Mr. Speaker, I move—

be discharged and the Bills withdrawn.

Agreed to.

Mr. Speaker, in the so-called new policy formulation by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition, one theme was repeated like a refrain: The theme that apart from standing for full citizenship and franchise for all on a common voters’ roll, the PFP also stands for the protection of group rights. In this connection he said on three occasions—

He went on to say—

He also said—

That he should now suddenly be putting greater stress on group rights than before is understandable to us, because he realizes that he can neither obtain nor retain any support without giving minority groups assurances that they will have a right to exist under their policy. However, how he wishes to achieve this, in the light of his policy, is totally beyond our comprehension or belief.

Let us assess the guarantees for group interests offered by the PFP. Let us see whether any comfort is to be derived from them by any voter who considers entrusting his future to the hands of the PFP. I cannot assess all aspects of their policy but I can dwell on a few. The first criterion I want to use is the question of what political power the Whites and other minority groups will enjoy under the policy of that party.

It is clear—I think the hon. the Leader of the Opposition will concede this point—that at the central level of their geographical federation, the ultimate result will be a majority of Black voters. Since the PFP realizes this, as is evident from several speeches with which we are all acquainted, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition suddenly comes along and makes a speech strongly emphasizing the federal states. He states that the borders of these federal states will be determined “taking into account group, regional and other interests”. He goes on to say that each of these federal states will enjoy “the maximum legislative, executive and judicial powers”. Is this the carrot to be held before the nose of the White and other minority groups? The impression is now being created that they will to a large extent be able to look after their own group interests on a regional level and will be able to take decisions themselves. But that does not accord with the hard facts of reality. We need only look at the three biggest concentrations of people in South Africa for it to be clear that the Whites will find themselves in the minority everywhere, at the level of federal states as well.

In the Pretoria/Witwatersrand/Vereeniging region the Whites ask: “Are we going to vote and compete for power with the people of Soweto, of Atteridgeville, of Mamelodi, of Sebokeng and of Sharpeville, in a single federal state? The Durbanites ask the same about kwaMashu and Umlazi. The same questions are asked here in the Peninsula. Surely there is only one reply which the PFP can give to this within the framework of its policy and that is: “Yes, together with the people of Soweto, together with the people of all the other regions.” The hon. member for Parktown is nodding his head in agreement. If one also bears in mind that there will be full freedom of movement under a PFP Government, that there will be no influx control, that a squatter will have a stronger right than that of a landowner as soon as he has put up his hut, then it is clear that division of the country into geographic regions within a federal unitary state will afford no security to the group interests of any minority group. This could be of use for far-off regions and regions such as the homelands, but apart from that, offers no salvation, no protection of group interests as such, in a geographic decentralization. The picture would of course be somewhat different if the hon. the Leader of the Opposition were to say that it was his plan to separate Johannesburg and Soweto, for example. But I have already had the reply that this is not the policy. Of course it is not their policy, because if he were to advocate that, then surely he would be back to the Group Areas Act, which would be one of the first Acts they say they would abolish if they were to come to power. Therefore there is only one logical conclusion; that in each of these federal states, just as in the umbrella federal Parliament, the Whites would enjoy little political power because they would be in the minority everywhere.

The second criterion I want to adopt is that of residential areas. The area where one lives, who one’s neighbours are and everything that goes with that are surely factors that are intimately bound up with the concept “group interests”. We have only to look at America and Britain which, with a less complicated population structure and population pattern have difficulties in this regard, to find that it is almost unnecessary to prove this statement. In both of those countries, serious friction is experienced where people of different groups live in the same area. It simply does not work there. In both countries there is hate and friction due to residential mixing, and the residential areas separate automatically, after racial hatred has been stimulated and after group relations have been seriously harmed. Surely the PFP has taken cognizance of the fact that even liberal Britain, and even its Press, are beginning to consider a special residential area for Bengalese. But what does the PFP want to do in South Africa, in South Africa with its extremely high potential for friction? They say they want to do away with group areas but promote group interests. They say that everyone can live where he wants, but that group interests are safe in their hands. They want to hand over South Africa to what has been proved elsewhere to be one of the greatest sources of friction and hate. Whereas the hon. the Leader of the Opposition, in his capacity as member for Sea Point, knows how much discord there is in this regard, he wants to legalize the unfortunate conditions prevailing there by doing away with the Group Areas Act. No, group interests are not really important to the PFP. The open society comes first, and the group interests are only an afterthought to satisfy interests are not really important to the PFP. his conscience because he has crossed over to a party with a policy which he has always opposed.

I refer to one last criterion, namely education. A statement that one of the fundamental pillars of the identity and culture of a specific group is the education of its youth within the group context, surely requires no scientific motivation. Every hon. member of the PFP knows that. Nevertheless it is their policy that schools must be open to everyone. The hon. leader agrees. It is true that here, too, we have an effort to gloss over the policy of open schools for everyone with concepts such as “no forced integration”, “neighbourhood schools”, etc. However, those concepts are meaningless if they are to be read in conjunction with the rest of their policy of free movement, integration of residential areas and abolition of influx control. There is only one logical conclusion, namely that all schools will be accessible to everyone under the PFP. Any other interpretation is in direct contradiction to the new creed of full rights of citizenship.

Tell us about the private schools.

Once again the assurance that group interests will be looked after by the PFP is a hollow gesture meant only to soothe peoples’ fears.

One could continue in this vein to expose each of the so-called guarantees for group interests. Their “bill of rights” includes the absolutely ridiculous provision that group conflicts will be negotiated by way of a referendum. Their Senate is also to serve as a so-called watchdog in this regard. All these things are fripperies that are alien to Africa, impractical and impracticable. Such mechanisms can only be of use in a homogeneous community, a community which is one of will and one of sense and is inspired by an exceptional kind of idealism which is encountered nowhere on this earth.

Like the USA.

If the hon. member holds out the USA as an ideal community, as one where group interests come into their own, he must please ask the hon. member for Rondebosch, who was there, where he encountered the most hate on the streets and where he saw the most racial friction. He will then find that in comparison with the USA, South Africa is a Utopia of peace among the races.

It is not ideal, but it is pretty good.

Against this background we must tell the PFP that they must stop hiding behind their hollow assurances that they will protect group interests. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition put choices to us, but it is they who have to choose. In South Africa with its heterogeneous population structure there are only two ways: either one is prepared to draw lines and differentiate for the sake of the elimination of group conflicts and for the sake of group interests, or one goes all the way with integration and an open community, all the way as regards friction, power struggles and group conflicts. The National Party made its choice a long time ago.

What are we having at the moment?

It has to draw and maintain lines. However, that is not as far as the National Party goes. This brings me to the hon. member for Rondebosch and the argument he put to us the other evening. I ask him to listen carefully. The National Party does not simply draw lines, it does not simply differentiate and it is not simply entrenching the position of the Whites. At the same time we realize that there is a great danger if the line is drawn unjustly. We realize that the National Party cannot entrench its group and its interest at the cost of other groups.

Words, words, words, while you are doing exactly the opposite.

We realize that the National Party cannot secure the identity of the Whites at the cost of the Black man, the Indian and the Coloured.

That is exactly what you are doing; so much so, that you are endangering our survival.

Consequently the National Party will continue to do two things. It will continue, firstly, to create opportunities for all, opportunities for the full realization of the interests of every group on all spheres.

You are living in an absolute dream-world.

Surely the hon. members know that we have already made a great deal of progress along these lines. The end of our road is not, as the hon. member for Rondebosch maintains, that we should continue to govern at the cost of others. No, Mr. Speaker, the end of our road is that every people and population group will govern itself. The end of our road is not that we shall continue to live in luxury in our own residential areas, at the cost of Black, Brown and Indian. The end of our road is that each group will be happily and properly accommodated within its own group context.

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

No, Mr. Speaker. I might reply to an intelligent question, but not to a question from that hon. member. [Interjections.] Secondly, the NP will continue to encourage, create and utilize areas of contact and channels of communication. The end of the NP’s road is not that each will sit in his own comer and think up plans against each other. The end of our road is that the essential interaction at all levels will reach full maturity. The proposed Cabinet Council for White, Brown and Indian is an example of this interaction, of these areas of contact and of this liaison and communication. As far as the Black peoples are concerned, the interaction will take place at an inter-State level by way of bilateral agreements, etc. I say, therefore, that while the NP is drawing lines for the sake of peaceful co-existence and group interests, it is drawing them, and wishes to draw them, in such a way that it will be unnecessary for groups to look with covetous eyes at what is on the White side of the line. The same things will also be on their side of the lines that we draw. Similarly the NP’s lines are not walls of shame, but walls with gates.

I want to conclude. Both the hon. the Leader of the Opposition and the hon. member for Musgrave beat the drum of unity in this debate, unity in the face of common threats. I have no fault to find with the concept of unity, but where these hon. members are at fault is in thinking that diversity and unity are two conflicting concepts. We believe otherwise, because we believe that there can be unity while upholding diversity, and that is not an idle dream. After all, Europe has unity and also diversity. Surely that area stands united in the economic sphere, and defends jointly the borders of West Germany. After all, the OAU stands together despite its diversity, sometimes even imprudently. In the same way, the oil-producing countries maintain unity without forfeiting self-determination and sovereignty. What, then, is their basis for the statement that for the sake of unity we must integrate politically in a unitary State? That is the fundamental philosophy underlying what they have said.

It is not only those two hon. members who beat the drum of unity. I have received a copy of a letter written by the organizer of the NP regions of the PFP. Before they got to the theme of unity, they say—

[Interjections.] They are proving here how unity can come from diversity—

It seems that the hon. member for Houghton has had her day and that that also applies to the hon. member for Groote Schuur and the hon. member for Bryanston. As far as the latter two members are concerned, we can understand why their names were left out. This letter, too, plays on the theme of unity. They say that it is also important that their central premise—that all 24 million South Africans should be joined under a new constitution in a common loyalty to one common fatherland—be publicized far and wide. They then refer to the 177 000 South Africans who do already feel that way.

When I look at the world it seems to me that political integration is no prerequisite for uniform action by people with a common interest. Despite the Black smear tactics of the PFP and despite their casting of suspicion on our good intentions and our fixed intention to see fairness, justice and equity for every people and population group, we shall continue to build lasting unity in Southern Africa, lasting unity founded on the recognition of diversity.

Mr. Speaker, I know the hon. the Minister for Social Welfare will be happy to hear me speak even though my “time has passed”. I shall take the advantage to reply to him in the short time available to me.

I did not omit your name.

I do not mind if you did. Listening to the hon. the Minister of Social Welfare, one would have thought that the NP Government had just come into power and that it was laying before the country a plan which was going to bring peace, prosperity and unity to South Africa. May I remind the hon. the Minister that the NP has been in power for 30 years. [Interjections.] We have reached the end of the third decade of NP rule and one would have thought that by now all these promises would have come to fruition and that there would have been some achievements for the Government to present to the country. What has in fact happened? It is true that we have had a huge spate of innumerable laws placed on the Statute Book in an attempt to divide South Africa racially as far as the economy, education, social amenities and political life are concerned, but the grand design of apartheid is as far from realization as it was when the Nats came into power. What have we achieved? I shall be the first to admit that there have been removals. Hon. Ministers of Community Development have moved hundreds of thousands of people under the provisions of the Group Areas Act. Half a million Indians and Coloureds have been moved during these years. In this country we have moved as many Indian and Coloured people as the entire population of Swaziland. I wonder if people realize that? We have moved Indians and Coloureds numbering double the White population of Rhodesia.

Are they better off now?

If that is an achievement, the Government has achieved something, but will anybody tell me whether South Africa is in fact less integrated, as far as the overall racial communities are concerned, than it was? If one looks at the population figures, this is absurd. Can the hon. the Minister tell me how many Black people there are in the Vereeniging complex?

300 000.

The hon. the Minister will admit that they outnumber the White population in that area.

What has been achieved? The grand design of apartheid has failed. Two independent Bantustans have been created, neither of which is recognized by any country in the world except by each other and by South Africa. That is all. One of them has already broken off diplomatic relations with South Africa. What an achievement after 30 years of the grand design of apartheid! This is the year 1978, the year when millions of Black people were supposed to be streaming back into the homelands to enjoy the prosperous life there. That has of course not taken place. There have been removals, however, and hundreds and thousands of Black people have forcibly been removed back to the homelands. The demographic picture of South Africa does not change, however, except in the minds of the Government. We have now seen that we cannot entice people back to areas where there are no jobs for them. Hon. members will remember that the Tomlinson Commission laid down that a minimum of 50 000 jobs per annum had to be created outside the agricultural field if the Bantustan plan was to have a hope of succeeding. I asked the hon. the Minister of Plural Relations a question only the other day in the House, and the figure he gave me was that something over 30 700 jobs in toto had been created. The whole thing is hopeless; it cannot possibly work. The NP now goes in for the numbers game; that is all. The people disappear from our demographic statistics. As each independent Bantustan is created, 3 million Xhosas are crossed off the statistics, 2 million Tswanas are crossed off the statistics and the Government hopefully believes that in five years’ time it will cross all the Africans off the statistical tables of South Africa and we will be left with a White majority Government in this country. It is a joke, a bad joke and it is a joke that nobody even laughs at these days.

It is a sick joke.

They do not laugh at it because all that has remained is racial ill-feeling and the fact that we have urban riots. As the hon. the Leader of the Opposition has pointed out there are 4 000 young people training across the borders in order to come back to South Africa and create violence. Is that a sign of a peaceful, happy and united country? I do not believe it is.

Let us look at the economy. There sits the hon. the Minister of Finance. Is he satisfied that a growth rate of 0,5% is indicative of the success of the Government’s policy? I say this Government has failed, and it is no good the hon. the Minister of Social Welfare and Pensions jeering at the policy which we suggest, a policy which would lead to a South Africa of a vastly different kind. We would have a country which would have cordial relations with the Western World. I do not say that it would be Utopia or that it would be easy, but it is at least a policy which takes cognizance of the realities of the situation in South Africa, i.e. that if we are to survive we have to face up to the demographic picture in this country. The Whites are in a minority; the Blacks are in a majority. We have got to find some way to negotiate for a peaceful future on the basis of that reality. That is what I am trying to say.

I believe that if all racial discrimination which is legislatively entrenched were withdrawn—let me add that a great deal of this type of legislation has been withdrawn in South West Africa, and the skies have not yet fallen in on Windhoek—we would have a South Africa enjoying cordial relations with the Western world. We would have a South Africa against which there would be no threats, crusades and campaigns for disinvestment. I am thinking of threats that concessions from the Import-Export Bank will be withdrawn and that banks must withdraw their investments. We would have a South Africa which would have diplomatic relations with the Black States of the continent of Africa and a South Africa which could be the industrial workshop of the continent of Africa. That is the sort of South Africa which we would enjoy.

It is that already.

It is not that already. There is surreptitious trade with the Black States, but South Africa is not the industrial workshop of the continent of Africa. That hon. Minister goes overseas and has a rush of blood to the head. He tells people in Brussels all about the wonderful removal of discrimination in this country.

“Merit not colour.”

Yes. He said that merit, not colour, was the yardstick. This is precisely the basis of this party’s policy as the hon. members for Yeoville and Rondebosch, and the hon. the Leader of the Opposition have pointed out. Did the hon. the Minister tell those people in Brussels that what he was talking about was the exception and not the rule in South Africa? When he talked to the people in Brussels the Government had not desegregated 26 theatres, but he told everybody that theatres were desegregated. Did he tell them that cinemas were still segregated? Did he tell them that everything that is being desegregated has to be done by permit? Permits, permits, permits are needed for everything. This is the most permit-ridden country in the world. Can you, Sir, imagine a country where practically half the population is engaged in giving permits to the other half? That is really what it amounts to. There can be no other country in the world where such a vast body of civil servants are unproductively employed in giving permits …

A “permitsive” society!

… for all sorts of things that in any normal society are simply taken for granted. We envisage an open society in this country. That is our hope for survival. Otherwise, of course, one survives by the gun and one survives by abrogating the rule of law. I want to remind the hon. member for Piketberg, who says that law and order must be maintained, that years ago William Pitt said that if order is to be maintained, the laws must be just. That is the basis of it all. It is simply because the vast majority of the people in this country do not agree with apartheid in separate development and have had no say in the laws which have been passed in this country, that the Government has had to abrogate the normal processes of the law. The reason is that the rule of law and apartheid are incompatible. They are in conflict over and over again and that is the real truth of the matter.

We are never going to re-establish cordial relations with the rest of the world as long as we fly in the teeth of all the accepted practices of the Western world. The process of normal justice is one of those basic practices. That, of course, we have abrogated.

The hon. the Minister of Justice thinks he can banish Biko. “Hence, horrible shadow!” he cries, like Macbeth, but Biko’s shadow is not going to be banished any more than Banquo’s ghost was banished. It is going to continue to haunt us.

You are Biko’s ghost.

I want to tell the hon. members on the other side of the House that in this country we cannot afford any more Biko’s or any more urban unrest. If this country is to survive, we not only have to take the positive steps the hon. Leader of the Opposition and the hon. member for Yeoville outlined the other day; we also have to refrain from provocative actions. Our very survival depends upon it. I am not only talking about the outside world, although that is important; the hon. the Minister of Finance knows this country cannot advance on its own capital resources because we cannot generate enough capital for growth, however much we may want to. It is as simple as that. We need overseas risk capital, and therefore we must refrain from provocative actions, but not only because of that; we must refrain from provocative actions because we do not want any more urban unrest. We do not want a repetition of the unrest of 1976 and 1977. That means that all sorts of things must happen. We must not only stop removals in terms of the Group Areas Act, although I am very pleased that that has happened—late in the day. As I have said, we have already removed half a million Indian and Coloured people. Nevertheless, that is something. However, there are other provocative actions which must cease. For instance, the whole question of the urban areas has not yet been properly tackled. The hon. the Minister of Plural Relations and Development announced yesterday that he was now giving greater powers to the community councils. Unfortunately he is giving those powers to a community council which does not enjoy the confidence of the people of Soweto.

Why?

They were elected with a poll of 6%.

Whose fault is that? [Interjections.]

The hon. the Minister of Justice does not listen and keeps everybody locked up. [Interjections.] Everybody of importance in Soweto was locked up. The leaders were locked up, and that is one of the main reasons why the polls were so low.

Why make a fool of yourself by not getting your facts straight?

What sort of facts would the hon. the Prime Minister like me to quote? Must I say that there are going to be no more Black South Africans in South Africa within five years? Is that what he calls the facts of the situation? The fact is that over 50 leaders of this community were locked up. Many of them are still locked up in terms of section 10. Does not the hon. the Prime Minister know that?

Why did you say all the leaders were locked up?

A great majority of the leaders have been locked up. Does the hon. the Prime Minister not attach any importance to the low poll for the community council in Soweto? It is common knowledge that the Government is nervous about 16 June and any possible things which might happen on that particular anniversary date. Does the hon. the Minister of Justice think that he is going to have to lock up people every year in order to prevent unrest? I find this situation quite absurd. This Government is ruling at the present stage by a series of measures which allows it to lock people up, to hold people in detention and it is not ruling by the general consent of the population of South Africa. The sooner it realizes that the better for all of us.

Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to the speech of the hon. member for Houghton and I must say it was just as provocative as all her speeches usually are. I think it is about time she realizes that what members of her party say in this Chamber is extremely harmful to the good relations between the Whites and the other racial groups of South Africa. If this point can be made clear to them than we will really have achieved something in this Chamber. I want to ask the hon. member for Houghton—I think she is an honest member—one simple question. Has she ever sung the song “We shall overcome”?

Of course! Often.

Have you sung it often?

Yes, it is a very nice tune. I sing it under the shower every morning!

She has often sung the song “We shall overcome”, the song of the ANC, the song of the PAC and the song that was sung in 1961 in the March of Tennessee by the freedom fighters in the USA. I shall come back to this point because I want to point out to the Official Opposition that collaboration exists between them and various groups and various organizations all over the world. There is something that binds them when it comes to offending South Africa and when it comes to the stirring up of racial emotions in South Africa. However, before I come back to the hon. member for Houghton, I want to ask the hon. the Leader of the Opposition a question. I do so in all humility and I do it as a backbencher. During election campaigns we say several things on several platforms and I am quite sure the hon. the Leader of the Opposition will answer this simple question of mine. During his election campaign, did he use the following words? I would very much appreciate it if I could get his attention just for a moment. Did he use the words: “The best way of solving South Africa’s apartheid problem would be to hold a national convention composed of the genuine representatives of all the people in the country?”

I do not know whether I used those specific words, but the general trend is correct.

He says that the general trend is the same.

I now want to come back to a matter which was raised during the Foreign Affairs debate, when the hon. member for Bezuidenhout referred to the congress which was held in Lagos between 22 and 26 August 1977, where 122 African States drew up the Declaration of Lagos and as a result of which the United Nations Security Council took certain measures and decided that this year should be the Anti-apartheid Year all over the world. I then said to the hon. member for Bezuidenhout that that conference had been organized by the United Nations in collaboration with the OAU, the ANC and the PAC. I now wish to come back to this quote. This congress in Lagos was opened by Dr. Waldheim, the Secretary-General of the United Nations. In his opening address he said the following—

This is very important, because to me this points out exactly what is happening all over the world.

*Mr. Chairman, I would urge the hon. members of the Official Opposition to take a look at the resolutions of the United Nations Security Council which were adopted in 1963. First of all it was resolved to appoint this committee of experts. Furthermore, I also want to point out the Security Council resolution of 1964 …

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

No, I am not going to reply to questions at all now. I am quoting briefly from the 1964 Security Council resolution, as follows—

I want to make the categorical statement that the enemies of South Africa, using the United Nations as a base, with communism as the driving force, make their influence felt in the Organization for African Unity, and collaborate there with the ANC and PAC. Then they also have their allies in South Africa, allies who are not only active in the military sphere and in the sphere of terrorism, but who are also politically active. I want to tell the hon. member for Houghton and her party that I consider them to be part of that alliance. They cannot deny it or dispute it. [Interjections.]

Today the hon. member for Houghton spoke about “removals”. By that she meant the removal of Black people. That is of course the one thing she always uses to rouse and stir up emotions. The hon. member for Musgrave again had a lot to say about citizenship. I shall refer to his speech again in a moment. However, I just want to submit that the way in which he refers to citizenship is his particular way of stirring up emotions.

During the present session, as well as on previous occasions, the hon. member for Rondebosch has referred repeatedly to the unfair dispensation in the economy. According to him the Black people will reject the economic structure in South Africa because it is only the White man who benefits from it. Other hon. members of the PFP again referred repeatedly to the young people. They referred to the young Black people and said that Black youths were rejecting the entire system in South Africa. If time had permitted, I could have quoted gems from their speeches here in this House, things which they said in regard to each of these concepts. In the speeches concerned they set to work in such a way, they chose their words in such a way that it could leave no doubt whatsoever in the mind of any Black person, or of the members of their alliance, concerning the modus operandi and the objectives of the Opposition. In reality their objectives—if one examines them closely, mean only one thing, viz. to dislodge the White minority and to get a new and different government established on another basis.

I should also like to quote what the hon. member for Pinelands said. I want to say with great respect that, if ever a dangerous, a recklessly dangerous speech was made in this House, a speech which finally and irrevocably convinced me that the PFP is playing a sinister role here, it was the speech made by the hon. member for Pinelands during the discussion of the Education and Training Vote. After he had mentioned the inequality in the education situation quite a number of times during his long speech, he concluded by saying—

Last year it was my pleasant privilege to travel through the USA for almost eight weeks, to be able to converse with people in the most prominent positions, to exchange views with leaders in all spheres. There is one point to which those people consistently refer. That is why one is filled with resentment when one listens to those hon. members. Those people consistently come back to the subject of education. They argue in exactly the same way the PFP argues. They say that, because the Black people in South Africa are being subjected to a so-called suppressive and inferior system of education, they cannot achieve justice and equity. This is the charge which is being brought against us throughout the world. This is why we had to spend enormous amounts of money to publish a book, Stepping into the Future, which that side kicked up such a fuss about.

[Inaudible.]

Merely in passing, I want to say this to the hon. member for Bryanston: In the terminology of the Afrikaans people we speak of great academics and great politicians, but in the Parliament of South Africa he is the greatest hysteric we have ever had. Among the hysterics in history he will count as one of the very greatest. What I now want to say about emotions, applies very specifically to him. What I said in respect of education refers not only to the hon. member for Pinelands. The hon. member for Musgrave made the following observation in the same connection—

Without venturing into the sphere in which the hon. Minister has already replied to them, I want to say that it is an utter and infamous lie to bruit those facts abroad, just as they are, and to present them to the Black children.

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: The hon. member for Innesdal referred to a statement made by the hon. member for Musgrave as “an infamous lie”. [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, I was referring to the facts. I said that if we bruited those facts …

Order! The hon. member has not finished speaking, but I do not understand what he has been saying to mean that he is directly accusing the hon. member. However, the hon. member must be careful.

Very well, Sir.

Mr. Speaker, may I ask whether the hon. member for Innesdal is prepared to repeat what he said … [Interjections.]

Order! Is the hon. member accusing the hon. member for Musgrave of being directly misleading?

No, Sir; I am not accusing any of those hon. members. I am referring to the unqualified use of those words, as they are frequently used in our country and also as they may be interpreted in Hansard. If we say such things without qualifications, surely we are arousing emotions among the Black people. It is being said that it is the young Blacks who are up in arms. Throughout Africa it is the young people who are up in arms. This is the case throughout the world, and in Africa more than in any other continent, for in Africa they, as we do, have the problem that there is not always a meaningful place for trained and educated people in the labour market. This is a reality of Africa. Of what avail is it to us to arouse those emotions? I now want to bring this point to the attention of the hon. member for Pinelands: If we make a calculation to establish what it would cost to eliminate the gap which is indicated by the direct use of those numbers, we find that it would cost us R2 000 million in a single financial year. To equalize the salaries of the teachers, would cost us an additional R95 million. But that is not the point. The point is that the entire comparison is completely incorrect. Most of the Black children, for example, are in the lower classes, where the costs are entirely different. The teachers have lower qualifications, and therefore receive less money. I can continue in this vein, but I do not want to dwell on this subject for long.

The hon. member for Musgrave, who falls into the same category as the hon. member for Pinelands, advanced the argument of citizenship. The hon. member for Houghton has also reiterated: “We will be depriving Black South Africans of their citizenship.” That is to say, as though every Black person in South Africa, or in that portion of South Africa where we have the political say, will find himself in the position that he is being discriminated against, that he will have no opportunities such as employment opportunities or educational opportunities. She also says this, while the Minister of Plural Relations has specifically and emphatically stated that it is his object to make Soweto the most beautiful city in Africa. We are struggling with the realities of Africa, and we cannot do these things overnight. The hon. member for Parktown made one of the most positive statements I have heard from a member on that side of the House this session. He said something which all those people ought to inscribe on their hearts, something which they should write into their “Bill of Rights” and constitution. They should make it part of their philosophy of life. His words were: “The name of the game is confidence.”

†If there is no confidence, how on earth can there be investments in South Africa? If one creates an atmosphere of ill-feeling between the races, if one constantly refers to issues of citizenship, to matters in the educational field, to the removal of people, and to discrimination being this Government’s objectives, what on earth is one doing other than not playing the game of confidence?

*The hon. member for Houghton was quite correct: We are seeking economic development in this country. We are in search of money, because we have an enormous economic task, to the benefit of every individual in this country. We must develop the free, capitalist system so that the benefits of that system can work their way through to every ethnic group and every individual: White, Brown, Black and Indian. For that we need confidence. We on this side of the House are trying as hard as we can to adopt the measures we consider necessary to get that economic process under way, but it is not easy. The hon. member for Houghton could ask the hon. member for Parktown how difficult it is. The hon. member for Parktown, in a speech which I have here, said that we should also look after the interests of the White workers on the mines. The hon. member for Parktown is shaking his head. He appreciates the economic realities. If one appreciates the economic realities, how on earth can we become so hysterical about emotional matters which cannot be rectified overnight.

Both hon. members spoke about discrimination. The crux of our policy in every sphere is to try to escape completely from discrimination, but as long as there are different races in one geographical country and as long as there are different peoples, there will have to be statutory or non-statutory distinctions. As long as distinctions are being drawn, there will be people who say that it is discrimination, and that some people are being treated unfairly. During the six weeks I was in America, where I had the privilege of visiting the Black residential areas in several states and cities, I told the former American ambassador to South Africa that I had never in my entire life before, in spite of the fact that I was acquainted with the circumstances here, seen so much hate in the eyes of Black people in South Africa as I saw there. With that I am not saying that everything that is being done in America is wrong, or that their policy has failed in every respect. There are many Black people who have managed to enter the main stream. However, the conflict situation which is being created by trying to force people into the main stream is a dilemma which South Africa has to escape, and that is the crux of the policy of the National Party.

I want to return to the point of citizenship and say that the policy of the National Party, politically, economically and sociologically speaking, is a developing policy and not static policy. In respect of the Blacks in certain areas in South Africa, there is the starting point of development. I want to tell the hon. member for Houghton that if she had listened carefully to the speech made by the hon. the Prime Minister, as well as the one made by the hon. the Minister of Plural Relations and Development in respect of Soweto, she would not arouse emotions over the community council for which only 6% of the voters voted. Even if they had had a polling percentage of 80%, she would still not have accepted the community council because it does not fit into her pattern of thought. Nor does it fit into the pattern of thought of certain Black leaders. I want to ask her whether it is only the leaders who collaborate with the United Nations and vote with our enemies in the OAU—we also have many friends there—and is it only the leaders who represent the ANC or PAC, who represent the opinion of the Black people in South Africa? After all, it is only those people who are consistently quoted by members of the PFP.

Above all we are looking for stability in South Africa. In this late hour of South Africa’s history, with all the problems around us in the international world, in Africa and in Southern Africa, we cannot afford to debate with those people. I want to say with all the conviction at my disposal—I am addressing this in particular to the hon. member for Pinelands—that the PFP has become completely, absolutely and totally irrelevant in White politics in South Africa. They cannot take over the Government of this country, not now, not next year, not ever.

However, they do have an enormous task—and with that I conclude. Their task is to help us not to stir up emotions between Whites and Black in South Africa in a diversity of fields so that all of us will ultimately pluck the bitter fruits of economic collapse and of social and political chaos, because that is what they, and the team in which they are playing, are inevitably heading for.

Mr. Speaker, it is my earnest belief that politics in South Africa is taking on a totally new character. We are now at a watershed in South Africa’s political history. One has only to look at the utterances and threats from foreign quarters, as well as those that are expressed internally, to realize that everything is coming to a head. I am reminded of the words that were often used by Mr. Radclyffe Cadman when he referred to the fact that South Africa was the pot on one of the back burners of the stove but that, when the time was ripe in the game of international politics, we would be moved to the front of the stove where the hot burners are, the fast cookers. This is where I believe we find ourselves today.

Therefore I believe that we must take a good look at the situation. What has the National Party Government done over the past 30 years that does not or cannot carry clearly emblazoned across it the words: “Yes, we know you did it, but you did it too slowly and you did it too late.” Why has it been necessary for the past 30 years to have been 30 years of change for the sake of expediency rather than change for the sake of the best interests of the country we all love? I believe it is not necessarily the party that is the ultimate good in any society, even if it has been there for 30 years. It is the people who are the highest good in a democracy. The only way to establish a sound society within the borders of one’s country is to motivate all the people into accepting that loyalty to one’s country and to one’s fellow citizens must be placed very high on the list of priorities.

There must be political differences and it is true of our situation here that there are political differences. In our plural society we also have differences in respect of skin colour. However, if we ever hope to achieve anything in this country of ours, we must have a common loyalty, we must have a true South Africanism. I know in my heart of hearts that the Government would like to see this, but I believe that the Government is not going about it the right way. The prime example of where the Government goes wrong in this regard is to be seen in its attitude towards the people of Transkei and Bophuthatswana vis-à-vis the urban Blacks and citizenship. I refer for instance to the enforced citizenship of the urban Black who, because he is a Xhosa-speaker, is told that he is no longer a South African and cannot be considered as such, but that he is a Transkeian by virtue of the language which he speaks. If it is to happen to me, that I am told that I am a citizen of the United Kingdom because I speak the English language, I will tell them to go to hell—as clearly as that.

That is a very muddled argument.

On the contrary. It is a very clear argument, Mr. Speaker. I think it is a very clear argument.

I am sorry to say that this session of Parliament has proved once again that we were correct when we said that nothing would ever change the NP. I am afraid that the Jan Marais’s, the Dawie de Villiers’s, the Louis Nels and the Pik Bothas will never effect changes of any consequence.

Or the Hendrik Schoemans!

Or the Hendrik Schoemans. They will never effect changes of any consequence anywhere close to the pace that we so desperately need now, more than we have ever needed before. One need only listen to the petty politicking demonstrated in this House during the Third Reading of the Indian Council Amendment Bill by the hon. member for Umlazi, to see what I mean. I am sorry that he is not here with us this morning. I understand from the hon. Chief Whip that he is not available. In his absence I want to say to him that I can understand his frustration to some degree. You see, Mr. Speaker, neither he nor his party has managed to hold the reins in Natal for 68 years, and for that I say: Thank heaven!

We have now.

That hon. members party does not have the reins in Natal and it will never have the reins in Natal.

We have the majority of the seats in Parliament.

In his speech the hon. member for Umlazi accused my party of double standards and attempted to illustrate this by quoting carefully selected portions of a paragraph contained in the NRP’s aims and principles. However, he used that old trick of just reading those words which he wanted to read. He omitted many words that went before and many that followed on those he quoted. I submit that his speech was a gross distortion of the facts, and I further submit that his reference to a pamphlet which he claims emanated from this party …

Order! The hon. member is not entitled to say that the hon. member’s speech was a gross distortion of the facts.

Mr. Speaker, I withdraw the word “gross”. Instead I will say it was a distortion of the facts …

Order! The hon. member must withdraw that too.

I withdraw that, Mr. Speaker.

That hon. member went on to say that these words emanated from this party. I quote—

That is an untruth because an examination of that pamphlet will show that it was not issued by this party. It was issued and published by a candidate who stood in the election in 1977. It was not issued by the party, as he alleges.

Who was the candidate?

He stated clearly in his speech “another pamphlet of theirs”. He has nothing to be proud of, because we in Natal are not going to forget his attitude towards Sunday cinemas when it was expedient for him to adopt a diametrically opposed attitude to that of the NP—and to that of the hon. the Minister of Justice—during the election campaign. He did that because all they were looking for was votes. I do not think that hon. member is worthy of any further attention, because I am convinced that his politics have not risen above the level of a Std. IV debating society.

I would now like to turn my attention to the Official Opposition. This has been their watershed year and could be better described as the year of the damp squib. What has this party achieved since it came into being in 1959?

When?

In 1959; the hon. member might not remember. It has, granted, achieved the distinction of becoming the Official Opposition.

Try to be honest about it.

It took them 18 years to achieve this. They are represented by 17 members in this House plus one Senator in the Other Place. That represents a growth of one member for every year of existence. We came into being last year and we fought an election within the first five months of our existence.

That is a silly argument.

We are represented in this House by no fewer than 10 hon. members and we have the privilege of having the services of nine hon. Senators in the Other Place. That indicates a growth of 1½ members per month of existence. The Official Opposition claims growth; if hon. members want to see growth, they should have a look at the NRP. [Interjections.] Why did the Official Opposition not respond to the call that went out from Sir De Villiers Graaff, a call of the highest statesmanship and a call for the sake of South Africa? Why did they not assist at the time in a spirit of goodwill to join together in order to form a real alternative to this disastrous Government sitting on those benches today? I shall tell hon. members why: They preferred to say: “It is our way or nothing.” The result is that they sit here today, a pathetically small groups with the important title of “Official Opposition”. What of their performance since acquiring this mantle of office? During the discussion of his Vote the hon. the Prime Minister asked them to tell us what their policy was. He made much of bringing his sandwiches so as not to miss a word. Others have continuously asked them to clearly state their policy.

Is it now your policy to fight with the Official Opposition?

I am examining that hon. member’s party’s performance. Others, “die mense daarbuite”, have continuously called for their policy and their cry built up to a crescendo, until it was announced by their national chairman, the hon. member for Musgrave, in a recent newspaper article that we, the country, could expect some news later this year. The Citizen scooped the pool, however, the day before yesterday by announcing that the PFP was to put forward a survival plan for South Africa. I have the hon. the Leader of the Opposition’s Hansard of that date and from it we find that this survival plan is nothing more than PRP policy as set out in an address by the party leader in Johannesburg on 26 July 1975. This survival plan, this “blueprint”, as it has subsequently been called, is staler than the hon. the Prime Minister’s sandwiches.

Do you think you are being funny?

I am not being funny; I am being perfectly serious. Time precludes me from making specific comparisons, but permit me to quote excerpts both from the Hansard of the hon. the Leader of the Opposition and from the booklet, setting out the principles and the policy of the South African PRP, not the PFP.

Could you actually tell us what your policy is? [Interjections.]

I quote the following from the hon. the Leader of the Opposition’s Hansard (Hansard, 7 June 1978)—

Let us have a look what this 1975 model booklet says on page 7—

And so it goes on. The interesting aspect is that the Leader of the Opposition said further (Hansard, 7 June 1978)—

*This is, word for word, what was printed in this pamphlet.

†The speech of the hon. the Leader of the Opposition must be seen against the background of the fact that they are still seeking a way. There are policy committees and conferences that have been called. This is nothing short of a frank admission that they have no new direction. I venture to suggest that the hon. the Leader of the Opposition will not be their leader for much longer. I do not think the hon. the Leader of the Opposition is going to be the Leader of the Opposition next year.

Who do you think it is going to be?

I do not know; you tell me. [Interjections.] They let the hon. the Leader of the Opposition stand up in the House on Wednesday with a great fanfare and give us all the old hogwash that the original Progressive Party served up years ago. [Interjections.] I believe they did this because they were worried that the ethnicists like David Walsh and the hon. member for Bezuidenhout, who is not here this morning—it is amazing how conveniently some gentlemen are absent from the House—were gaining the upper hand. These gentlemen were gaining the upper hand and that is why these policy committees and congresses had to be preempted by the old Prog hardliners, by the old Houghton group.

Do you not think that they threw out Lorimer as well?

We are not fooled by this. Once again the Progs have presented a very pretty box, beautifully wrapped and tied with a bow, but there is nothing inside of it They will go on with their congresses and I suggest that when we gather here in January of next year the Official Opposition will once again try to convince the country that they are effective.

However, they will be tied by the divisions within them to all their time-worn clichés, platitudes and generalities. One thing has emerged clearly from this session, and that is that the Official Opposition has not once been able to fulfil its prime function, namely to present clear alternatives to Government policy. It is not sufficient just to oppose a measure. The role of an Opposition is to be responsible and always to be in a position to lay the alternative on the line, because without an alternative there is no real debate. [Interjections.] Let me say that the PFP has been exposed for what it is. They are the spoilers in the game of opposition politics in this country. [Interjections.] Their actions have proved them to be completely and utterly irrelevant in South Africa today. Their supporters will see this. I endorse my hon. leader’s call … [Interjections.]

Order!

Keep reading.

I am going to read from an article which appeared in a newspaper.

You have been reading all the time.

I endorse my hon. leader’s call that he put out, calling on “disillusioned members of other parties to join us in forming a new broad based opposition”. One obviously cannot talk to the elected politicians, but I believe the people outside, the followers of both the PFP and the NP, are becoming more and more disillusioned. They are the people that we call upon today.

A new force has emerged and I am proud to be part of it. The NRP is the only party which offers a hope of resolving the fundamental conflicts in the South African society.

Tell us how.

The hon. member for Pinelands says that I must tell him how. What about the province of Natal? [Interjections.] We in our party invite all South Africans to talk with us and discuss with us our policy and philosophy before they once again blindly commit themselves to an opposition party that has neither a policy nor a future, or to a governing party that is recognizing the facts of the South African situation too slowly and is doing too little too late.

Mr. Speaker, the Official Opposition reproaches the Government for standing firm on the principle of self-determination. This Government did not come into power by a coup d’état. Is the Official Opposition really a Rip van Winkle party? Does the PFP not know that it was on this very principle that the NP was sent to this House by the electorate 30 years ago? Where was the PFP on 30 November 1977? On that day the electorate once again returned the NP to this House, because they entrusted this selfsame right to the NP. Why does the PFP not accept the electorate’s mandate to the Government? Why does the Official Opposition show contempt for and insult the electorate by now wanting to have recourse to a convention?

It is this looseness, this strangeness, this lack of realism and this contempt of the electorate on the part of the Official Opposition which induced the hon. member for Durbanville to say that ultimately none would be left of those 17 members. I agree with him, and I can advance reasons why that party of 17 will still disintegrate to zero. They are trying to wish us away. Every time a Deputy Minister or a Minister is appointed, or if a new star appears in the firmament of the NP, they wish that he would depart from the beaten track, or repudiate or abandon the party’s policy and that he will have such a following and support that he will be able to terrorize the party to their, Official Opposition’s, advantage. During this session, this wishful thinking has been evident time and again. There is nothing strange about this wishful thinking; it is merely a refrain of a swan song that began in this House as long ago as the ’fifties. I want to refer to an example of this swan song. It was none other than Sam Kahn who said, with reference to a certain Minister, that that Minister, in the circumstances in which he found himself at the time, wanted to abandon the policy already laid down by the NP for many years because it would come into conflict with the facts of the Opposition, only to find that that policy would not die so easily.

†Mr. Speaker, during the past election campaign it was predicted that the NRP was born to die after 30 November 1977. On 27 January 1978 only one Cape Province NRP member took his seat in this House. The Nats of the eastern Cape admit that it was by mistake and that it should not have happened. One gains the impression that the party organization and the hon. member for East London North—I regret his absence—are sharing the illusion that he is the saviour of this little new party. It must be so because during this first session of this 6th Parliament he stood up no less than 60 times. An interesting comparison is that the hon. member for Houghton—known as “the talkative lady”—has spoken only 40 times. It is obvious that if an hon. member wants to establish such a record, a lot of talking will have to be done, talking without saying anything. Then an hon. member must, to put it in plain language, talk nonsense. Let me illustrate this point. I wish to quote the hon. member for East London North who said that the hon. member for Griqualand East “got in by the accident that half his voters were registered in Transkei and on polling day they had to do all their voting by special and postal vote. A lot of these votes were incorrectly filled in by the magistrates concerned and were thus rejected”. What a nonsensical argument! Did any other hon. member ever utter such nonsensical remarks in this House? Fancy, voting on polling day by special and postal votes! Talking in this way is nothing new for the hon. member for East London North. Only last year he was accused of making an alarmist speech. I quote from the Hansard of the provincial council dated 24 May 1977, as follows—

The hon. member for East London North is blamed for irresponsible talk. The hon. member for Yeoville came to this conclusion. I am no friend of the PFP, nor do I subscribe to the viewpoints of the Daily Dispatch, but Sir, the Daily Dispatch said that the hon. member for Yeoville rightly said so. I do share these views. The hon. member for East London North referred to Transkei and said—

This irresponsible remark manifests a total lack of feeling towards sound and desired relationships with our neighbours. It demonstrates the tunnel vision of the party. Mr. Speaker, I take strong exception to what the hon. member has said because of what he is suggesting. What does he suggest to these people living on the borders? Many of these people are my voters, my friends, my people, residents of Kaffraria. Let me just put it clearly, here and now, that these people comprise a stable society. They know their neighbours. The hon. member for East London North will not influence them with cheap and irresponsible talk. If the hon. member for East London North wants to leave the country, he is looking in vain for partners from Kaffraria. [Interjections.]

The Daily Dispatch is also concerned about this insensitive utterance. In an editorial dated 9 May 1978 the editor of the Daily Dispatch writes as follows—

*Mr. Speaker, it is not only Transkei which is being disparaged. South Africa is also being got at. It is dramatically being stated in this House that South Africa is the polecat of the world.

Die Burger itself said that.

Of course it is not being said in the sense that a polecat is a good exterminator of vermin, but rather in an offensive sense—so much so that according to the hon. member for East London North, the whole world ostensibly hates South Africa.

Sir, I am quarrelling with the NRP. When one starts belittling and reviling oneself, one immediately creates the unmistakable impression that one has no self-respect. What has become of the NRP’s respect for South Africa, then? What deplorable things must we, on this side of the House, witness?

But let us first talk in a lighter vein now. Talking of polecats, it makes me think of an amusing custom of the Xhosas. When they want to ascertain whether a person can speak their language, they make him say a little recitation. No matter how the recitation is said, it remains very amusing to the hearer. The recitation is—

It means—

Now, whenever the hon. member for East London North rises to his feet, I think of that polecat. I then associate this green mat of the Chamber with the grass, and I think of that broken neck. [Interjections.]

The hon. the Minister of Finance introduced a budget which, since the Second Reading, has stimulated the economy to such an extent that there are already visible signs of an improvement. It is something we have been waiting for a long time, and we are grateful for that. It is also something about which we become opportunistic and excited. We in the Eastern Cape are striving to stimulate the economy. The hon. the Minister of Economic Affairs and some of his officials travelled to East London for a full day’s good work in this connection. The hon. the Prime Minister made an announcement in East London during this session that he and members of his Cabinet had approached thé University of Port Elizabeth to institute an urgent on-the-spot investigation of the bottlenecks in the economy in that area.

But, Sir, what happens in this House? The hon. member for East London North tries to hamper what this side of the House is trying to do. It is not I who said that; no, it is an expert who said that. It is what the hon. the Minister of Transport said, and I have respect for his judgment (Hansard, 1978, col. 2510)—

The NRP is just like a puppy—under one’s feet all the time—but fortunately there is also the humoristic, the fascinating aspect, especially when the hon. member looks beyond his party and he, as a back-bencher, tries to speak out of turn and then speaks on his own behalf. Just listen to this—

Sir, that is nothing; just listen to how he, as a back-bencher, addresses the hon. the Leader of the House, and that after only six weeks in the House. [Interjections.]—

I have heard of political rashness before, but why the NRP allows it to such an extent is beyond my comprehension.

Mr. Speaker, I shall not have time to deal with interjections or with any questions, but in a short space of time I am going to try to deal with each of the political parties represented in this House. I want to begin with the Official Opposition. The PFP has been described as “a team of gifted political super stars” although most of them have never taken part in any fight against the NP! They are kept alive only through the publicity given to them in the English Press. Such is the co-operation between the English Press and the Progs as a result of Press handouts by the Progs, that it has resulted in non-attendance in the Parliamentary Press Gallery, this session on a scale never seen before in this House. The journalists’ work is done for them, in fact, by the research team of the PFP in their offices. The Progressives, the Reformists and the Bassonites, now called the PFP, are a team of political primadonnas and certainly not super stars! They squabbled over office accommodation at the beginning of the session; they squabbled about seating arrangements in this House and many of them have a history of undermining every single party to which they have ever belonged. Now, however, the biters are bit Some of them are disillusioned with the disharmony, the bickering and the petty jealousies among them in their new political home and even their journalistic pals agree to this being so. The hon. member for Sea Point is no leader, but there is no need to labour the point The hon. member for Yeoville is a perpetual aspirant leader who is always the bridesmaid but never the bride. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout is neither a leader nor a follower. My friend, the hon. member for Durban Point, recently referred to him as a floating trophy! I would prefer to describe him as a booby prize! South Africa needs a better opposition, a moderate and a responsible opposition or else we are going to drift inexorably into a situation of a one-party state in South Africa and I am quite sure that no one in this House wants that.

The Progs seek a Black alliance. Many of them, like the Carter Administration, see no future for the Whites of Southern Africa. They therefore try to get the best terms that they possibly can from the inevitable Black majority that they and their newspapers foresee and in fact work for.

Let me now deal with the New Republic Party. People ask me why I am critical of the New Republic Party. I am critical of this party because it claims to be a brand new party. If it is, then why do its organizers and its collectors claim to be supporters of the old United Party that it is in effect the old United Party under a new name? I am also critical of them because, although they say today that their policy is pluralism and confederation/ federation, and this is a step in the right direction and it is forward thinking, I want to ask them what has happened to Kowie Marais’ 14 principles which were to have been the basis for a unified Opposition and for the creation of an alternative government in South Africa. I am critical because the jingoistic Mr. Watterson is unrepudiated and not expelled in Natal, just as Mr. Winchester was for years and years not expelled in the days of the old United Party.

I am critical of them because the chairman of their party in Springs urged the supporters of the NRP in Springs to vote for the Progressive Federal Party and he is unrepudiated. The New Republic Party is in fact the Natal Republic Party. It has nine out of its 10 seats there. It is now trying to find some sort of rôle outside of Natal, but it is to all intents and purposes non-existent and bankrupt in the cities of the Cape although it tries to milk the platteland. It is wholly ineffective in the Transvaal and its offices in the Orange Free State have closed down. A political party is either in its infancy or entering its second childhood when it starts playing with tinker toys in this House to illustrate its policy. It is no wonder that the hon. the Prime Minister is able to say with justification that “die NRP is geheel en al onskadelik”. It may be harmless, but it is certainly not blameless. Most of the NRP members sitting here are responsible, by their actions or their inaction, for the Progressive Federal Party sitting in the benches of the Official Opposition. They tried to go to bed with the Progs and they were spumed. Can anyone therefore blame me for being critical of them?

Let us examine the SAP. It is asked why we do not join the Nationalist Party. We do not join the Nationalist Party for the simple reason that we do not agree with all that they stand for …

Nonsense. The hon. the Prime Minister told you that he would not have you.

… although we freely admit that they have changed and that they have moved closer to us and to those things for which the old United Party stood. We have not joined the Nationalist Party because we were elected to oppose those Government’s actions and policies with which we do not agree. We do not join them because we offered the electorate a new kind of Opposition in the light of the dangerous times facing the Republic. Our position I outlined in the first debate of this year. It is to support, where possible, measures to improve the external defences of the Republic and the maintenance of internal law and order, but to criticize maladministration, inefficiency and corruption; also to make constructive alternative proposals; and, furthermore, to urge the Government to carry out the most meritorious aspects of its own policy. Another reason why we have not joined them is that we at all times believe that it should be stated loudly and clearly from these benches that all of those in opposition do not share the views of the PFP. Lastly, the reason why we do not join them is that we believe that there must be a political home for moderate and conservative South Africans who for reasons perhaps the same as ours cannot join the NP and for whom the PFP policy is anathema and the NRP policy is unintelligible and sui generis to Natal in any event. There is one more reason and that is that we believe that we must point out at all times the un-South African and harmful opposition of the English-language Press not so much to the Government but to their very own country and people.

What about our outlook and policy? Perhaps because we are small in number, we think we are able to look at things a little more objectively than we did before. We are perhaps not so hidebound and we have a greater freedom to say what we would like to say. However, our party’s six principles are sound and unchanged since their adoption by the party from which we stem. Two of them —White leadership in the interests of all our peoples and as the sponsor and guarantor of orderly progress, and, the creation of a compassionate society in which social justice will be ensured in the interests and well-being of all individuals and in which groups will be safeguarded—are indications of our faith in the ability of White South Africans to lead purposefully and to build a happier South Africa in which all South Africans can live. We regard bilingualism for those in public life as essential, while national unity among the White peoples of South Africa is an essential prerequisite in our opinion to a greater South Africanism among all the peoples of the Republic. The SAP may only have three representatives here, but we have a lot of sympathy outside and we have the potential to grow. We have played the role in this House we told the electorate we would play. We have got things done and we have influenced the Government with some of our arguments. We have tried to play a part. We have not just opposed.

Now let me deal with the NP. The NP dominates Parliament through its sheer weight of numbers. Many of its members are content to go with the stream while others are frustrated at the lack of speaking opportunities and at the lack of opposition. Because of what has happened to the Opposition, we now unfortunately have in Parliament a political generation of Nationalists who have never fought an election and who have never had to pay election expenses. The NP base has been broadened to take in others who are not traditionally Nationalists. This is a new experience for the party and one which will still have to prove itself successful in practice. However, the fact that the “effective” Opposition has been so ineffective certainly does not mean that this Government has become the most efficient in history. The repeated rise in Railway tariffs has been a tremendous setback for the economy at all levels. These tariff increases have severely harmed the farmer who is compelled to use private transport to evade crippling rail costs. Living costs, the costs of industrial machinery and building costs have spiralled and not a single section of the economy has been left untouched. I am sure it would be far better if the hon. the Minister of Finance would give a direct subsidy to the Railways rather than to have these periodic crippling tariff increases. Share prices have not followed the rise in the bullion price as would be expected, possibly because of increased working costs, and consequently the economy has not benefited as it should from the higher gold price.

I want to deal with the Bantu Affairs Department. The renaming of that department as the Department of Plural Relations and Development has certainly not improved the lot of the Black man in the cities or lessened urban unemployment. The choice of name, I would suggest, was a poor one. If I may make a humble suggestion, “Swart Aangeleenthede” would be a better name than “Plurale Betrekkinge”, especially as the word “Black” is to replace “Bantu” as the official terminology of the Government. The Bantu Administration Department at all levels far too often handles the most sensitive of race relation contacts in a highly insensitive way. I would suggest to the department a crash programme in public relations as an immediate necessity.

A lack of industrial infrastructure in the homelands is a millstone around the neck of those homelands. Border industries certainly have not proved to be the sole answer. The homelands must be developed as a matter of urgency by White capital, skill and initiative and job opportunities must be created there or we will have more and more squatter problems throughout the towns in the Republic. The consolidation of the homelands is not taking place speedily enough, especially as more and more people in the Republic are starting to think in terms of larger-scale partitioning as the ultimate direction in which we shall have to move in a search for a division of power, rather than a sharing of power.

The fishing industry is in a mess and no one can doubt any longer what has happened to the South West African industry. The same is happening to the pelagic and rock lobster fishing industries off our coasts through greed by the industry and indecisive action by the Government.

The State-Press confrontation has not been resolved. All that has happened is that South Africa has been accused inside and outside of interfering with the freedom of the Press. However, the Press has been allowed to continue as recklessly as before.

There is going to be a confrontation between the State and the Church. Certain church leaders are undoubtedly seeking confrontation. The squatter problem, the integrated school issue and the shameful urging of Defence Force chaplains not to wear uniforms are part of this programme of confrontation. I want to ask the hon. the Ministers concerned why we allow South African Churches to remain members of the World Council of Churches which helps to finance terrorists who shoot our sons on the borders? Three weeks ago two radical priests from South West Africa were allowed to laud Swapo and denigrate our servicemen at the University of Cape Town. Yesterday a leader of the Patriotic Front whose thugs are killing English-and Afrikaans-speaking Rhodesians was banned only when he arrived to speak at a meeting which was held at the University of Cape Town.

This Government acts far too late, it very often acts in an ad hoc manner and there would seem to me to be very little evidence of a planned approach in Government policy. Most important—and I think the Government fails to realize this—confidence must be restored among the White men of Southern Africa. How can the Government do it? In the case of Rhodesia the Government has supported efforts to reach a settlement. An internal settlement has indeed been achieved. If we want to restore the confidence of Whites in Southern Africa, South Africa must say now that we support the internal settlement, and not only that, but if need be, that we will send a peacekeeping force to protect the Whites—our own people—in Rhodesia from the same sort of catastrophe that took place in Kolwezi. In addition, we should publicly guarantee their safety.

In the case of South West Africa, the Whites are uncertain and they are worried. I believe South Africa should go ahead now with the proposals of the Western powers which we have accepted and made into an agreement. Any further delay will result in a breakdown of White morale and confidence and Swapo will win an election if there is too much of a delay.

In the case of South Africa, confidence must be restored since much self-confidence has been lost amongst White people. There must be confidence in our ability to withstand the assault that is taking place upon us, both from within and from without. If necessary, we must make it plain that we will use a nuclear deterrent, and we must make sure that we have the ability to deliver it. Self-confidence must be restored to the White man and not only self-confidence, but also a belief in our destiny as White people, a pride in our White skin and a pride in our White heritage.

Mr. Speaker, in general the hon. member for Simonstown delivered his customary responsible speech here. It was also characteristic of that party’s actions during the session and if they continue in this way, one can assure them that they do have a role to play in our Parliament.

When one comes to this Third Reading debate, it is probably not inappropriate to review the session and the appropriation debates that we have had during the past few months. If one wants to do this, one cannot but begin with the unbelievably poor start that the hon. the Leader of the Opposition made here in the House this year.

It was catastrophic.

I think the way in which the hon. the leader began, was really catastrophic and I say it with the necessary respect. I am afraid that yesterday the hon. the leader ended here where he began: Last of all. I am not doing the hon. the Leader of the Opposition an injustice; it is his own supporters and his own newspapers who say this of him. As the leader of the Official Opposition, the hon. member put up a miserable show in contrast to the leader of the NP on this side of the House, the hon. the Prime Minister. One wonders whether the PFP is not going to look around and keep an eye open for another leader during the recess. I shall not be very surprised if they turn up here next year not only with a brand-new policy, but also with a brand-new leader. There are at least two hon. members that I can think of who would, for example, act in a much more responsible manner, and they are the hon. member for Yeoville and the hon. member for Parktown.

If one observes the behaviour of the rest of the Opposition, it is striking that they were able to criticize with absolutely freedom during the six months of the session. No one on this side of the House—I want to emphasize this—in particular no responsible hon. Minister made any objection to any justified, constructive criticism—and let us be fair, there was such criticism. We do quarrel with them about fair criticism, but we are not angry with them. However that is the only positive thing I can say about the behaviour of the Official Opposition during the past six months. If one listens to the hon. members and reads through their speeches made over the past six months, a disturbing pattern emerges, a pattern which not only makes one extremely concerned and causes one to hang one’s head in shame at the fact, not only that South Africans are making these allegations, but that moreover it is hon. members of this House who are making this type of remark here so that it can be broadcast to the world. This is what shocks and shakes one. But I shall come to that again in a moment.

This morning the hon. member for Innesdal had basically the same idea in mind when he referred in passing to the potential for revolution and anarchy that exists in South Africa. In this regard I want to associate myself with the hon. member, because if there is one thing that must be prevented at all costs, it is that revolution should break out in South Africa. Not only will it cause bloodshed and chaos; it will also mean the end of this country. If one refers to a state of revolution, it is essential to look at the circumstances and factors that, according to experience, history, etc., always contribute towards such a revolution. The first requirement for a revolution is a heterogeneous population structure. We have this in South Africa. In the second place there must be inefficient administration and this we do not have in South Africa. In the third place there must be social problems such as poverty, poor housing, unemployment, exploitation, etc. These circumstances are present to a lesser or greater extent in all countries in the world, and this applies to South Africa too. For a revolution to succeed, it is essential for the following also to occur: Political and military organizations must be established. This morning the hon. member for Innesdal referred to the fact that such organizations already exist both inside and outside South Africa. No one can doubt this any longer. Another important step that must take place, is the breaking down of the existing system in a country. In the process the existing political community is strongly condemned and attacked and the authority and legality of the power in that country is undermined in every way. Onslaughts upon the administration of justice, the existing legal order such as the police are methods that are used. Unfortunately, time does not allow me to go into this fully, but there is a great deal of evidence of this. In this regard one also hears cries of corruption, tyrants, oppressors, self-seekers, racial bigots and discriminators. This is the idiom of the revolutionary. Psychological preparation for violence also plays an extremely important role in the process of breaking down the existing system.

In every community, to a lesser or greater degree, there is a natural resistance to solving mutual problems by means of violence. Every community has a threshold of frustration and their resistance must first be lowered before violence will arise. In this regard I should like to bring the following aspects to the attention of hon. members: Firstly, it must be indicated that the existing system depends upon unjustified violence, for instance by police action, and that violent action in reply is justified; secondly, that all peaceful attempts have already failed and that violence is the only way out; thirdly, that the system is powerless or ineffectual to combat violence and that there is a chance that violence may in fact succeed; and fourthly, by elevating persons who die in the process, to the status of martyrs. Surely we have had several cases of this in South Africa. The target groups of the sowers of revolution—and this applies to South Africa too—are the vast majority of poor Black and Coloured people who allegedly have no political rights or political say, and secondly, the Black and Coloured élite, who are supposedly discriminated against.

Those hon. members laughed at the hon. member for Innesdal this morning when he accused them of this. Let us, however, assess the remarks and speeches made by some of those hon. members during the past six months, according to the recognized, proven norms that have been laid down as the basis of anarchy and revolution.

Let us begin with the hon. the Leader of the Opposition. I could quote at length from his speeches, but I shall try to be brief. On Monday, 30 January this year, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition said that (Hansard, col. 23)—

In column 24 he goes on to say—

Then he went on to say in column 27—

Then in column 27—

Then he goes on to say in column 31—

In column 38 he goes on to say—

Do you note how much emphasis the hon. Leader places on the so-called “repression”? On 11 April 1978 the hon. the Leader of the Opposition said (Hansard, col. 4408)—

He went on and said the following in column 4409—

This among other things, is the kind of language spoken by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition here in the South African Parliament. I do not know if this is what we should expect from a responsible Leader of the Opposition. Personally I think that the hon. the Leader of the Opposition will be on very thin ice if he continues in this way.

I see the hon. member for Houghton is in the House. Let me just take a look at what she, among others, said in her speeches. On 31 January this year she said (Hansard, col.116)—

In column 117 she went on to say—

And then in column 121—

I also quote from column 843—

In that same speech she also said—

The hon. member for Bryanston reacted to this as follows—

The hon. member for Houghton also said recently in this House that the magistrate in the Biko case “deliberately” passed an incorrect judgment, while we say that we must keep our administration of justice in South Africa on a high level and keep its reputation unsoiled. This is the type of remark made by hon. members on that side of the House.

I also want to refer to what the hon. member for Groote Schuur said in a speech that he made here. He said …

Order! I just want to tell the hon. member that I have had to pay a lot of attention to the word “deliberately”. Did the hon. member for Houghton use that word?

It is in Hansard.

Order! I am speaking to the hon. member for Verwoerdburg.

Mr. Speaker, I asked the hon. member for Houghton whether she was alleging that the magistrate in the Biko trial deliberately gave an incorrect judgment and the hon. member’s reply to that was “yes”.

Should the hon. member not add that when the hon. member for Houghton spoke again, she said that she did not hear properly and that she had not said that, but that the magistrate had definitely given an incorrect judgment.

I concede that, Mr. Speaker, I want to be fair towards the hon. member. The hon. member for Groote Schuur, however, …

That is a half-truth.

Order! The hon. member must withdraw those words.

Mr. Speaker, I withdraw them.

The hon. member for Groote Schuur said (Hansard, 3 March 1978, col. 2275)—

Please note: imposed upon! I should also like to address a few words to the hon. member for Orange Grove. We know that he is frustrated at his party not electing him again as Whip this year, but why does he now take it out on us by saying things like the following (Hansard, 2 May 1978, col. 6152)—

In that same speech he also said (col. 6153)—

That hon. member is talking like this about South Africa, our fatherland. What type of man talks about his fatherland like this?

I see the hon. member for Bryanston is here and I should like to address a few words to him, too. The hon. member said, inter alia (Hansard, 22 Feb. 1978, col. 1641)—

He went on (Hansard, 12 April 1978, col. 4587)—

He goes on (Hansard, 28 April 1978, col. 5855)—

And (Hansard, 1978, col. 5857)—

I could continue in this vein to quote several things that the hon. member for Bryanston said. I want to quote just one more. I quote (Hansard, 1 June 1978, col. 8268)—

He went on to say—

What a disgraceful thing for an hon. member to say, someone whom one would expect to show more responsibility. Although, as we heard this morning, there is the potential in South Africa for serious problems to arise, that hon. member says such extremely irresponsible things.

Business suspended at 12h45 and resumed at 14h15.

Afternoon Sitting

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to see that the hon. member for Pinelands is back in the House because I have one quotation that I should like to read to this hon. member. I believe that he is going to speak after me and he may therefore please reply to this. He says in col. 158 of Hansard of 31 January 1978—

Further on in the same column he says—

Later on, in column 160, he says—

I think this is a disgraceful statement to make. Sir, I have not quoted a single example of fair or justified criticism of the Government, because we do not hold such criticism against the Official Opposition. But what I have quoted, is evidence from the mouths of members of the PFP. They cannot deny it It is on record. It is in Hansard in black and white. This has been happening for years now. We have this type of thing year after year. I think we are entitled to ask them today, and I ask in all seriousness: What is the PFP up to in South Africa, and what would they like to achieve in South Africa? I have sketched for hon. members the recognized actions and language of the revolutionary throughout the world. I have also quoted from speeches in Hansard made in this House by some of the members of the PFP. I now leave it to the judgment of hon. members to draw their own conclusions about this matter.

I should seriously like to ask the hon. members of the Official Opposition: Do you want to bring about a revolution in South Africa? [Interjections.] I make a very serious appeal to the hon. the Leader of the Opposition, as well as to members of the PFP, please to put a stop to this type of language, in whatever context it may be. Criticize this side of the House, attack us, but in heavens name do not make us out to be oppressors and underminers, because we are not. We need only look at the actions of the Government during this session to see that this is far from the truth, and that it is not so. It has been a session during which, under the most difficult circumstances conceivable, without help from that side of the House, we have continued to make honest efforts in various ways to improve race relations in South Africa. This applies in several spheres. I could mention several of them, but time does not allow me to do so. One need only look at any sphere in South Africa to find that the Government is making an effort in an honest, sincere way, to eliminate friction and to relieve tension. In addition to that, this side of the House has indicated once again during this session that the maintenance of security and of law and order for all inhabitants of South Africa, White, Black and Brown, enjoys the highest priority. Those hon. members can do what they will, but it will remain so, because we on this side of the House have the will and we also have the right to remain here. We on this side of the House are prepared to stand up and be counted as far as that right is concerned.

Mr. Speaker, I want to reply immediately to the hon. member who has just resumed his seat and I also want to reply to some of the comments made earlier by the hon. member for Innesdal. The hon. member for Verwoerdburg quoted from a speech which I made during the censure debate, but I do not have the specific reference in front of me. I would, however, like to say to him immediately that when he quotes in that way he should really try to quote in context. I was making the point— and he knows this well—that in South Africa at the moment—we have seen this developing over the last few years—that there is a movement towards violence in our society at every level.

That is not true.

It is true.

That is nonsense. [Interjections.]

It is absolutely true, Sir. I say this is a matter for great regret, and we have got to do something to stop it. One method that can be used is simply to meet violence with violence. But it is not going to work that way.

I will repeat especially for that hon. member and for that side of the House that that in itself is not going to solve South Africa’s problems. I shall try to return to that point in a moment.

The hon. member for Innesdal spoke earlier today. He is a man who speaks with great conviction and with great feeling. As a result of his deep feelings, he often speaks with a deep sense of urgency and of agony. For that I admire him, because the matters which are facing South Africa are not matters of light moment, not matters of merely scoring debating points. They are matters of urgency and of conviction. I can only say to the hon. member for Innesdal two specific things.

Firstly, he referred to the fact, and seemed to suggest that he was relating the United Nations’ statement of 1963 to the approach of the PFP towards a national convention. If he only knew something of the history of one of the forerunners of the present PFP, he would know that as early as 1959 and 1960, in this very House, mention was made about the desperate need for a national convention. [Interjections.] In other words, the idea of a national convention was mentioned long before 1963.

I want to quote what another Afrikaner says, in case the hon. member for Innesdal does not want to accept my word. I want to quote a man by the name of Dreyer Kruger, who may be well known … [Interjections.] I guessed hon. members would not want to hear this. [Interjections.]

Order!

This man may perhaps be a “veriore Afrikaner”, but I regard him as one of the Afrikaners whose eyes have been opened. [Interjections.] This is what he said, and I quote it in all seriousness to the hon. member for Innesdal—

I believe he is absolutely right. [Interjections.] I had imagined that during this debate—one of the final major debates of the session—one would have heard a great deal about the 30 glorious years of NP rule. I suppose I should have realized that even hon. members on the Government side would be a little apprehensive of describing the past 30 years as glorious. If one looks back over the 30 years; if one looks back in particular at the movements that are beginning to take place within the NP, strong as that party is, large as that party is, one must say, with specific reference, for example, to labour and the labour field, which is after all one of the most significant areas and which is closely linked with the hon. the Minister of Finance, the hon. the Minister of Economic Affairs and the hon. the Minister of Labour, that one welcomes the movement towards a reappraisal of, a fresh look at, an examination of our entire labour system in South Africa. We have already set out clearly, I hope, during the discussion of the Labour Vote, our own views on this, and we are now looking forward to the Wiehahn Commission report.

I believe that what emerges from that is going to be one of the most fundamental contributions towards the recipe for peace and towards the restoration of confidence in South Africa, because it impinges on the whole of our economy and on the situation, of course, of hundreds of thousands of workers, both Black and White. We also seem to see new and fresh developments in the approach of the NP towards education, which is also another fundamental area on which we should concentrate if we were to restore confidence and if we were to move in the direction of peace in South Africa. In this respect, we have expressed our own views. We maintain that one has to look at both sides of the coin, that one has to look not only to the improvements that have been made, but also at the very long road which still has to be travelled. We have tried to make that as clear as we can.

If we have expressed this urgently and strongly, it is because we have some little understanding—little as it may be—of what is taking place within the areas. We do not speak lightly. Therefore, in wishing the hon. the Minister of Education and Training well, as we tried to do, we also urged him and his department, as well as the Government as a whole, not only to take the steps that they have taken, but also to move even faster in the direction of a system of education which will be seen not simply in terms of various race groups, but as an educational policy for the whole of South Africa.

There is an aspect on which one does not want to touch, except very lightly. The time has come, however, for the NP to make up its mind whether it is going to support Piet or Sybrand. I hope very much indeed it is the hon. the Minister of National Education who is going to win that particular battle. I want to say, too, that the whole movement away from discrimination, despite the bleats and the complaints of some of the backbenchers on that side, is to be welcomed. Every movement, every single instance where the Government moves away from discrimination on grounds of race and colour, will continue to receive the support and the welcome of this side of the House.

Let us not imagine, however, that the movements which are taking place are sufficient. There is the whole area of salaries, education and housing. One can also think of the prosecutions in terms of the influx control and curfew regulations. There are hundreds of thousands of people who are affected daily by these regulations. When one bears these facts in mind, not forgetting the movement of people in terms of the Group Areas Act, then one realizes there is a very long way to go.

All of us in this House, I suggest, believe that freedom and security are the two aspirations of all peoples. On the one hand a freedom, an ability and an opportunity to express who we are and what we hope to be, but, coupled with that, the security which will never be threatened because of one group’s freedom which may involve someone else’s.

There is no such thing as absolute freedom.

The unfortunate problem is that as we sit in South Africa today, we find that a great number of people have neither freedom nor security.

There is no such thing as absolute freedom; nowhere in the world.

Yes, I agree with the hon. member.

Then it is O.K.

May I say, however, that there is a considerable degree of uncertainty in South Africa today. There is a considerable fear of the future in the minds of the people opposite me now as well as on this side and in many parts of South Africa. There is also amongst some people talk of despair. One sees it in the articles which are written, the statements that are made and the movement out of South Africa which is taking place. There are people who have come to the conclusion that there does not seem to be any policy or any party or any way out of the present morass and conflict. We disassociate ourselves with that mood of despair. We believe there is a way forward. We believe a solution must be found.

You have surrendered already.

No, not at all. When we talk about the resolution of conflict, let us be clear that we are not merely talking about Russia and Cuba, that we are not talking about the indiscretions of the West. We are talking about the basic, inherent conflict within the South African society which can be described in social terms, in economic terms and in political terms. When one looks at the history of our country and the struggle of politicians of all parties over the years, not only the last 30 years, but throughout the history of our land, then all of us must concede that the basic conflict which we have to come to terms with is the conflict of Black and White people living in one geographical area. That is where the conflict is.

Why call it a conflict?

Because it is a conflict. When I talk about conflict, I mean that there is one group of people now in control and in charge who can lay down the conditions, and that there is another group who does not accept that.

Just one group, one single Black group?

No, there are large numbers, several groups, the majority of the people living in South Africa. Will the hon. member concede that? Therefore there is an inherent basic conflict, which must be resolved. The hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs has made that abundantly clear, and why? Because he has had the opportunity to stand and take a long look at South Africa from the outside. He has been able to talk to people over the years about the situation here. I only wish we would come to our senses and see that there is this basic conflict. There is one thing that is absolutely fundamental. There can be no resolution of conflict unless there is mutual agreement amongst the conflicting parties.

Therefore it is not good enough for one party in the conflict to prescribe the total remedy for everyone else.

Is there no conflict between Black and Black?

Of course there is conflict between Black and Black! I concede that. There is enormous conflict built into the South African complex and I say that it is the responsibility of that Government because it is in power. This Opposition has to criticize that Government when it fails to do the one thing that needs to be done in South Africa, namely to resolve the conflict. We have tried to say how that resolution of conflict can be arrived at. We have said again and again, and the PFP will say it again now in this debate, that there is only one way …

Black majority rule!

No, Sir, that is the way of negotiation. When one hears the hysterical outcries of members of that side of the House, then I would only ask them to take another look—I have not even time to quote it—at the article written by Dirk Richard in Die Vaderland. It appeared in yesterday’s edition. He makes the point that it is no good trying to be cross with Gatsha Buthelezi and cross and annoyed with Dr. Motlana. We have got to come to terms with them. That is what he suggests and I believe that he is absolutely right. I believe that there are people on that side of the House who accept that.

The hon. member for Pinelands must please refer to “hon. members on that side of the House”.

Yes, of course, Sir. I mean hon. members and hon. Ministers on that side of the House. I believe that there are those who believe that. When the hon. the Minister of Finance makes a speech like that very important speech in Brussels and places the emphasis on merit and when the hon. the Minister of Plural Relations and Development makes the same point, then I believe that there is at least some sort of consensus between us, a recognition that there is such a conflict, that it needs urgent resolution and that the only approach can be upon merit. It surely means that we have got to come together and find the way forward together, because we cannot do it separately. Whilst we move towards that I believe that there are certain preconditions which must be aimed at by that side of the House and this side of the House as well.

Do you not think that you are bedevilling every effort on our part?

No, not at all, Sir. We believe that the lack of awareness of the urgency of the situation is such that we have to keep saying: “In God’s name, wake up before it becomes too late!” In conclusion I want to say that the preconditions which are necessary if we are going to resolve this conflict in South Africa, are that we must create the conditions and the opportunities which can lead to negotiation. I do not mean concessions and changes; I mean that there must be a nurturing and a developing of new trans-racial bridges which will enable us to find one another in this country and resolve the conflict which exists here, so that we can move forward together as a country which has peace and security and hope and not distress.

Mr. Speaker, I want to deal very briefly with what the hon. member for Pinelands has said. First of all, with reference to Mr. Sybrand van Niekerk, I would like to say that in the framework of the law of South Africa and in the framework of the policy of the NP of South Africa nobody can fault Mr. Sybrand van Niekerk. The second point that I would like to make is that the hon. member for Pinelands has spoken very half-heartedly this afternoon. He has not been convinced of his stance or his policy, and has not really criticized us. He made a half-hearted speech this afternoon, and I will tell you why. He has no faith in his leader and no faith in his policy. The NP however has never had more optimism and faith in the future than it has today. There is no despair in this party and there is no possibility of a breach in this party. We are absolutely confident under the leadership of our Prime Minister.

You remind me of the band on the Titanic!

If there is a conflict between Black and White and between Black and Black, then that conflict is not of a racial nature; it is in the nature of a conflict between nationalisms. It is a conflict if there is a conflict—between nationalisms. The only possible way of solving such a conflict is to give each and every nation its complete freedom and independence. That is our policy and it is the only possible policy in this country of ours.

*Now I want to go on, in this Third Reading debate, to a brief discussion of this session as a whole. This is the first session after the general election and during this session the hon. the Leader of the Official Opposition had to prove himself a man of stature who could stand up to the questions put to him by the hon. the Prime Minister. He had to prove that he was a man who could provide leadership and was worthy of the confidence of his followers. I know the hon. the Leader of the Official Opposition knows in his heart that he has failed. There are three other members of that party to whom I also want to refer. Firstly, I want to refer to the hon. member for Parktown. When he makes a speech, it is clear to all that he has the stature of a leader. The fact of the matter is, however, that he only came in in February and has said that he is not interested in becoming Leader of the Opposition. That is the problem: He is not interested. The second person who could possibly be a leader, is the hon. member for Bezuidenhout.

Never!

He has the necessary experience. The problem is, however, that not even the people of Bezuidenhout have confidence in him. He had a majority of only 50 votes. That is the problem. The third person with a possibility of becoming the leader is obviously the hon. member for Yeoville. I want to say at once that he is a hard working member of this House. He is also a patriotic member of the House and also has the stature of a leader. However, that party intentionally bars him from any leadership position. He is not afforded the opportunity to come forward to save that party. Consequently it is the most ineffectual Official Opposition in the history of this country. A more effective opposition—I would not call it “an effective Opposition”— is the NRP. They were clearly a more effective Opposition during this session. The SAP in turn, was the most patriotic Opposition.

I have now given a survey of the possible potential for leadership in that party. Let me say immediately that I am absolutely convinced in my soul that there is no potential for leadership as long as they keep the hon. member for Yeoville away from any possible power base. I now want to turn to the policy of the PFP. It is necessary for us to look at the policy of the PFP, not because it is such a good policy, because that it certainly is not, but because there were people who voted for them. For that reason we have to analyse the policy a little more closely. The hon. Leader of the Opposition spelt out his policy and I should just like to point out two aspects of it as spelt out in a newspaper report in August last year. In that report he said with reference to the policy of the PFP—

That was the first leg of his statement. The second leg was the following—I quote him again—

†Mr. Speaker, “the elimination of race discrimination and all that this entails” means that one should do away with the Group Areas Act and with separate schools for separate colour groups. It means all that. It also suggests a positive approach of “we will eliminate discrimination”. But then he immediately turns around and say there will be no compulsory integration nor any compulsory separation. It does not make sense, For instance, if a Coloured man would like to go and stay in a White area, he will argue: “There is no compulsory segregation; so I am allowed to go and stay in that area”. However, the White man will turn round and say: “Wait a minute. There is no compulsory integration; so you cannot stay here”. This is absolute nonsense. One cannot find any sense in the policy of that particular party. Secondly, they have another policy …

Mr. Speaker, may I ask the hon. member whether he regards the opening of 26 theatres as compulsory integration?

No, I do not think so at all. That depends on local conditions. That is a stupid question. The other point I want to make is that the PFP now has a new policy, an absolutely new policy. In terms of this policy they say that they will have a new constitution for the Republic drawn up, negotiated and agreed on by representatives of all sections of the people. This is a new policy. It is not a multiracial policy, but a multisectional policy. They have a completely new policy with sections of the community as basis. Nobody knows how they define that. Moreover, this policy is completely divorced from the reality of the South African scene. When one uses the word “sections” without defining it otherwise, it is really the old British policy of divide-and-rule. Nobody is fooled by this. It is an artificial approach to the problems of South Africa. There is no future in this policy of the PFP. I am surprised that so many people have voted for them.

*I want to say something about Dr. Motlana, who in my view has been, and still is, quite an embarrassment to that party. Hon. members must understand that Dr. Motlana was invited by that party to address them on Republic Day. Now the question is: Is he a representative of any section of the peoples of South Africa? That is the question. As far as Dr. Motlana is concerned, I want to mention at once that he is a Tswana. He is a Tswana de jure, and if those people have any respect for the laws of this country, he is a foreigner. He was invited to come and make a speech. He is not an elected member of any Tswana section or group. Not at all. He was invited because he had obviously been spoken to in advance and it was felt that he shared more or less the same policy and the same spirit as that party. On what basis did the PFP feel that Dr. Motlana shares their political spirit?

†On what basis did they find a kindred spirit in the political field in Dr. Motlana? Let us look at a few facts. First of all, he is not an elected leader. Secondly, he is not a South African citizen. Thirdly, he is a member of the Committee of Ten of Soweto, a committee which was created in the editorial office of The World. That committee was never voted for. However, we find that on 19 October a commission of jurists found that this Committee of Ten was a subversive committee, creating trouble and strife in this country. Against that background the PFP have found a kindred spirit in this particular gentleman. If we go further, we find that this hon. gentleman says that the “stooges” of the independent homelands will not be considered as men of honour and will be completely left out in the cold.

*Why does the hon. gentleman say that? He says that because he is a Tswana and because he is not elected. Those people, the PFP, are still angry because paramount chief Mangope accepted independence, because they fought hard against his accepting independence. In reality, then, this is their way of paying him back.

†I think the voters of South Africa should take cognizance of the fact that the PFP is prepared to have a person like that create bad feelings between independent States on our borders and ourselves. If that is the policy they are going to follow in future, it bodes ill for South Africa if ever they should come into power.

*The bell has started to toll for that party, and the people of South Africa are realizing what is going on in their midst. What did Dr. Motlana say? Is what he said, what those hon. members wanted him to say? No. He did not do that, because he said inter alia, the following in the Transvaler of the 6th of June—

That is his approach and also the reason he went to address them. I quote him again—

†If this was the first exercise of the PFP in constitutional negotiation, it was a dismal failure. It must prove to the electorate of South Africa that this particular party has no future in the political constellation within South Africa.

*Their first effort failed dismally, after they had even gone as far as handpicking somebody. We find that Dr. Motlana also had the following to say—

He says: “Racial minorities should not be taken cognizance of.” What does that party say? In his speech the hon. the Leader of the Opposition said: “We must keep racial minorities.” What they are saying, therefore, is that we should perpetuate racial differences in this country. They maintain that we should perpetuate racial differences forever in this country. We know, however, that in the whole of Africa, wherever there was constant racial tension, it only led to chaos. It became so bad that Dr. David Welch said that “Racial minorities must be protected”. The Rand Daily Mail and everybody else is shouting: What does it really mean in essence? It means that they want to perpetuate racial differences in this country. What else do we find? Dr. David Welch says there is no future for “racial minorities”. Surely, then, their policy is a farce. They are a bunch of racists who want to beat the racial drum in and out of season. There is no future for a racist in this country and in Africa. The NP is not a party for racists. It is a party which consists of people who advocate nationalism. We maintain that in order to defuse any conflict situation which might possibly arise, each separate nation must be given its own separate, independent area. In such an area there are no differences of race, colour and other differences, because it is a homogeneous area in which tensions of this nature cannot build up.

†That is the only possible policy for this subcontinent of Africa. We believe that once we have created different nations consisting of different homogeneous nationalities, all strife and tension will be removed. If one gives somebody complete freedom and independence, what more can one give him?

*That is the policy of the NP. We are not racists and we are moving away from discrimination on the basis of race and colour as fast as we can. What is that party doing, however? They are handicapping us wherever they can. They use words which stir up emotions, words like “apartheid”, and they never talk of “nationalism”. I am very glad that Dr. Motlana spoke at their congress. He has proved that the PFP wants to maintain racial identity in South Africa forever. We are not interested in racial identity. We are interested in national identity, and we believe that it is the only possible way in which this continent can be happy and free. I see the hon. member for Bezuidenhout is listening with an open mouth. [Interjections.] Finally, I should like to say that the White nation in South Africa has never been so at one and full of confidence for the future as they are under the leadership of the present Cabinet and the present hon. Prime Minister. I want to urge the people of South Africa to look at the policy of the PFP. The PFP has no future in South Africa and I want to tell the South African people not to waste their breath on such “irrelevancies”—as Dr. Motlana called them. They must come to the NP so that we can solve the problems of South Africa together. It is easy. There is a policy and a leader and we are prepared to do it.

Mr. Chairman, I should like to exchange a few words with the hon. member for Griqualand East about the attack he launched on the hon. member for East London North. Firstly, I want to say to him that we on this side of the House have the habit when one of us wants to attack an hon. member opposite, to notify the member concerned so that he can be here in the House. If it is not possible to contact the hon. member personally, it is our habit to go through the Whips and to ensure in that way that the hon. member whom we want to attack, will be in the House. [Interjections.]

If it is not a habit on that side of the House, I want to tell the hon. Chief Whip and the other hon. Whips opposite that I think it is high time they cultivate that habit amongst the hon. members opposite as well. [Interjections.] The hon. member attacked the hon. member for East London North about words used by his own voters in his own constituency with regard to money they requested from the hon. the Minister to build a road across the land of Whites so that the farmers could have a road out of Griqualand East. The hon. member for South Coast and I received instructions from the voters to approach the Minister with certain requests and these requests were exactly what was stated here by the hon. member for East London North. I think that hon. member should in future be a little more careful when he wants to attack another hon. member in that vein. What the hon. member for East London North said was the words the voters in that hon. member’s own constituency used to us. [Interjections.]

†I want to quote one word which the hon. member for Pretoria West just used. I wrote down what he said. He said that the groups in this country should be completely independent. Did I hear him correctly?

I said “nations”.

That the nations should be completely independent.

*The hon. member for Vryheid announced that he is going to stand in Mooi River at the next election. I do not know who gave him that courage, but the fact of the matter is that no Nationalist has stood in Mooi River for the last three elections. [Interjections.] I wonder what has happened, but I just want to say that the hon. the Prime Minister is not going to save the NP a second time by appearing in a television programme. That is impossible. That cannot happen.

†I want to look at the policy of the NP. We are approaching the end of a session during which we have seen momentous changes taking place. South Africa is never going to be the same again after the end of this session. I think every hon. member must accept that we are moving on a road which will lead us into other paths and into another future from the one we have had in mind for ourselves over these many years. I think we are at this time entitled to look at the policy of the NP and to ask what the guidelines are that party has been following and what they attempt to set out. The hon. member for Pretoria West has said that the nations of South Africa must be completely independent If somebody has achieved something during this session, our party has achieved it. Pluralism is accepted as the basis of the future relationships between all the groups in this country.

Nations or groups?

I shall come to that point in a minute. In my view these groups of people include the Zulus, the Vendas, the Coloureds, the Indians, the Whites and the urban Blacks. For that reason I do not use the word “nation” because in my book the word “pluralism” applies to the separate relationship between the urban Blacks and the Black communities in the homeland areas. For that reason I use the word “groups” and I think the hon. member over there is able to understand the difference. The problem with hon. members on that side of the House is that they misapply the term “pluralism”. The hon. the Minister of Plural Relations and Development is nothing more than a Minister who deals with Black relations, the relationship between Black people and White people, and with the Governmental control the White Government is today still exercising over Black people. That is what the term “plural relations” means in the book of the NP. To them it means the Governmental control exercised by this White Parliament over the Black people in South Africa. I want to stress that the most important political fact in Africa today is that there is a growing pluralism amongst the Blacks in the urban areas and the Blacks in the homeland areas. For anybody to dispute that, is simply not to look at reality. One is simply not looking the facts in the face if one does not accept that there is a growing emergence of a group of Black people living in the urban areas who associate themselves with what we are doing here. They are part of the nuclear area which is White South Africa, an area in which Whites, Coloureds, Indians and Blacks are living permanently.

Now legislation is being introduced to give those people permanence. They will be able to hire, buy or acquire rights—whichever term one wishes to use—for 99 years. Black people are going to be here, as the hon. the Prime Minister used to say in the old days, “van melktyd tot ewigheid”. They are not going to move away. That is a fact not one of those hon. members can get away from.

The real question is how we are going to protect group identity. I think this is a question which has to be debated in this House. How do we protect and guarantee group identity? We have made proposals, we have even produced a model to show how it can be done. [Interjections.] We have shown the model to German members of Parliament, American visitors, people from Britain and journalists who have done years of political reporting and every one of them has said that it is the first time that they have seen a political party which can show one what it means. The fact that hon. members on that side of the House cannot see it, is either a case of “domastrantheid” or “domonnoselheid”, one or the other. Let us just take the example of the Free state of Bavaria in Germany, which has a relationship with the government in Bonn and also with the Common Market in Brussels. What is there more in that case than what we are asking for in South Africa with the model that we have set up? In the nuclear area where there are Whites, Coloureds, Indians and urban Blacks, there should be Parliaments, as this Parliament is going to be there. Next year this Parliament will be a Parliament to represent Whites in the nuclear area There will be a Parliament for Coloureds and there will be a Parliament for Indians.

You are talking about dummy Parliaments.

I am not talking about dummy Parliaments. When a group of people take power in a Parliament they will see that there is progress towards real power. I have enough faith in those people to say that they will insist that those Parliaments proceed to a reality of power.

On a point of order: Mr. Speaker, may the hon. member keep on attacking the hon. Minister of Plural Relations in his absence?

Order! That is not a point of order.

I am unable to help the hon. member. If he is so completely stupid, irrelevant and ridiculous, I cannot help him at all. I was quoting from a speech by the hon. the Minister. I am not attacking the hon. the Minister; I am quoting his words. What he said was that a family of nations in South Africa is predicted. An hon. member on that side of the House says that nations will be completely independent, but what does the hon. the Minister say? He says that each nation must have political sovereignty, but they will all be militarily, socially and economically interdependent. The hon. the Minister of Plural Relations further said that a body would probably be created in which the nations of Southern Africa would discuss their mutual problems. However, this body must not have the power to enforce its decisions, otherwise we would be swamped by the majority. This is precisely what we have been saying the whole of this session, namely that there should be a sovereign Parliament for each of the groups in the nuclear area. There should be a body where they come together.

It is impossible to have a sovereign Parliament for each group.

The hon. member says it is impossible. Nothing is impossible if people are gathered together on a basis of goodwill and pluralism is structured, which is what we are trying to do in South Africa. A plural situation exists in South Africa, and with goodwill we can draw people into our orbit. That is what we need. We need to draw people into the orbit with us so that they can live and work together in some kind of a nuclear state. I therefore say to the hon. the Minister of Finance that this concept of a nuclear state deserves serious attention. It is not enough, when we produce a Tinker Toy model here to demonstrate the principle, simply to try to laugh it off. There is a reality of political thinking which demands attention in the situation in which we live today in South Africa, because it gives us the chance to structure something which is peculiar to us in the peculiar situation in which we live. It is a situation in which this Parliament is going to have to move itself out of the summit of power in which it is today to the periphery, and to create other bodies which are going to share in the control of the area which is the nuclear area in which we all live.

This is the area in which it is going to have to project itself into the confederal relationship between all the different nations which the hon. member mentioned, or the groups, as I prefer to call them, where the White man will still have a say and will participate in the future of all those groups of people. Our success will depend on how many of these groups can be attracted into one’s orbit and what sort of relationship there will be with them. The hon. member for Umlazi challenged me to a debate. I wish my friend Piet Pugnacious was here. I would like to challenge him to give us time on TV so that we could debate this situation. I can just see it: “PG gesels met die balletjies.” It would be a marvellous idea. It would give us a chance to get up and put our case. I challenge the hon. the Minister and any member of the NP who wants to come. Give us the time and we will see that the people of South Africa know what the story is all about.

The Black people in the urban areas are going to have to face the problem of having to control access to their own areas. They will control access from the homeland areas to Black urban areas by reason of the fact that accommodation is limited, that employment is limited, that there is only a limited living space which can be made available to people coming in from the outside areas. When the White Government does it is is looked upon as being discrimination, as being influx control. It is all those things which have given us such a bad name in the outside world. However, the interests of those people themselves demand that control should be exercised. The hon. the Minister said himself it was envisaged that this might well be carried over to those people. I am unable to understand why it is that the Government cannot grasp the ideal that we outlined and that we have put before them. Why must the White Government always be the Government which has exercised these sorts of measures which have earned us so much unpopularity in the world outside?

The NP has been in power for 30 years. If I had to give them a present, a 30th birthday present …

Give them your balls!

… I would give them a rear view mirror. That is what I would give them, because the whole policy of the NP is today based on advance in reverse. [Interjections.] As they sit there, the hon. the Prime Minister and all his cohorts, and the tenth legion in the comer, looking ahead of them, they can see where they have been. However, if they want to know where they are going, they have to look in a rear view mirror because they are going backwards, out of the situation in which they were before. One of the things the hon. the Prime Minister has done, one of the successes he has had, is to extract that party out of the culde-sac in which it was put by the late Dr. Verwoerd, a cul-de-sac in which there was no progress, in which granite apartheid sealed them off. One thing that, I believe, history will prove about the hon. the Prime Minister, is that where there were cracks in the granite, he has put his fingers through the cracks trying to make contact with the outside world. For that reason, because of the fact that he has been able to extricate the NP from all the problems in which they were put by their own policy, a policy which brought them to a dead-end, the hon. the Prime Minister stands high among the Prime Ministers of South Africa. However, it is not my task to praise the hon. the Prime Minister. I have rather come here today like Mark Anthony, not to praise Caesar but to bury him. I want to put it to the NP that the hon. the Prime Minister is the last asset which they have. In view of the new constitutional arrangement which is about to be made the hon. the Prime Minister will either be the State President or he will move out of his present position. Then we will be facing a totally new situation, new groups of people and a new republic for which we will have to find new answers and new solutions.

We have a government in power, a government driven into a situation from which they can only escape in reverse. There is no way of turning the NP around and heading it into the future without bringing it into absolute confrontation with reality. That is one thing the NP cannot face. It cannot face reality and still survive and still pretend that they have a policy of any value.

One wonders what sorts of ideas one is now going to get from the NP. This is now the last major debate of this session. We have had some indication that we are going to get a new constitution. We have had debates. We have had speeches. We have had conferences. We have heard that there is going to be a new set-up with three different parliaments with a new State President, etc. We have not had one answer from one hon. member on the Government side, however, about what is going to happen with the Black people in the urban areas. When the hon. the Minister of Finance finally gets up he is obviously not going to reply to the politics of this debate. However, somebody will have to reply. [Interjections.]

But you know what our policy is!

I do not know what your policy is. As I understand the hon. the Minister of Plural Relations the NP’s policy says that all those Blacks will disappear, that they will all become citizens of another country. They will all become citizens of kwaZulu, and because of that they will no longer be citizens of South Africa Therefore, all their political rights are in their homelands. The same applies to the Bavenda and to all other Black groups. They will disappear from our political dispensation because they will become citizens of other countries. Now the hon. member nods his head, having shaken it to begin with. He nods his head because that is his policy. He is, however, now creating a situation where there will be a 99-year lease. There will be permanence for people living there. They will be there for ever. Not only that, but there will also be a natural increase in population in those areas and they will be part of the political dispensation which the Government projects for Coloureds, Indians and Whites only. There is no way in which the hon. member can avoid it. He cannot avoid it. 68% of the people who voted for that party during the last election say, according to a Mark-en Meningopname, that those Black people are part of the political dispensation in which the White man is involved and from which he will never escape. If we are to face reality at all, we have to take cognizance of that fact.

We have heard the hon. the Minister of Plural Relations and Development saying that there could be this family of nations, but not a single spokesman of the Government will come out openly and say that this is what they are going to do. They are not facing realities, they are not looking reality in the face and there is no chance that that party, as it is constituted today, will be able to do so. There are, however, members of that party who do agree with that. [Interjections.] There are many members who agree with that and I am not sure whether the hon. member for Brakpan does not agree with that. He has such an intelligent look on his face; he must be getting something out of what I am saying. [Interjections.]

Throughout this session we have tried to put our point of view. We have tried to create what we regard as a new political debate. We have tried to create a new concept in politics which is a nuclear concept. We have tried to take it from the world of nature which embraces from the most infinitesimally small particles that one cannot see or even think of to the most enormous, huge, infinite intergalactic space. The law of nature says that about a nucleus there are bodies which can move in orbit. They can move in an order. They can move in progression. They can all make their contribution and there is no need for them to clash. They can work in harmony and in peace. That is the order of the world. That is how the whole of our world today works. Everything that we know just works in that way. I think we have succeeded in putting this idea across and that there is something real in that particular situation.

I do not want to spend a great deal of time on the Official Opposition in attacking them, but what we have had from them is a statement of policy which is not new. It has not altered much from what we have heard before. What we face, is a situation where that policy is to be a subject of debate, a subject of a congress. We have heard that there will be discussion. We have heard the opinions of Dr. Motlana and we have heard that between those two poles there will be discussion and something will emerge. I fail to see how for the White community there can be an element of protection and guarantee between the attitude adopted by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition and the attitude adopted by Dr. Motlana. It is merely a progression from one state which I already find unacceptable to one which I find totally unacceptable.

For that reason I said yesterday—I am quoted in The Cape Times of this morning as saying it—that in this Parliament there are two sorts of people: “Daar is Blankes en daar is Progs.” [Interjections.] I think that is important.

Order! What does the hon. member mean by that?

Sir, I am going to explain that immediately.

The hon. member had better be cautious; I am listening to him!

Mr. Speaker, my intention was—I explained it further in a note to the person concerned—that there are people in this House who believe that the White identity is something which needs to be protected and guaranteed. It needs to be structured into a constitution whereby it cannot be assailed. As far as I understand this party—I listened very carefully the other day—there is no such thought in their minds that there is an identity for the White man which needs a separate place where it can be guaranteed, where it can be identified and where it can be protected. [Interjections.] If I am wrong, I invite any hon. member—they have a speaker left—to get up to pursuade me that I am wrong. As I see the situation, however, where you have a condition where half of the total votes are going to be based on a multiracial roll with a Std. 2 qualification, you cannot protect an identity such as that of the White minority or of the Coloured or the Indian minority. Where there is protection, it must be built in and there has to be a constitutional mechanism. Bills of Rights and court decisions and that kind of thing have not succeeded in protecting that.

What about the United States?

The situation in the United States is a totally different situation. There is an immense White majority in the United States. There is a persistent attempt in the left-wing circles in this country to translate from the United States their situation to the situation here in South Africa. This is done by students, the PFP and others, but it is a totally different situation and the analogies simply do not apply. When you have an enormous White majority over a very small minority of Blacks, as in the United States, a Bill of Rights might work, but can it be expected to work here in South African conditions? We have a sovereign Parliament, and we are going to give power to other groups, but one cannot give away all one’s power. I want to make the point that we are continually assailed because we do not do away with discrimination. Discrimination will never be done away with in this country unless there is security for this group of White people who today hold the power. What we have to do is to persuade the White community—together with the Indian and Coloured communities and others against whom discrimination takes place—that they can move from this position here where we are into a new dispensation where they will be secure.

You are talking like a Nationalist now.

If the NP had an idea of how to do it, I might have some hope for them as a party to lead this country into the new Republic, but they do not have an idea. This is the problem. After 30 years all you have is a party machine that chugs along without an idea in its head. One also has a professional organization led by my friend over there and others, which goes on clicking over and clicking over, and it has such a grip on the whole life of Afrikanerdom that it is almost an automatic thing that goes on and on. What we need is a new idea and those members do not have a new idea. This is our precise problem. All they have got is that they are coming back from the impossible positions into which they have put themselves before. The problem, however, is that time is catching up with them. Time is running out for them.

It has already caught up with you.

I still have five minutes more!

May I put a question to the hon. member?

Mr. Speaker, I have a long experience of that hon. member asking questions. I must say that I have never yet heard an intelligent question that had anything to do with the debate coming from that member. I do not think that it is in any way required of me to give him a chance to ask questions.

The last point that I wish to deal with is the question of the new idea which was introduced by the hon. member for Yeoville, of social democracy.

I must confess that I am a little bit puzzled by the idea, and I hope that there will be an expansion on this idea. My concern is simply that three of the greatest political parties in the Western world are social democrat parties. I do not know whether this is now an idea which is being injected into our politics, that there should be a social democratic party or parties, or whatever it is going to be, in the political life of South Africa. I think it is terribly important that we should understand that the basis of the future of this country is the free enterprise system and the individual man. I think it is so terribly important for the Black man in the urban areas that the idea of the individual man, as opposed to the idea of the tribal group, should be something which ought to come out and which ought to be reflected in the new situation. I know what the hon. member on my right is thinking. He is thinking that, because we regard the Black people in urban areas as a group, there is no place for the individual; but that is totally wrong. There is a very important place for the Black man as an individual when he is in an urban area as part of a group, since he will have deliberately associated himself with something that is different from what he knows. He has taken that deliberate decision. I have quoted before the figure of the number of people in this country who do so. It is a growing number of people.

As we are approaching the end of this debate, I therefore simply wish to say that I do not regard the Government as having come out with a clear line this session of what they intend to do about that most important problem not only in South Africa but in Africa, viz. the Black man in the urban area. The party on my right has nailed its colours to the mast. It is the old mast and the old colours. There is nothing new there. No new thoughts have emerged from there. They propose as a basis, negotiations with people whom we know to be considerably to the left, if I may use that as a convenient expression, of the position they themselves occupy. I would like to think that what we have suggested is a practical proposition whereby we can construct and put together on the basis of negotiation with the different groups of people in this country a system that will work. It will be done by agreement. It will be done by talking to people as we have already been able to do. Not only the hon. the Minister, but everybody else will know that we have been able to do so in the province of Natal. We have been able to bring together there people, the most diverse groups of people, if I may put it that way, in order to discuss things together and make a working reality out of the pluralism of the people in the province of Natal. I think we can say that we have shown that the idea can work which we hold out as an idea for the future for South Africa. We can attract people into our orbit. We ourselves will provide one of the elements; we will form part of the nucleus— but there must be a nucleus around which all these groups can orbit. Otherwise they are going to fly off into outer space and we are going to lose them.

The hon. the Prime Minister has said there must be an economic attraction between them. I have mentioned this before. There is an economic attraction between ourselves and Lesotho, and between ourselves and Botswana, but where are they today? We have lost them. The leader of Botswana is today one of the five front-line presidents, and Lesotho is a member of the OAU. We have lost them because we did not provide them with a link, with something by which they could associate themselves with us. What we are doing is revolutionizing the whole of Southern Africa. We are changing the whole of Southern Africa. We are creating a climate of hope and a climate of change which is of vital importance to those Black people. The fact that South Africa has turned its back on them is, I think, one of the most fatal mistakes that has ever been made by the Government in the 30 years it has been in power.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Mooi River indicated earlier in his speech that he would like to present the National Party with a rear-view mirror because the National Party is advancing backwards.

When you look in your mirror, you will see the NRP in it.

I do not think it is necessary to remind hon. members of the House of the numerous elections that party has lost, and each time they lost an election they won a moral victory. If that is not an example of advancing backwards, I have yet to see a practical example of advancing backwards. The hon. member for Mooi River tried to elucidate the policy of the NRP. Basically, I acknowledge that they accept the separate identities of the various groups, as the hon. member for Mooi River said, or the various peoples of Southern Africa. There is, however, a fundamental difference between his party and the National Party, and that relates basically to the principle of separate sovereignties. His party accepts a federal or confederal system, which has not been defined explicitly. He complicates the issue further by saying that they think in terms of groups. He then states that they regard the urban Blacks as a special group. For what reason do Blacks when they reside in urban areas become a new breed, so to speak? What makes the Zulu in Umlazi or in kwaMashu different from the Zulus who reside in Inanda or Nongoma? What makes them so different? Is he not aware that Chief Gatsha Buthulezi has said on numerous occasions that he as chief of the Zulus represents as much the interests of Zulus in Soweto as he does the interests of Zulus in Nongoma and Mkuze.

What do the people of Soweto say?

Chief Buthulezi says that he represents the interests of the Zulus in Soweto.

What do the people of Soweto say?

Soweto people accept his guidance.

All of them?

I do not say all of them. Whose guidance do they accept?

You know you cannot say that.

If he wants to differentiate between urban Blacks and rural Blacks what is his attitude towards the differentiation or what he calls the plurality between the urban Whites and the rural Whites? What is the fundamental difference in categorizing rural Whites and urban Whites who belong to the same nation, who belong to the same people, who have the same cultural, political and natural background? Why does he differentiate between urban Blacks and rural Blacks?

They have adopted a new system.

They may have adopted a new system but so did tens of thousands of Whites when they moved to the metropolitan centres of South Africa Then they also adopted a new system.

Did they come from a tribe?

They basically belong to the White nation and they belong to the national, the social and the political being of the White nation. On the same basis the Zulus, irrespective of where they are, whether they be in Soweto, whether they be in Ezhakeni or whether they be in kwaMashu or Umlazi, have a being and they belong to something. There may be a few odd ones who do not feel themselves totally tied to that but we have exactly the same thing amongst the Whites. To what group do hon. members of the PFP feel they belong? Can they be described as detribalized Whites?

The hon. member for Mooi River also referred to the plurality of nations. He quoted what the hon. the Minister of Plural Relations said and he referred to the family of nations. He also referred to the free state of Bavaria as part of the Federal Republic of Germany within the integrated context of the European Parliament. There is this fundamental difference that the free state of Bavaria has been part of a unitary system of Germany for over 100 years where they have had complete and equal participation in the political structure. For over 100 years they had complete and equal participation.

What are they now?

At this stage they form part of the Federal Republic of Germany which is still part of a political unit. See how long it has taken culturally developed States of Europe—it is a question of decades if not of centuries—to pussyfoot into a closer unity of European nations. Even when they speak of the European Parliament which is to be elected in 1979, they still limit the sovereignty of that European Parliament to an absolute minimum. Sovereignty is retained by the various ethnic nations of Europe. I do not say that within the South African context federalism or confederalism will not be the answer within 100 years. That may even be the answer in 50 years. However, at this stage there is no solution in federalism or confederalism in South Africa.

Finally, I want to deal with some matters that have been raised by the PFP. Let me first deal with the hon. Leader of the Opposition. He tried to outline the PFP policy yesterday and he spoke of a Federal Republic in which the boundaries will be drawn, as he said, “met inagneming van groeps-, streeks-en ander belange”. What I would like to ask him is: If in elaborating his policy he says that these boundaries will be drawn with consideration for group interests, regional interests and other interests, would he consider including Soweto and Johannesburg within a single federal State in terms of PFP policy? Would he consider including Umlazi, kwaMashu, Durban and Chatsworth in a single political State for which, in terms of their policy, a representative Government must be elected according to educational qualifications? If the hon. member is prepared to reply to those questions in specific terms at some stage, he will be doing the country a service. By merely saying that they believe in a federal system in which the States will be drawn with consideration for the group, regional and other interests, is so vague that it becomes absolutely meaningless.

The hon. member also raised the question of the 1936 Bantu Trust and Land Act. He posed the question to the hon. the Prime Minister whether the question of land in South Africa is regarded by the hon. the Prime Minister as being negotiable. In the light of his question to the hon. the Prime Minister, I would like to ask him whether he presupposes that it should be negotiable. If he did not do so, he would accept the statement made by the hon. the Prime Minister that as far as the totality of land is concerned, that issue is not negotiable. In terms of the 1936 Act it was agreed that 7½ million morgen of land should be purchased by the White Parliament and be given free to the various Black areas and Black nations that existed in 1936. If the hon. member regards that matter as being negotiable, I want to know from him whether he expects of this Government to continue giving additional land free and at the expense of the White taxpayer or whether he expects that, if such land questions were to be negotiable, a free republic of Transkei could offer to purchase certain land at market value. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition shakes his head. He is therefore not prepared to accept negotiations on the basis of paying for value. He expects the White man, however, to relinquish his lands and to give it to the Black nations on a free basis. That is the basis on which he expects this to be done. In that regard I can obviously only reiterate what the hon. the Prime Minister has said, i.e. that the question of land division is not negotiable beyond the 1936 Agreement.

The hon. the Prime Minister must be very pleased to know that you support him.

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition also came with airy-fairy questions like a bill of rights, the rights of individuals, a federal court of appeal and a rigid constitution. Can the hon. the Leader of the Opposition tell us of any single multiethnic country on the African continent where a bill of rights or a rigid constitution has safeguarded the interests of minority groups? I am not interested in whether they are Black minorities or White minorities. All I want him to do is to give me one example of a multi-ethnic country on the African continent where a bill of rights or a rigid constitution has been of any value whatsoever. I do not accept that there is such a country and I want to know why Southern Africa, in terms of the PFP policy, should be any different to the rest of Africa.

The hon. member for Musgrave raised various points which, to my mind, should also be replied to. He spoke of the single society for South Africa, referred to crisis situations and said that a solution should be found through the formation of some sort of national Government and that we should close the ranks to meet a common threat. This is typical of the sort of argument used by people who do not know the circumstances of a multi-ethnic society such as that in Southern Africa. It is typical of the sort of argument used by supporters of the Civil Rights Organization in the United States who have no concept of the situation in Southern Africa. Speaking of that, I can only say that it is perfectly obvious that the hon. members of the PFP are acting, wittingly or unwittingly, as spokesmen and agents for the State Department, or the Carter Administration of the United States, in their campaign in destroying the present order in Southern Africa.

I should like to quote from an extremely interesting article written by Sir Julian Amery, a former Conservative Party Cabinet Minister in the United Kingdom Government. Sir Julian wrote—

Then Sir Julian Amery adds—

The PFP, as witting or unwitting agents of the Carter Administration, are in fact leading the South African political situation to the precipice of confrontation. They speak of a unity of purpose in Southern Africa. They are leading the situation in South Africa to a direct confrontation. They know very well that nowhere else in Africa in a multi-ethnic society as in South Africa, has it been possible to form a single Government that has been able to maintain a democratic system.

In fact, in a recent article in The Cape Times, by two well-known liberals, Anthony De Crespigny and Peter Collins … [Interjections.] They are liberals with a small “1”, not with a capital “L”. The writers said specifically that liberalism cannot necessarily be brought about by the extension of the franchise and that liberalism does not mean the extension of the vote under the system of “one man, one vote”. Do the PFP believe that the solution to the problem of Southern Africa lies in a single political structure which will be a federal or a unitary structure? I do not believe that the PFP believe in true federalism because they only say so in general terms. They believe, as the hon. member for Houghton has said, in “one man, one vote”. They believe, as the hon. the Leader of the Opposition quoted Dr. Motlana as saying, not in Black majority Government, but in majority Government, a majority Government that can be nothing else but Black. However, the United States does not believe in majority Government. The United States is not interested in the PFP, in the hon. member for Houghton or in the hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

I thought we were their agents. Make up your mind.

The United States is only interested in destroying the present order in South Africa, in destroying White authority on the continent of Africa.

The USA has indicated and has proved conclusively that they are quite happy to accept military dictatorship and one-party States in the rest of Africa. They curry favour with Nigeria because their conscience and morality are oiled by Nigeria. With the PFP being the mouthpiece in this House of the State Department, it is also obvious that they are quite willing to let themselves be used and misused by the State Department to destroy the present order on the South African subcontinent. For that reason one can only warn the public at large that the PFP, as a political organization in South Africa, should be destroyed as soon as possible. I wish the NRP luck in getting back at least some of the supporters of the PFP to support them.

That is why you support them whenever you can.

I do not support the NRP, but as opponents of the Government they have at least a fundamental appreciation of the plurality of the South African situation.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Klip River wants to know why the PFP proposes a more complicated, sophisticated constitution for South Africa than is to be found elsewhere in Africa at the moment. I am amazed that an hon. member of this House should put such a question. We think it is possible to create a more developed form of Government in South Africa because we believe that South Africa is a more developed country. We are not as pessimistic about South Africa’s chances as he is. He seems to believe that because, according to him, we are a typical African country, South Africa should be ruled by a form of tribal domination, as long as it is his tribe that is dominating. We believe that we can do better than that.

There are so many things arising out of this debate which one would have wanted to discuss, but time does not permit of much.

I just want to refer to the general pattern of the budget as it was discussed in the Second Reading as well. I just want to refer to what we in these benches said about the effect of the budget on the financial situation of our more well-to-do and less well-to-do people in South Africa. We pointed out in the Second Reading debate that in fact, this budget affords relief to the rich and imposes heavier burdens on the poor. This remains indisputably true. The hon. member for East London North also referred to this in this debate. He made something of an attack on the hon. member for Yeoville for having said these things and made a clumsy effort to cause a rift between the hon. member and myself. The hon. member will excuse me if I do not quote my entire Second Reading speech to him from Hansard, because he can go and read it himself. If he does so he will find that I said that a person would have to earn more or less R10 000 per annum before this budget would afford him any relief. Moreover, this has been proved since then by a number of impartial authorities in the country.

I should now like to refer to the major constitutional issue which, has dominated the debate, and quite rightly so. I want to say that there is one truth which we in South Africa simply cannot evade and that is that the economic and political interests of people are so intimately bound up in our society, as is the case in other societies, that they simply cannot be dealt with separately. Political apartheid together with economic integration simply will not work. The reason is simple. The reason a man wants to use its political rights is specifically to look after his economic position. That is the point of the franchise; that is the point of political rights. It is true that in the history of the Whites in South Africa, considerations other than merely economical ones have often counted for a great deal, but even here this was often decisive. This has always been the case in the majority of elections throughout the world.

I want to assure the hon. member that as far as the urban economically integrated Black man in South Africa is concerned, the vast majority of his interests and aims are of an economic nature. If one asks him what he wants, he wants wages, he wants housing, and education for his children. Political rights are important to him, for the most part only because he wants to use them for that purpose, because he wants to use them to redress his economic grievances.

In the earlier years in this House, in the era of the late Dr. Verwoerd, this fact was at least recognized on the Government side, even though in a topsy-turvy fashion. Dr. Verwoerd himself and the other leaders around him stressed the temporary status of the urban Black man. Even at that time it was difficult for some of us to recognize that status. To the Government of the time, however, it was a political necessity to insist that this was the case, because neither Dr. Verwoerd nor any other politician could ever manage to convince a reasonable voter that it was equitable permanently to deny a person political rights at his permanent place of residence where his real, viz. his economic interests, lay. Since then, however, a change has occurred in the NP’s approach to these matters. Instead of the stringent, theoretical and scrupulous attachment of the Verwoerd regime to separation for the sake of separation, we now get the new policy in accordance with which there will be separation where it is practical, and shared facilities where circumstances demand. The most widespread and by far the most important case where it has been found that separation is impracticable is of course our economic life, with implications for our entire society. Black and White work in the same industries, live in the same area, are served by the same administration from the same flow of revenue and obey the same laws. Hon. members on the Government side will probably refer as they often have done in the past, to the contract migrant labourers who come and work in our mines and to the so-called “gastarbeiter” of Europe. However, those people are simply not comparable with our permanent urbanized Black population. A contract labourer is a person who undertakes to come and work on specific conditions for a specific period in a specific capacity. He knows in advance what his conditions are going to be, and in most cases his family does not accompany him. At the end of his period of contract, he returns home. His basic interests are there, not where he works. The circumstances of the urbanized Black man are, however, entirely different. What hon. members must understand is that our understanding of the structure of our economy has changed drastically since the days when the policy of apartheid was accepted by that party, and when they still spoke in terms of the Black people who would return to their areas.

As I have already pointed out earlier this session, the inter-church congress of the three Dutch Reformed Churches pointed out as far back as 1949 that the idea of apartheid was acceptable and could afford a solution to the race issue only on the basis of total separation, and that applied to the economic sphere as well. Against that background it is generally accepted today that the urban Black man must be regarded as permanently established. Some of them have been living in the cities for as much as three generations. They are totally subject to the authority of this Parliament and this Government. Their wages, their accommodation, the education of their children, are entirely dependent upon the wishes of this House of Assembly. Nevertheless there is not a single Black face present here, not a single member for whom a single Black man has voted. On the other hand, any stranger can come to South Africa as an immigrant from abroad and after five years he can obtain full citizenship rights and also become a member of Parliament, as my good friend and colleague Mr. Gordon Waddell did, fairly recently. There is only one reason for this difference in approach. Skin colour, and nothing else. This is the most flagrant example possible of pure racial discrimination. It is indefensible, and hon. members opposite know that it is indefensible. It makes a bitter farce of the Government’s claim that it wants to move away from discrimination. In this regard I am going to refer once again to the statement which the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs made the other day—which clearly enjoyed general support on the other side of the House—when he said that we may not deny ourselves the right to govern ourselves. At first sight this looks quite fair and just. However, may an urban Black man not demand the same right? What happens if he says that he cannot abjure the right to govern himself either? May he, then, not demand the right to govern himself? How are hon. members of the NP going to achieve both of these things at the same time?

The statement that a colour, a language, a religious or a population group has the right to govern itself without sharing power with any other group can only apply when it can succeed in totally separating its real interests from the interests of the other group or groups concerned, otherwise it is meaningless. This is of course what the Hindus and the Moslems tried to do in India. They campaigned for geographical separation. This made the whole enterprise more or less practicable. However, we are not doing this. The White man and the Black man in South Africa are and remain totally dependent upon each other, and their mutual dependence is growing steadily, as has been the case throughout the past 30 years.

Now I am quite sure that I shall immediately have hon. members on the Government side saying that they are in fact making provision for political rights for the Black people, but of course only in their own territories. Then I must say, with all respect, that we are getting tired of this pathetic fig leaf with which the NP attempts to cover its political nakedness. [Interjections.] Let us assess this on the basis of one simple question. Whose laws are these that the urban Black man must obey? If the Government of Bophuthatswana, for example, makes a law providing that its subjects no longer need carry passes, can the so-called citizens of Bophuthatswana throw away their passes if they are living in Soweto? [Interjections.] Can they throw away their passes? [Interjections.] Hon. members opposite maintain that the NP gives political rights to a citizen of Bophuthatswana living in Soweto, by saying that he can cast his vote for his Government in Bophuthatswana. Can that Government for whom he can vote …

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

No, I do not have time to reply to questions now. Can that Government give him the right to throw away his pass? Can that Government give him the right to join a trade union? Can that Government give him the right to send his children to the school of his choice? [Interjections.] Of course not. Under the policy of the NP that urban Black man remains the total subject of this Government. [Interjections.]

Can you vote for the Government in England? [Interjections.]

The so-called citizenship which the urban Black man of the homelands enjoys—the homelands in which they do not live—is worth very little to them in the cultural sphere, and nothing at all in the economic sphere. Someone made an interjection about England. There are hon. members in this House who were born in England, or in any event, such hon. members have sat in this House. The franchise of the Black man in Soweto, a franchise which he has to exercise in Bophuthatswana, is worth far less to him than the franchise in England is worth to a South African citizen born in that country. [Interjections.] That, quite simply, is what this amounts to. If one looks at it carefully, one will see that a Government is a spatial entity. The law can only be valid within specific geographic borders. Beyond those geographic borders that same law is invalid. If one wishes to have political apartheid one has to bring about a territorial separation. If not, then the choice is not between common freedoms or separate freedoms, as hon. members of the NP would have it, but in fact between sharing of power and “baasskap”. What we have at the moment is “baasskap”. The only road that will lead us away from baasskap is the road of power sharing.

Now I want to come back to the statements by the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs. He said that the Government will not give up the right to govern himself. What does this mean in practice? What do the Whites—viz. the majority of the White people—in fact wish to achieve in practice by retaining the right to govern themselves? For what purpose is this right used in practice today? It is used, inter alia, specifically to maintain the privileged economic position of the White man as against that of the Black man. As my hon. friend the member for Bryanston put it so effectively the other day, if a Black South African in Soweto feels that he wants to go and live elsewhere, the White authority simply decides that he may not. If he wants to do other things, it depends on the White authority whether he may do so or not.

I note that it often happens in this House that an hon. member on the Government side really feels aggrieved at any suggestion that the White Government would deal with the Black people with anything but the greatest consideration. For the purposes of my present argument it simply is not necessary for me to dispute that. For the sake of argument I shall assume that the White Government would want to deal with its Black subjects just as considerately as it treats its own people. However, it remains a fact—hon. members know this full well—that adult people in the modern world do not simply want other people to take decisions on their behalf. They want to decide for themselves. They themselves want to participate in the decision on their future. The argument that the White Government will act however nobly in regard to its Black subjects, even if it were more convincing, is simply not worth the trouble discussing.

When the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs states so eloquently that the White man is going to regulate his own affairs, he means in effect that the Whites are at the same time going to determine the fate of all the Black Africans and, with a few exceptions, that of the Coloureds and the Asians as well. Whether hon. members want to hear it or not, they must know that from the point of view of the Blacks and the Coloureds, this is nothing but colonialism. What makes it worse is that it is colonialism based purely on skin colour.

Talking of skin colour, in the course of this debate some hon. member on the Government side asked my hon. friend, the member for Pinelands, whether he was proud to be White. I believe that my hon. friend is quite capable of looking after himself, but because it suits my argument I want to deal briefly with that question. I do not think it is right to be ashamed of one’s skin colour. However, I do not think it is right to be proud of it either, any more than one should be proud or ashamed of being 5 foot or 6 foot tall or of having blue or brown eyes. These chance physical characteristics are really unimportant. What is important is that every White man in South Africa should realize that he is born into a privileged position and what he can be proud of ashamed of is how he has acted towards those who are lesser privileged. On the last day, that is the question that will count; not with what characteristics one was born, but how one has employed them. That is what I am prepared to be proud or ashamed of, and not a chance factor such as the colour of my eyes or my skin.

I have no fault to find with that; I just do not know how you get past that.

Mr. Speaker, we do have specially difficult problems as has been pointed out on both sides. Do as we may, the majority of our people are Black and the majority of our people, if we take the country piece by piece, will be Black within everyone of those pieces. Certain matters can be dealt with on a community basis, but essentially, Government, central or provincial, has to decide and has to determine what the services are that every section of the population receives. As my hon. friend, the member for Houghton, said earlier today, the choice is whether you are going to govern by consent or without consent. As she also said quite rightly, if you govern without consent, then ultimately you govern by the gun.

Consent of whom?

Consent of the governed. The hon. gentleman over there is a learned lawyer and I am sure he knows the American Constitution a lot better than I do. Governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed and the majority of the governed in this country are not asked for their consent.

I just wanted to get clarity on whose consent you referred to.

It should be clear to the hon. member now. Therefore there has to be a negotiation. There is no point going to a negotiation if one has taken up a totally inflexible position. One should go to a negotiation with some ideas in one’s head. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition has set forth during his debate a model which is a usable model, a respectable model which any constitutional scientist will recognize as making use of a number of the best tried devices in the world for bringing together the people of a diverse society into one political entity.

Of course it is difficult, but what are we discussing? We are discussing the alternative to eternal baasskap. It is very difficult to find an alternative to the domination of one tribe which the hon. member for Klip River prefers, but we have to find it and we have to try it. We have to have enough faith to believe that it is worthwhile. I think it was the hon. the Minister of Social Welfare and Pensions who articulated the fear that there was not any or not enough security for the particular White minority with which he is concerned in the plan put forward by the Leader of the Opposition. He based this on the fact that there would always be a majority of Black voters. There is a majority of Black people. If you are afraid of a majority of Black people, then whether you give them the vote or not, you had better start being afraid and you had better start worrying about your security. But whether there is domination, in the malicious sense of that word, by one section or another within a diverse society like ours does not depend on whether there is a majority or not, otherwise every minority in the world would have lost its position by now. What it depends on is what constitutional restraints there are under which majority power can be exercised, majority constraints such as the bill of rights, such as an independent judiciary, such as the form of the legislature, the form of the executive and the composition of the executive which must be sufficiently representative.

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

No, my time is almost up. It depends on whether the executive is so composed that it is likely to be evenhanded in the way it governs and on the nature of the society in which this executive exists? I am not contending that the constitution put forward by the Leader of the Opposition is perfect; neither is he. I am not contending that it will come out of the ultimate national convention in exactly the form in which he puts it forward; neither is he. But it is a constructive plan for a form of government of this country that is not “baasskap”. Somebody else must put forward a better one before I am tempted to support anything else.

*In the minute still at my disposal I want to comment on one or two statements by the hon. member for Durbanville. He referred most indignantly to certain words of Mr. Sonny Leon. Mr. Sonny Leon is supposed to have said: “If they force it down our throats, we will vomit it up.” The hon. member seems to think that that is a statement to be condemned.

†Mr. Speaker, what sort of statement is that from a man? It is the statement of a man who feels that he is constantly being forced to do things which he does not wish to do, which are no part of his own desire in his own country. He does not say: “I will kill you;” he does not say: “I will blow you up”; he does not say: “I will shoot you with a gun”—he says: “If you make me sick, I will vomit.” I hear those words with a sense of deep concern, not with a sense of anger against Mr. Sonny Leon. Mr. Sonny Leon is as South African as anybody in this House. He is a South African who has fought for his country. He is a Coloured man who has endured the obloquy of his own people who call him an Uncle Tom because he makes use of the institutions which this Government provides for him.

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

I am not going to talk to the hon. gentleman. When that man says: “If you keep on ramming things down my throat, I am going to vomit.” I think it is about time that the Government started thinking.

There is another point I would like to have raised, but my time has unfortunately expired. [Time expired.]

Mr. Speaker, I must apologize for my weak voice, but I trust that hon. members will be able to hear me.

We have had an interesting debate during the past few days. I think that a number of excellent contributions were made. I am the 35th speaker in this debate. I want to express my thanks and appreciation to all hon. members who saw fit to praise me for the budget. The circumstances under which we had to prepare this budget were certainly in no way easy, and therefore we appreciate such kind words all the more and find them all the more encouraging. More than any other document, a budget contains and reflects the essence, the crux of a Government’s financial policy. It is therefore fit and proper that when a budget is under discussion in Parliament, it should be debated in detail and comprehensively. I make so bold as to say that this budget has emerged from the debate unscathed and unimpaired. In addition, I think it is necessary for a budget to be seen in its correct perspective, i.e. against the background of the world in which we live and work. This is particularly the case in a country such as South Africa, with its important economic and financial relations with the outside world.

What picture does the world economy present today? I think one can say that the prospects are anything but bright. One need only refer to the latest reports of authoritative bodies such as the IMF and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development—the so-called OECD—to support this statement. There are certain signs of a revival in countries such as America and West Germany, but these are really not convincing. In general there are a number of impediments —as the hon. member for De Aar said so effectively in the debate—to the world economy, and we have to bear these in mind.

I feel that a number of enlightening, balanced and realistic speeches were made on this side of the House which testified to a realistic approach to the state of our economy and the financial and economic policy of the authorities. In this way, for example, the hon. member for Sunnyside summarized the essence of the budget very well in a few words. The hon. member for Newcastle referred, with justification I thought, to certain ill-conceived generalizations on the Opposition side, and referred in particular to the hon. member for Yeoville. The hon. member for Malmesbury emphasized the necessity for us to display the necessary confidence under the present circumstances. The hon. member for Piketberg, in turn, emphasized the necessity for increased productivity. He said that honest labour was a prerequisite for a sound economy. I think this is an absolutely basic requirement. I have already referred to the hon. member for De Aar. I must say that I think he furnished a very fine elucidation of the assets and liabilities of our economy, of the overall balance sheet, and of the advantages and impediments which exist, impediments such as inflation, unemployment, etc.

Then, too, I want to thank the hon. member for Namaqualand for his contribution. I think he replied very well to the statement made by the hon. member for Yeoville that he was not satisfied with the degree of stimulation of the economy. In particular, too, the hon. member for Namaqualand referred to Walvis Bay. He brought the economic and other problems of Walvis Bay very clearly and sympathetically to our attention. I am grateful for that. I must say that I am in complete agreement with him that Walvis Bay is at present having to contend with unique problems, problems that are being aggrevated by setbacks in the fishing industry. Several months ago I received representations from the town clerk and other interested persons for assistance to that area in an attempt to help overcome their adjustment problems. It would not be desirable to be overhasty in taking a decision on this matter. The many complicating factors must first be thoroughly investigated. Consequently I sent two officials of the Department of Finance to Walvis Bay a few weeks ago for the special purpose of obtaining on-the-spot information on the area’s problems and reporting back to me. A long and useful report has been received, and it is my intention to arrange, as soon as possible during the recess, a meeting of all interested parties so that the State’s assistance to that area can be identified and quantified.

There were other speeches as well to which I can really refer with pleasure. I think the hon. member for Mossel Bay again displayed a very practical approach when he said that change and progress in South Africa should take place gradually. The hon. member for Von Brandis displayed an excellent fighting spirit here, something which in my opinion is necessary when one is dealing with an Opposition such as the one we have here. I can continue in this vein, but lack of time compelis me to apologize to those hon. members to whom I did not refer specifically. However, I can assure them that I listened to them very attentively.

I want to come at once to the speech I made in Brussels.

†It is very kind of the Opposition to give so much attention to what I said, even to the extent of drawing the hon. the Prime Minister into this remarkable contribution. I should like to say that the reports I have seen of my speech are correct and that the actual representation which the hon. member for Yeoville gave of it was not correct. I did not say that luxury hotels and sports centres are “all” open to all races. Why did he put the word “all” in there?

I quoted your exact words.

Why did he put the word “all” in when it was not in my speech?

I quoted your exact words as reported by the Department of Information, but I knew you would run away from it.

I want to challenge the hon. member for Yeoville to tell me where he got that from? It is not in my speech and it is not in a single report I have seen of it. I simply want to know why that hon. member said that I said all luxury hotels and all sports centres and all parks are open. I did not say so.

Look at Hansard. I quoted exactly from your speech. I knew you would run away. [Interjections.]

Well, I wrote it down.

Order!

If I wrote it down wrongly, I am at fault. However, I wrote it down, and in my notes here I have the word “all”.

I quoted your exact speech. [Interjections.]

All right! [Interjections.] On that point I will now read from an exact copy of the speech I made in Brussels. I have it in my hand. I said—

That is what I said.

What I wrote down of what the hon. member said was that these had all been opened to all races.

I will get the exact Hansard.

As long as we know what I said!

As long as you know what you said!

I have it here.

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order! Is the hon. member for Yeoville allowed to refer to the hon. the Minister as “you”?

Order! The hon. the Minister may proceed.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I then referred to the developments in the Black townships.

I referred to the move towards autonomous local councils. I referred to the move to enable property rights to be granted to the Blacks in these townships and to the fact that the building societies could then grant mortgage loans on the basis of such title. I then went on to say that record amounts were being spent on housing, on education and on social and health services for the Coloureds, Indians and Blacks. I took education as an example, pointing out that there was already compulsory school education for the Coloureds and the Indians and that the number of Blacks in secondary schools had increased fourfold over the last six years while the number attending universities and teacher training colleges had more than doubled in the same period. I also said that a comparison of these heads of expenditure with the rest of Africa would be revealing indeed. I referred to labour legislation and to how we were making very comprehensive inquiries into the whole position through authoritative commissions of inquiry. I also told them what we were trying to do to improve the constitutional dispensation for the Coloureds and the Indians. In this regard I said—

I shall be returning to that. I then added the following words—

In regard to the question of merit, I would like to say that I have never subscribed to an integrated society in South Africa, and I have often stated my views on that. I do not see the sense or the practicability of talking in terms of a multiracial society whatsoever, but rather of a multinational society and of the policy of separate development. It is interesting to note that, on this point of merit…

[Inaudible.]

The hon. member opposite must just hold on. I am dealing with merit. I want to indicate to those hon. members what our system of merit means. Under the earlier régime, before the present Government came forward with its policy of separate development, one could have had among the non-Whites a person rising to the rank of sergeant in the Police Force, but there were no commissioned ranks at all. Today they can rise to the rank of officer on merit. That was achieved under our separate development policy. Under the régime of these people sitting opposite me and who talk so easily of merit, a man with the qualifications of Dr. Van der Ross, now principal of a fully-fledged university, could not obtain an appointment at the University of Cape Town. That is what I call merit being acknowledged. Let us take sportsmen. Coloureds, Indians and Blacks can now compete internationally, which they could never have done prior to this Government’s policy being implemented. They can now do so. It is not a policy of integration; it is a policy of separate development, according to which the separate identities of the several national groups are being recognized. These are the things that I am talking about when I refer to merit being recognized by the Government.

You did not say it.

Of course I did. What else could I have said? [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, can I ask the hon. the Minister a question? [Interjections.]

No. I can recall four occasions when hon. members on this side of the House politely got up to ask questions of the Opposition and they were turned down, sometimes very cursorily. [Interjections.] What the PFP want is a mixing of the races like chocolates in a box. That is what they want.

You are running away.

I am running away from nothing.

Of course you are.

I am running away from nothing. I shall be coming to the hon. Leader of the Opposition in a moment. We do not want a system of merit where one scrambles the egg. That is not our idea of a system of merit. That is of course what their policy of unbridled racial integration and multiracialism means. That is what I am talking about. I can talk at great length on the question of merit which our policy recognizes every day.

Your credibility must be in tatters overseas.

That is an interesting remark. I would have thought that the very last man to talk of credibility in this House is the hon. member for Bryanston. [Interjections.]

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

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Yeoville can just remain seated. I shall be dealing with him just now. [Interjections.] The hon. member for Yeoville made the most remarkable series of statements in this debate. He said what we needed was an ideological base. The Government has been attacked ever since I came to Parliament as being a Government that deals in ideologies, but now the hon. for Yeoville suddenly comes in this debate and says that we need an ideological base in South Africa.

To fight communism. [Interjections.]

Order! The hon. member for Yeoville must not make so many interjections.

What is this base to be? Astoundingly, it is to be social democracy. The ideological base of this country has to be socialism.

I never said that. Do you see how you can twist words?

Order! The hon. member for Yeoville has made his speech and he has already made more than a dozen interjections. I cannot allow a stream of uncontrolled interjections.

Mr. Speaker, can I address you on a point of order? Is it permissible for the hon. the Minister to take a word which was not used and turn it around to create a false impression?

Order! That is not a point of order. The hon. the Minister may proceed.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Yeoville must keep calm. I have taken a lot of time to study his speech. It so happens that I had the opportunity over many years to study social democracy. I can mention some of the people under whom I have studied here in South Africa and in Britain. Social democracy is an unmitigated form of socialism, and I shall prove it to the hon. member for Yeoville at any time on a public platform.

I accept that challenge.

What is the hon. member for Yeoville envisaging? What is happening in western Europe today? What is happening in Britain today under the Labour Party Government? Social democracy! What is happening in Italy today? What is the tremendous fear in France about the communists encroaching more and more on the Government of that country? It is because of the system of social democracy. Why did the hon. member say “social democracy” and not “capitalist democracy”? The hon. member has put both his feet into it in this debate and he is not going to get away with it in a hurry. He said a very, very odd thing. What happens in these countries which practise variations of social democracy? In the first place incentive is killed. Secondly, one gets trade unions running rampant. You see, Sir, the hon. member missed the boat completely. In this country he will never get the trade unions on his side. The trade unions in South Africa are responsible bodies, and I want to pay them a tribute for that today. They are responsible and they stand behind this country’s best interests. The hon. member for Yeoville has completely misjudged the issue when he talks about social democracy for a country like South Africa.

What did the hon. member say further? He wants higher living standards and full employment. I presume the hon. member also wants industrial peace and harmony and that he also wants an effective bulwark against communism and Marxism. The hon. member did indeed say that this system must be used to counter communism and Marxism. I say that if one looks at the countries throughout the world that practise whatever variation of social democracy, one gets exactly the opposite tendencies setting in. I think this is a very serious matter.

Furthermore, the hon. member talked about a five-year plan. What is more a feature, a hallmark, of socialism and communism over how many years than five-year plans? [Interjections.] Every single one has a five-year plan. He says that we must have a five-year plan and not for instance, a three-year plan. What to me is so interesting about the hon. member’s speech is that now his blatant misstatement of the Government’s policy falls into place. The hon. member for Parktown realizes the seriousness of it. Today he made, right out of context—he must have a very guilty conscience—a defensive reference to the attack on us that we allegedly want to tax the poor. Now it falls into place. What is the hon. member aiming at now? He is aiming at a redistribution of wealth. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition said so last year. He will remember that the hon. the Prime Minister took him up in no uncertain terms. The hon. the Prime Minister took him up on it more than once and challenged him on that question of the redistribution of wealth. It is a pity that this issue has been raised right at the end of the budget debate, because this thing should be thrashed out in public to the maximum degree. I believe that party has once and for all shown everybody their true colours. If one has a redistribution of wealth, one is going to tax the people who need the incentive in order to give the money to the poor. But apparently we are the people who are now taxing the poor.

I just cannot help adding that the hon. the Leader of the Opposition has made one really remarkable statement. Incidentally, I thought I ought to refer to his constitutional proposals as he set them out, but the hon. the Minister of Social Welfare and Pensions so completely dealt with it that I do not have to do it too. I thank him for it. He did it better than I could have done it anyhow.

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

No. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition said that the budget would reduce living standards. He just made that statement, without offering proof. I think that is the most remarkable thing which has been said in this whole budget debate. Everybody agrees, and all the comment I have seen points to it, that if there is one thing the budget aims to do, it is to uplift and improve living standards. Yet, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition said it would lower living standards and furnished no evidence to substantiate his statement.

What the hon. member for Yeoville is really after is a super Welfare State. He has said there must be equal pay for equal work throughout the Public Service, a solution to the housing problem for all races, equal educational facilities for all race groups, and equal pensions for all the people of South Africa. It is a very easy matter to sing out these noble phrases, but I want him to tell us how and in what time-span he is going to do it.

I did.

No, he did not. I have a copy of his speech. If he had said it, I would have commended him.

[Inaudible.]

I have read it. Over what period and how precisely is this going to be done and who is going to pay the vast amounts involved, as it will run into thousands of millions of rand? He must tell us. Is this to be done in one year? The hon. member for Bryanston said, if I heard him correctly, that we have to spend R500 million on housing now. Is that correct?

[Inaudible.]

I wrote it down. I do not think the hon. member remembers. [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, may I help the hon. the Minister? Mr. De Beer, the Under-Secretary of the Department of Plural Relations said that R510 million was required to meet the backlog of Black housing, a backlog which at the moment amounts to 170 000 houses.

I understood the hon. member to say that that amount should be spent immediately. I want to ask again how that is to be done, because, as all hon. members know, we have to meet a defence bill of record proportions, of which every right-thinking South African approves. There is complete consensus on that. I have never yet received any representations to the contrary. As a great trading nation we have to do it under very difficult world economic conditions. These things are simply thrown in and we are told that we have to spend R500 million, that we must spend thousands of millions of rands on these things. The hon. members opposite must tell us over what period and how it must be spent, who is to be taxed and who is not to be taxed as well as the form of the taxes, and then we can debate these things. Then we can see who is responsible and who is not responsible in matters of public finance. The hon. member for Yeoville talks about taxing the poor. I would like to know what would happen to this country if we forthwith engaged in all the matters which that hon. member has thrown into the debate.

The hon. member for Musgrave talks about a crisis of confidence and also about the need for a “plan for survival”. Two or three other hon. members on that side of the House also used the same phrases. There is no crisis of confidence in this country. There is only a crisis of confidence in the minds of our friends opposite. This country has pulled itself up by its own exertions and by its own policies under this Government from a condition which could have been catastrophic because of world conditions, and today it has one of the most stable and soundest economies in the world. If hon. members doubt this, I ask them to read the report of the IMF mission which came to this country earlier this year. That report is on record and was referred to in “Business Times” of the Sunday Times a few weeks ago in what was a most responsible piece of reporting. It is worth reading where they say that what is important is a country’s credit rating, and they say that South Africa’s credit rating is good. They say many other things. They say the way in which we pulled our balance of payments round from a huge deficit to a current account surplus of R750 million was a remarkable achievement. How many countries in the world have managed that? These are the things we have to look at if we want to have a responsible debate. We are told there is a crisis of confidence in the country and that we have to have a plan for survival. For whose survival? I think the only people who are in danger of extinction are the members of the PFP. I think they are going to be eliminated. I think the broad public of South Africa must by now be wondering what on earth they did to allow this group to become the Official Opposition. However, we can leave that to the future.

We have also been criticized on the stimulatory measures which we have taken to bring about the necessary recovery in the economy. It is said that these measures are quite inadequate. I think it is common knowledge that our conservative fiscal and monetary policies, I am glad to say, have been very successful in improving the balance of payments position. These, naturally, contributed to a slowing down of economic activity. We realized that and we said so in advance. It has been accepted by the whole electorate as part and parcel of the policy of financial discipline. Once this policy was established and was well under way, we began to shift the emphasis towards encouraging sound economic growth. I first announced this shift in emphasis in August last year. That is nearly a year ago. I took the matter, I think, a considerable step further in November, when major steps to stimulate the economy, in particular of the building industry, were announced by the Government. Then, in this year’s budget, I added substantial further momentum to this shift of emphasis. I called it a move from phase I to phase II of our policy. I emphasized the need not to over-kill, not to be too deflationary, because in that way the balance of payments problem would not be helped and inflation would not really be countered. I have a whole list of the things that we have done, and these add up to hundreds of millions of rands in a period of seven months. I therefore want to suggest that when the hon. member for Yeoville says that we need to stimulate the economy, it is not a new discovery. In fact, it is rather old hat! I said we would shift the emphasis and we have shifted the emphasis. The facts speak for themselves.

I believe that phase II of our policy is going to be just as successful as phase I was. However, I have said repeatedly that I do not want to stimulate the economy through a large increase in Government spending because of the dangers, apart from anything else, of inflation. We would prefer to stimulate the private sector as much as possible. We are aiming to do this in a number of ways. For example, the budget provides for an increase in the total deficit, excluding borrowing—as we call it—of just over 10%, to R2 100 million. This represents a significant increase in income created directly by the Government’s fiscal operation. I believe I can say that every economist knows that. This increase will result from several changes in State expenditure and revenue. I would just like to list some of them. There has been an increase in salaries and wages—moderate, but it is there. The increase in pensions is one of the biggest increases we have ever given. There has also been the reduction in taxation, in the surcharge on companies, the abolition of the 10% income tax surcharge on individuals, the increase in expenditure on export promotion, which was more than doubled, the increase in expenditure on housing, which is now at record levels, the increase in expenditure of the Public Works Department, R100 million is to be spent on the development of Sasol 2, etc. There was also a reduction in the import surcharge of something like R65 million, a considerable reduction in sales duties, and now the early repayment, next month, of the loan levy, running into something like R200 million together with interest. I suggest that these are very substantial amounts.

Secondly, the budget should certainly contribute to an increase in the broad money supply. I think that has become very necessary, because where the increase in the broad money supply was at a very high rate, of over 20%, three and four years ago, last year it was down to 7%. So far this year it has declined even a little further. I think the time has come not to allow the contraction in credit to go too far. That is why the Reserve Bank announced a relaxation of the credit ceilings a few days ago. That in itself could make a few million rand available to the private sector. Therefore I think we can say that all in all we have been watching the state of the economy very carefully, the need to stimulate, but not to stimulate in such a way that the private sector will be bled white, but rather to put the money and the stimulation into the private sector where this is a private enterprise economy.

I am glad to say that the last loan issue in May, i.e. Government securities, attracted about R340 million in new funds. That is in addition to the conversion of the old loans. I would like to add that the demand for Government securities has been so strong that we have been borrowing at steadily declining interest rates. I think the success of this financing programme has increased our scope for encouraging economic growth, again in the private sector. I hope to come back very briefly to that point in a moment.

*Already there are clear signs of a new revival in the economy. It is a gradual revival, but the indications are nevertheless very clear. The downward cyclical phase came to an end during the fourth quarter of 1977. We have now passed the lowest turning point and, as I read the signs, it is already in a new upward phase. For the present it is moving slowly, and that is understandable, but the important fact is that the new upswing is in fact in progress. Firstly, the volume of factory production which dropped remarkably during the recession phase, rose by 0,3% during the fourth quarter of 1977 and by a further 2,4% during the first quarter of this year. Along with this the capacity utilization in manufacturing began to increase again during the first quarter of this year. Secondly, real wholesale sales which continued to show a downward trend during 1977, showed a moderate upward movement during the first quarter of 1978. Thirdly, the total motor vehicle sales during the fourth quarter of 1977 increased by 1,8% and by 12% during the first quarter of 1978. During the first four months of this year, these sales were almost 15% higher than during the corresponding four months of last year. Fourthly, the seasonally adjusted figure for registered unemployment among Whites, Coloureds and Asiatics dropped from more than 34 000 in December 1977 to approximately 30 000 in April of this year.

In the meantime I am delighted to be able to say that the balance of payments position remains sound. Final figures are not yet available, but it is clear that during the first quarter of 1978 there was once again a large surplus on the current account, a surplus of more than R1 000 million at a seasonally adjusted annual rate. In addition there was once again a major surplus on the basic balance, i.e. on the current account plus long-term capital movements. It is true that the net outflow of capital has in general continued. This is in part still attributable to the repayment of loans and other credits abroad, by the public as well as the private sectors. However, I am delighted to be able to say that the net gold and other foreign reserves continue to rise. This is a very important factor. In the fourth quarter of last year as well as during the first month of this year— the latest figures—there was a steady increase in the net reserves. We hope that this will continue.

As far as the inflation rate is concerned, I can only say that it is still too high. But at least it is still less than 10%. Both the wholesale as well as the consumer price indices are less than 10% on an annual rate basis. One is very grateful for that.

†Mr. Speaker, in season and out I have myself defended gold. I have often asked what the latest United States onslaught on gold really means. What does the decision by the United States Treasury to sell 300 000 ounces of gold every month for six months really mean? The reason they give is that this is an attempt to improve their very serious trade deficit running at more than $25 billion a year. However, the sales of this gold, at the best, cannot earn them more than $600 million, which means $600 million against $25 billion to $30 billion. Therefore, I do not believe that this can be taken as a very good reason for this step. There must be some other reason for it. However, I have no doubt myself that the market will absorb these sales just as the market has absorbed the IMF auctions.

I would like to go further, because this is such an important item in our economy. I should like to say that the decision of the United States to engage in these monthly gold sales from the American gold stock will almost inevitably strengthen the position of gold and weaken the position of the dollar once the market has had some experience of these sales. Once the market has absorbed them—as it is doing—I think this is going to be the effect, because all past experiences from a stockpile is that the initial effect is to reduce the price of the commodity offered, but that the gradual liquidation of the stockpile itself soon begins to strengthen the price again. If the process is completed, the result is usually that the stockpile is gone and that the price is higher than before.

I think this has been the general experience of the United States in disposing of all sorts of stockpiles of scarce commodities. It has certainly also been the experience of the IMF in selling its gold. I think there is no reason to suppose that this experience will not be repeated. In any case, the Americans would not be selling if they did not need the money in some form or other. The fact that they need the money cannot, in my opinion, help to strengthen the dollar. The American policy towards gold is contradictary, and therefore could well be self-defeating. The United States Government wants to maintain the dollar as a stronger form of international money than gold, but it still wants a soft dollar for domestic purposes. To achieve that objective, the objective of eliminating gold from the system—as they say—the United States have taken every step except the one that could have had some effect perhaps. That would have been to strengthen the dollar. I think that gold is, for two reasons, a preferred store of value compared with any other form of currency. The net addition to its quantity is lower than that of competing currencies because an increase in the supply of gold depends on the mining industry and not on the printing press. Gold is the better money in the present and offers the better security for the future. As the editor of the London Times, Mr. Rees Mogg, said not long ago—in my opinion he writes with considerable insight—

I repeat that we have much to be thankful for. I believe that, given the proper confidence and hard work, we can make a great success of our economy, which has infinite promise.

To come now to the hon. member for East London North, I think his speech was—if I may say so—like the curate’s egg. It was good in parts, but not good right through. I shall say why. He was kind enough to recognize the realism of the budget. He rightly, I think, rejected and refuted the hon. member for Yeoville’s very tendentious and opportunist assertion that the Government is out to tax the poor. I think it is manifestly absurd to say that. I do not propose to waste more time on that. However, the hon. member for East London North then said—if I understood him correctly—that we must disinvest out of public corporations. That presumably means that part of the equity must go to the private sector, to private interests. That is how I wrote it down.

Now, this is a laudable thing, but how is it to be done? Before we started Sasol 2 we had lengthy discussions with big private interests. There was no inclination then that they would come in. They sit and wait for the Government to start the big public corporations in the national interest. The history of Iscor shows it. So does the history of Escom. It is the Government that takes the initiative and has to bear the brunt of the financing under what are today extremely difficult conditions. Therefore, while this might be a very nice thing, the hon. member must tell us how it is to be done. Unfortunately, it is merely a theoretical exercise at the moment. Then the hon. member made a very remarkable statement. These are his words—

*Mr. Speaker, let us consider a few official figures for a moment. Let us consider the gross domestic product per capita at prevailing prices. In 1948 it was R161. That was for the population in general. In 1977 it was R1 227. After making an adjustment with a view to inflation, it means that in real terms there was an increase of 82%. This is perhaps the best single way of determining the standard of living. It is not absolutely correct, but it is the best criterion at our disposal. It means therefore that the standard of living of all our people almost doubled during this period. In how many other countries of the world did the same thing happen? The hon. member must please tell us. The hon. member for East London North alleged that everything had deteriorated so badly.

Someone—I think it was the hon. member for Yeoville—said that there should be greater saving. In 1948 saving, as a percentage of the gross domestic product, was 11%. Last year it was almost 27%. This was one of the highest saving rates in the world. What more does one want? In 1948, when the poor old United Party relinquished office, the total amount that had been saved was R236 million. Today it already amounts to R9 000 million. However, the hon. member alleges that we have deteriorated as never before. In 1948 our export trade amounted to R286 million, as against R6 333 million last year. In 1948 the value of our import trade was R713 million, as against R6 893 million last year. The physical volume of our factory production stood at 117,2 in 1977 on a basis of a 100 for 1958.

The average growth over that period amounts to 5% per annum. The physical volume of our mining production, put at 29 for 1950, was 101,4 in 1977. Between 1950 and 1977 there was an average growth of almost 5% per annum.

How does that compare on a per capita basis?

This compares more than favourably with practically every country in the world.

*One must therefore be careful when one makes generalizations here. One must always take the figures into account.

Hon. members alleged that there was great unemployment. The hon. member for East London North even alleged that the unemployment we are experiencing today is worse than ever before. That was one more original statement he made. [Interjections.] But what are the figures? The provision of work, employment is the positive side of the picture. I have to eliminate the agricultural sector because we do not have comparable figures for it. What is the position as far as the other sectors are concerned? In 1958 total employment amounted to just over 2 million. In 1977 it was 4,5 million. In 1948 there were 12 000 registered unemployed Whites, Indians and Coloureds; in 1949, 19 000; in 1959, 27 500; and in 1977, 28 500. Where is the “terrible” unemployment? In 1959 it was 27 500 and last year only 28 500, while there were many more people in our country in 1977 than in 1959. [Interjections.]

Order!

Sir, I am not through with the hon. member for East London North yet, although the hon. member for Griqualand East dealt with him very well. I welcome him to this House as a Natalian. [Interjections.] Let us consider the number of unemployed as a percentage of the comparable labour force. In 1959 it was 2,4 and in 1977, 1,6. After all, one has to compare it with something. In the years of the great depression, during the early ’thirties, employment decreased. Between 1929 and 1933 it decreased from 607 000 to 550 000, a drastic decrease. Today, in the midst of all the unemployment we keep hearing about, the total employment figures increase month after month and year after year. Where is this “terrible” unemployment “which is suddenly worse than ever before”? One can continue in this vein.

The hon. member for East London North is also inclined to say that the Government intervenes in everything and apparently wants to take over the entire economy. It is said that what we are dealing with here is “creeping socialism”. But what are the figures? I cannot quote many figures, for unfortunately I do not have enough time at my disposal. The hon. member is inclined to be extremely critical of the Government and to speak of the large number of people who are apparently employed in the Public Service. I just want to point out that the number of employees in the public sector, expressed as a percentage of the total economically active people in the country, amounted to 12,9 in 1970, while it is now put at 13,5. Over a period of seven years it has only increased from almost 13% to 13,5%. Our hon. friend would do well to take a look at the figures in other countries. If one considers America, one finds that it is more than 16%. I can quote many other figures in this regard.

Actually, I am rather sorry that I do not have more time available to go into other aspects of the criticism which was levelled. However, I can advance the same arguments against that criticism, and refute the accusations and criticism on the basis of official figures, figures which cannot be contradicted.

In the few remaining minutes I should like to refer to an important decision which we have taken in the financial sphere. It deals with prescribed investments by financial institutions. In the light of recent positive developments in the economy, including the excellent support received from financial institutions, I consider it important to make an adjustment, a downward adjustment, in the prescribed investment requirements of financial institutions, that is the insurance companies, pensions funds, banks and building societies. I see these adjustments as an important part of the Government’s declared policy of shifting the emphasis for economic growth as far as possible to the private sector.

Consequently I have decided, with immediate effect, to reduce the prescribed percentages which insurance companies and pension funds have to comply with in respect of investments in public sector stock from 35% to 33% of total liabilities in the case of insurance companies, and from 55% to 53% of total assets in the case of pensions funds. At the same time the percentages for investment in Government stock by these institutions will be reduced from 17½% to 15½% and from 22½% to 20½%, respectively.

Similar adjustments in the prescribed investments for banks and building societies are perhaps not equally important. Nevertheless I have decided to make similar adjustments for these institutions. Perhaps I just could inform this House that I am at this moment making full particulars concerning this matter available in a Press release. All the facts will be available in that document.

I trust that these concessions will be welcomed by the financial institutions concerned in that they allow them greater discretionary powers in their investment policies, and will encourage them to make more funds available to the private sector for productive investment purposes. By lowering the prescribed percentages as I am now proposing, and on the assumption that these institutions will experience the same growth rate next year as during the present year, I estimate that an amount of more than R300 million per annum could now become available in the form of discretionary investment funds which otherwise would have had to be invested in Government stock.

I should like to emphasize that the proposed reduction refer only to investments in Government stock.

Finally I want to inform this House that the Treasury will once again enter the market at the end of this month to offer conversions to the holders of redeemable stock and to invite new investments in both its short-and long-term issues. The rate of interest to be offered on the long-term issue is 10,5%, and 8,625% for the short-term issue. Subscription lists will open on 29 June and close before or on 7 July 1978.

I am firmly of the opinion that at this stage we have done our level best to clear the way for a sustained upswing in the economy. We started with a policy of deliberate stimulation at the end of last year, and followed this up with substantial and consistent measures in the budget Since then our monetary policy has been adjusted to take account of new trends and expectations in the economy. In addition I believe we have now created substantial additional scope for the financial institutions to make an important contribution to financing the upswing.

I think that I am speaking on behalf of the vast majority of the members here in this House and of the general public when I say that this does not testify to a crisis of confidence. I think it testifies instead to great confidence in a very sound economy and that it constitutes a bright future for all our good people.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a Third Time.

Mr. Speaker, when the debate on this Bill was adjourned yesterday I was dealing with the statement by the hon. member for Pinelands to the effect that this Bill is in fact aimed at putting an end to the S.A. Council of Churches obtaining funds overseas for use here to defend so-called political detainees and defendants. It is the hon. member for Pinelands himself who saw the matter in this light. Not one of us on this side of the House referred to this in any way. The hon. member for Pinelands did so himself. I pointed out to him that every detainee and defendant in this country, irrespective of the charges he faces, is entitled to legal representation and can obtain financial legal aid.

That is absolute rubbish.

That is absolutely true and the hon. members surely know it. This very year an amount was voted in this connection under the vote of the Minister of Justice.

Since hon. members are so sensitive about this matter and since the hon. member for Pinelands himself has brought the S.A. Council of Churches into this, I want to refer to the position in this regard. Since 16 June 1976 the S.A. Council of Churches has received more than R4,5 million from outside bodies, R1,5 million of which has been allocated to the organization Asingeni. The hon. member for Pinelands knows what that organization is. Let us just take a look at what the S.A. Council of Churches has done with those funds that were obtained abroad. They have been given to the following bodies: Black Power organizations such as the Black Parents Association and Black Community Programmes—I should like to say something in a moment about Black Community Programmes; various bursaries; victims of the Soweto riots; the Asingeni Relief Fund; the Agency for Industrial Missions; the Legal Trust Fund; the Dependents Conference; and the establishment of the newspaper Voice. Asingeni have spent their funds on the following: Legal expenses; trials of security cases; the burial of Mr. Steve Biko; rehabilitation expenses; and other administrative expenses. I want to ask this responsible House today: If it is necessary for a body to obtain funds abroad amounting to the sum mentioned here, what is the reason? Can they not obtain the funds for this purpose within South Africa? Why are they unable to obtain them within South Africa? We have dealt before with the question whether funds from abroad should come to South Africa for certain purposes. After all, there is an Affected Organizations Act.

It was specifically the vice-president of the S.A. Council of Churches who first made the remark that if these funds were not to reach Asingeni, they would experience difficulties. R1,5 million has already been obtained abroad and another R2 million has been promised, and this money is spent on the defence of people detained or charged for infringements of our security laws.

The hon. member said last night that these people must be able to obtain proper legal representation. Our system of pro deo advocates is now no longer good enough when these people have money. The advocates in South Africa are not good enough to deal with the affairs of these people.

They do not bring in advocates from abroad.

No, there are no advocates from abroad. I am not talking about outside advocates. Let me enlighten the hon. member a little. He is still very young. The hon. member for Mooi River knows about these matters because reports concerning these matters have been made to this House before. There was a young lady called Paula Ensor who obtained funds abroad. She wrote to a good friend—his name is immaterial—and I quote an extract from that letter. Then we can see what the fundraisers themselves think about the advocates used. She says the following—

That is the kind of thing we have to look at.

I now come to the hon. member for Houghton. At one stage she had a friend—I do not know whether she is still her friend, but I take it that that is the case—who is also collecting money. It was for the so-called social welfare programmes. The hon. member knows this lady, Margaret Marshall. She was president of Nusas. She knew her. I quote from the report of the Schlebusch Commission. At one stage Margaret Marshall collected funds for prison education, so-called social welfare schemes handled by Nusas. I quote from page 284 of the Fourth Report of the Schlebusch Commission.

On 16 March 1966 Margaret Marshall, the vice-president of Nusas International Relations wrote via the Netherlands office of ISC to the president of USN Niger, an organization in America. She writes, inter alia, the following—

In the subsequent year, on 20 February 1967—at that stage she was the president of Nusas—she wrote about her proposed visit to America, to a person in an organization called American Metal Climax that on the recommendation of Mrs. Helen Suzman, M.P., she would like to pay a visit to him to submit her project to him. She then made the following remark—

She pleads the cause of a prison education. She states: “This provides education for any prisoner, in particular political prisoners who are serving sentences of longer than one year.”

So what?

Hon. members opposite want funds to enter the country—even such astronomical amounts as those to which I have referred—to assist so-called political prisoners and defendents. However they are not concerned in the slightest about any other prisoner in this country. These people are all they are concerned about. We must look at these matters and we must look at the method used to bring funds into South Africa to achieve certain aims, funds solicited abroad. Unfortunately I do not have the time to elaborate on this at length. I have before me a document compiled by the UN, and for the purposes of this debate I shall hand it over to the hon. the Minister so that he can take a further look at it. It was compiled by a person from South Africa. I want to dwell on this document for a moment, Mr. Speaker. This person wants to solicit funds abroad for the establishment or consolidation of “Black Consciousness” and “Black Power” in South Africa. Of course the document only refers to Black Consciousness because naturally they would not talk about Black Power. This person comes from South Africa. He is a Black man from South Africa and he compiled it for the UN. It is necessary for us to look at what these people say. I want to quote a few extracts—

He refers here to the whole aim …

Order! Is the hon. member not speaking a little wide of the mark?

Mr. Speaker, I am referring to the funds entering the country from abroad. This is a typical example of how these people solicit money abroad and bring it to South Africa I am arguing about the principle of the clause, Mr. Speaker, because the hon. member for Pinelands maintains that we have ulterior motives in regard to this clause. We do not have ulterior motives. On the contrary, our motives are completely pure. I shall refer to our motives because we are not ashamed to say it. [Interjections.]

Order!

Surely it is unnecessary for everything to be spelt out in detail by the hon. Minister concerned. Surely there are other hon. members in this House who can also say something. Surely we need not all sit as quiet as mice and say nothing about this legislation. This person states the aim of Black Consciousness when he says—

All this is all very well, Mr. Speaker. However, he goes on to defend the cause by saying—

He continues in this vein. That is the purpose for which funds are being sought. However, the hon. gentleman goes on to say—

He goes on to say—

It is therefore clear that we must keep a check on the money obtained and the methods used by people in South Africa to solicit money abroad, at the point where the organization is, viz. at the organization within South Africa which solicits money abroad. We could quote examples in this regard. Hon. members can go and look up all the reports of the Schlebusch Commission. It is shown there that these people deliberately committed fraud overseas by collecting funds for a certain purpose and then bringing it to South Africa and using it for a different purpose. Surely we cannot allow the funds entering the country from abroad to be handled in this way. After all, the hon. member for Pinelands has contact with the S.A. Council of Churches. He must not say that he does not have contact with them any longer.

I hold no office in that organization whatsoever.

The hon. member can still exercise an influence because he occupied a high position in one of the churches that are affiliated with the S.A. Council of Churches. Surely the hon. member can use his influence. We cannot allow these practices to be continued with.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Pinelands has very properly generated some discussion on the matter of funds from foreign countries being used to pay for legal representation in political trials in South Africa. The hon. the Minister, in his Second Reading speech, avoided raising this matter and understandably so, because by no stretch of the imagination, in my view, can this matter be brought to bear on any of the two basic principles which he himself laid down as being the substance of this Bill, namely the principle of accountability and the principle of disclosure. From the hon. the Minister’s mentioning of these two principles, it is clear that the whole purpose of this legislation is to protect the public. Must we believe that the hon. the Minister intends to protect the foreign public? This is the only way in which this matter can be brought to bear on these two principles.

In true Nationalist style, members on the Government side recoiled in horror at the thought that money from foreign countries is used to pay for legal representation of accused persons in political trials. They practically choked when the hon. member for Pinelands indicated that he saw nothing wrong with foreign money being used for this purpose. We then had the very interesting assurance by the hon. member for Schweizer Reneke—he has repeated it today—that the defence in political trials is in any event being paid for by the Government, either through the use of legal aid or through pro deo representation or other systems. I wonder whether hon. members on the Government side are duly horrified by the fact that Government funds are now being used for this terrible purpose.

No.

They are not, but they are thinking again, painful as thinking as such might be to them. If the hon. member for Schweizer-Reneke is right, it simply means that the foreign money is now being used for something which will have to be paid for by the Government in South Africa in any event. The whole matter therefore has no greater significance and no other significance than merely that the South African balance of payments is just that little bit better off.

Why must it be foreign money? Why can they not get money in South Africa?

That is ridiculous. The hon. member has assured us that no accused in South Africa need worry about financial problems when it comes to legal representation, and now he seems to be disputing that fact. It is so obviously vital that any accused charged with any serious crime in South Africa should have proper legal representation, whether he can afford it or not. It is clear that in this respect I have the support of hon. members on that side of the House, if one is to judge by the indignant assertion of the hon. member for Schweizer-Reneke that every accused in South Africa is entitled to legal representation, whether he can pay for it or not. I cannot think of a way of spending foreign money in South Africa which will have less effect on our national well-being than to spend it on legal representation to assist at a criminal trial. It is indeed a tribute to our own courts that any foreign organization, of any nature whatsoever, considers its money well spent on the services of a South African lawyer in a South African trial before a South African judge in a South African court. [Interjections.] Hon. members on the other side, and no less a person than the hon. the Minister of Justice himself in a previous debate, have by their attacks on the practice of paying South African lawyers with foreign money and by their inescapable inference that this practice somehow affects our legal system detrimentally, reflected on the impartiality, the independence and the competence of our South African courts. It is not surprising that in their political paranoia hon. members on the other side will not spare even respected institutions like the courts of law in this country.

The practice of maintaining the dependants of convicted political prisoners and detainees has also come under fire. If the hon. members on the other side had bothered to make inquiries about this, they would have learned that the State allocates grants to these people in any event. The situation is simply that every cent of maintenance that is paid for by foreign funds in this respect, is a cent less for the State to pay.

I should like to come back briefly to the speech made by the hon. member for Schweizer-Reneke … [Interjections.] … and to correct his statement that all accused people are entitled to free legal representation. The hon. member is completely wrong in this respect. The income limits required to justify legal aid in this country are ridiculously strict. Bar Councils all over South Africa follow the practice of in forma pauperis in terms of which members of the Bar and the Side-Bar render their services free. There are hundreds of cases which qualify in terms of our own standards for this free service when they do not even qualify for legal aid. This is an indication of how ridiculously strict the income limits are. Therefore it is nonsense to say that every person is entitled to free legal defence.

The other system is the pro deo system. By no stretch of the imagination can it be said that every person in South Africa is entitled to pro deo defence. That is absolute nonsense. The normal rule is that it only applies…

I did not say so. I said that it is provided in cases where the accused cannot afford his own defence.

Even so. That is what I am talking about. The hon. member wants to suggest that a pro deo defence is available to any accused in a political trial. That is absolute nonsense. The general rule is that pro deo defence is only available where the death sentence is a possibility. I shall concede immediately that certain exceptions are made in practice, but it is absolute nonsense to say that it is available to everyone. It is clear therefore that this whole legal aid system is still very far from adequate. I must, however, give some credit to the hon. member for Schweizer-Reneke. The doubtless enthusiasm with which he asserted that every accused in South Africa is entitled to free legal representation if he cannot afford it, made it clear to me that now that he is better informed about the matter, he may well become an ardent campaigner for a more adequate legal aid system in South Africa, even in respect of political trials.

*In this debate hon. members spoke as if this Bill was the only piece of legislation before a South African Parliament. The most ridiculous arguments were advanced, for example that where money enters the country from abroad and has been collected overseas, it can be used for the most terrible purposes under the sun. Surely that is a ridiculous charge. After all, there is a host of security laws in South Africa, and there is also a properly developed system of common law, which makes any kind of subversive activity virtually impossible. Do the hon. members wish to intimate that by controlling fundraising they are adding an extra element to the security legislation? That is a ridiculous argument. [Interjections.]

I now wish to deal with some of the reasons, or possible reasons, advanced for this legislation. The hon. the Minister said that the Bill is based on two cornerstones. I have already mentioned this, but I want to state it again. In the first place, it is based on the principle of accountability and, secondly, on the principle of disclosure. In themselves these two principles appear unexceptionable and sound. But surely this legislation goes much further than that. Let us just take four different problem cases which this type of legislation is supposed to deal with.

The first case I want to mention is that of a person collecting money, after which it is spent for purposes for which it was not collected. When someone collects money and then spends it on purposes other than those for which it was collected, he can be accused of the crime of common law fraud. Surely it is ridiculous to say that there is no legislation at this stage which can be applied in the case of a person who uses the funds for a totally different purpose than that for which it was collected. Hon. members will now tell me that there are borderline cases, and I want to concede that at once. The Bill provides that churches, for example, are exempted from the provisions of the Bill when they raise funds for the purposes of their religious work. Not too long ago we had the case of St. George’s Cathedral making tents available on their own land to squatters whose shanties on the Cape Flats had been demolished. This is clearly a borderline case, because it could be asked whether this is religious work or whether it arises out of one’s duty to one’s fellowman or whether, in the terminology of hon. members on that side of the House, it is purely a political action. [Interjections.] It is clearly the intention of this Bill to deal with this kind of thing. In that regard hon. members on that side of the House can expect no sympathy from this side for this type of legislation. In our opinion it is a service to one’s neighbour, a service of charity which it is fitting for any church to render. If the Government of the day is guilty of action which amounts to harassing of people so as to make life so totally impossible for them that they would almost prefer famine rather than go and live somewhere else, so that a person or a religious organization has to step in to do their Christian duty to relieve these peoples’ burden, then the Government must not expect us to support legislation of this nature.

The second case for which this Bill may be intended is when that person collects money and then spends it on subversive activities. I regard this as a ridiculous example, but it has been mentioned by hon. members. It is a pathetic example because there is a mass of security legislation in our country in terms of which such a situation could be dealt with.

The third possibility is that money can be collected for personal profit and under false pretences. One need not have any connection with a charitable organization to knock at a door to collect money for his own gain. Once again, the crime of fraud is at issue here. In this case this Bill will not make the slightest difference. It is true that such a person is unable to produce any card, badge or letter of authorization to people, but how many people would one really find who, when someone knocks at their door and asks for a few cents or a few rands, will ask for a document, study it and try to check whether the document is authentic or not? Therefore it is surely expecting too much to expect that this will entail any significant advantages in practice.

I now want to refer to the fourth possibility. A problem which has been referred to is that in some cases in the past, too great a percentage of the fees collected have been paid out to professional bodies. In this regard it is a question of an undertaking, a contract between the collecting organization and the professional person. What will this Bill contribute towards bringing about a change in this regard? If the public takes the trouble to bring to the attention of a charitable organization that it is spending too much money on the service of a professional collector, surely that is quite enough. Public pressure or sanction is surely quite sufficient.

Order! Just before the hon. member resumes his seat I want to tell him that the expression “paranoiac members” which he used earlier in his speech is not parliamentary and that he must withdraw it.

Mr. Speaker, I withdraw it.

Mr. Speaker, initially I thought it was tragic that a Van der Merwe should be a Prog, but the more I get to know the hon. member for Green Point, the more I begin to think it is not so tragic after all. In fact, we are pleased that he is one.