha Buthelezi a 100% mandate. What is this mandate the Zulu people gave? I want to quote from a manifesto issued by the Inkatha movement which sets out some of the issues. It was put to the people of kwaZulu. I want to quote some extracts appropriate to the subject being discussed at the present time.