as chairman, brought up the report of the Select Committee on the Liquor Bill, reporting the Bill with amendments.

Report to be printed; House to go into Committee on the Bill on 10th March.

laid upon the Table—

1. (1) Preliminary considerations, by Ernest Bury, on the Gütehoffnungshütte report on the proposal to establish an iron and steel industry.
2. (2) Report by R. B. Milne, Deputy Inspector of Mines, on iron ore deposits, Newcastle Iron Works.
3. (3) Report by Percy A. Wagner, on the Newcastle Iron Works.

I do not know whether I am entitled to make a remark in laying these papers on the Table. I propose to lay certain reports on the Table drawn up by officials, but I wish to observe that it is not desirable in general to hand in reports or memoranda of officials. The reason is that the general rule in the public service is not to publish such reports in order not to influence the officials in any way. An official is expected to make his report impartially and if it is known beforehand that his report will be made public, it may influence the report.

Before the first Order is read, Mr. Speaker, I should like to raise a point of order in order that I may obtain a ruling from you. Hon. members will remember that on Tuesday last I put the following question to the Minister of Justice—

The reply was as follows—

Arising out of that question I put the following supplementary question to the Minister—

To which the Minister replied—

Then the hon. member for Yon Brandis (Mr. Nathan) attempted to put a question to the Minister, to which he replied—

Thereupon yesterday I handed in the following question to the Clerk of the House—

1. (2) When did the Minister return to Pretoria, and when did he look into the matter?
2. (3) Is it not a fact that in less than a fortnight after his visit the sergeant received notice that he was to be transferred?
3. (4) Was not this action the direct outcome of the Minister’s visit and the threat contained in his speech?

That question was handed by me to the Clerk of the House and does not appear on the Order Paper. I understand unofficially that the reason was that it was considered that the first question I put was fully answered. I do not know whether I would be in order in submitting to you at this stage that it was not answered fully or otherwise, but I am raising this point that members may know exactly what they may do in regard to questions. In my submission the answer of the Minister is remarkable for what it does not contain, and it does not meet the question I put. Of course the supplementary question which I put makes the issue quite plain as to whether the sergeant was transferred because of any dereliction of duty or disrespect to the Minister. The Minister practically refuses to answer.

The hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell) has correctly stated the facts.

Notwithstanding the fact that I had beforehand privately intimated to the hon. member through the Clerk that the question, notice of which he intended to give on the 23rd was not admissible, he pressed for its inclusion on the Order Paper by following the course prescribed by S.O. No. 47 (1). I thereupon directed the Clerk not to admit the question.

There has been a growing tendency this session to place questions on the Order Paper and more especially to ask supplementary questions, not for the purpose of eliciting information but rather of scoring what might be called debating points against the Ministers concerned. Hon. members should remember that questions put in this House are not in the nature of cross examination of, or interrogatories put to, witnesses in a court case.

The underlying principles governing the latitude allowed in respect of questions that may be put to Ministers in the House are very old-established and sound. A question may be allowed which is designed to elicit information for the purpose of a future debate, but it must not usurp debate; it must not in itself be in the nature of or designed to elicit a reply in the nature of debate, one natural element of which is controversy. May, at page 249 (11th Edition), indicates that a question should not contain “arguments, inferences, imputations, epithets, or controversial or ironical expressions,” and that a question may not refer to answers to questions previously asked during the current session.

The grounds upon which the question has been disallowed are, firstly, that the original question was adequately replied to by the Minister, who expressly stated that he was not prepared to answer any further questions on the point, and secondly, that par. (4) of the proposed question not only attributed an unworthy action to the Minister but imputed that the Minister had given an untruthful or, at the least, an equivocal reply to the question of 22nd February, an imputation which certainly would not be allowed in debate.

Before we go on with that, do I understand that if the Minister announces he refused to answer a question on any particular point, that is out of order?

An hon. member may question a Minister, but the only means of compelling the Minister to answer is by way of motion. The position is simply this, that if a Minister says he is not prepared to answer any further questions it is futile to put such further questions.

Is it in order for a Minister to give an arbitrary refusal without claim as a ground of privilege the interests of the public service? I have always understood, and it is clearly laid down in May, that a Minister may refuse to answer further questions provided he does so on the ground that it is not in the interests of the public service? But in the present case the Minister said arbitrarily “I refuse to answer a single further question on this point.” Are we debarred from asking a Minister any question, or series of questions, on a very large number of other points?

I have already intimated that there are no means of compelling a Minister to answer any question, except by way of motion, and if any hon. member is dissatisfied with the attitude taken by the Minister in that regard, it is open for him to put a motion on the Paper in order to compel him; and that is the reason why, if a Minister once says that he is not prepared to answer any further question, it would be futile to let any further question be put. Of course, the position is different on the matter of any public interest, and if the Minister says that in the public interest he refuses to answer the question, that settles the matter.

May I put it to you, Mr. Speaker, it may be desirable and is desirable in the public interest that it should be known publicly that a Minister refuses to answer a question, and that cannot be known if the Minister simply answers that he refuses to answer a certain question.

I would point out to the hon. member that the refusal of the Minister to answer was in connection with questions arising out of answers given to questions appearing on the Order Paper on 22nd inst. and put by the hon. member for Bezuidenhout. As far as the question now sought to be put on the Paper by the hon. member for Bezuidenhout is concerned, the Minister knows nothing about it.

I quite agree with you, Mr. Speaker, if your ruling is solely founded upon the fact that the Minister has declined to answer any further question on this point, but I understood your ruling to be further based upon the consideration that in your view the question had been sufficiently answered by the Minister.

The hon. member will permit me. I stated that para. 4 imputes to the Minister an attitude or conduct which would not be allowed even in debate.

I therefore submit to you, in regard to all administrative acts of Ministers of the Crown, hon. members have the right to put questions in a supplementary form; and if your ruling is to this effect—that Mr. Speaker has to take the responsibility of deciding whether a question was fully answered or not, I would, with due submission, ask you, Mr. Speaker, whether, to a very considerable extent, you might not be curtailing the rights of private members in asking questions. That I think, Sir, is a point which, I submit to you, is worthy of grave consideration. I would ask you whether you would not give more consideration to that point, because we have established the right of putting supplementary questions and have adopted in this regard fully the practice of the House of Commons.

I do not think it could be inferred that I have to decide whether a question is fully replied or not—I certainly would not take that on myself. I think the question has been fully dealt with on the ruling I have given. Ministers are entitled to say they are not prepared to answer a question in the public interest. If they say so, that ends the matter, and nothing further can be done. If there are other matters on which the Minister is asked a question, and the Minister will not reply and says so, the only way of bringing these questions up is by way of motion. I cannot compel him to answer, and only the House can do so.

Other hon. members rose to speak.

On a point of order, is this in order?

If hon. members want to have further information, I do not want to withhold it.

I thank you, Mr. Speaker, for the courtesy with which you allowed me to put that point. Do I understand that if para. 4 were eliminated, and something else put in its place that did not transgress the rules, the rest of the question would be allowed to go in subject to the Minister replying or not, as he chose?

That is very hypothetical. If the hon. member would submit it, I would consider it.

Supposing the Minister still refuses to reply?

May I put the point to you, Mr. Speaker, with all respect— members of this honourable House are not aware of what the tenour of the question was, as it did not appear on the Paper. But I understood that the Minister gave a reply to the question the other day, which the hon. member who asked the question did not consider satisfactory, and he put a supplementary question, which the Minister refuses to answer. Is it not within the privilege of any member of this honourable House to put a question on the Order Paper which has not been put on the Order Paper before? It will then be open for the Minister to refuse to answer, if he desires to do so, but it gives the hon. member an opportunity of putting a concrete question on the Order Paper. If the Minister refuses to answer, the Chair would rule that the question can never be put again. In regard to this question, I understand it was never put on the Order Paper, and the House can have no opportunity of knowing whether the Minister, in his calmer moments, would have reconsidered his answer.

It is open for any hon. member to put any question on the Order Paper, if it is according to the rules of the House. As hon. members know, it is the duty of the clerks to deal with questions as handed in, and if such questions do not conform to the rules, they generally speak to hon. members who have handed in these questions on the point. If the members are not satisfied with the views taken by the clerks, then it is perfectly open for them to see me about the matter. In this instance, the hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell) thought it right to obtain my ruling in the House.

Mr. Speaker, you have explained that if a Minister refuses to answer a question, the only redress is for a member to put a motion on the Paper.

You will be wrapping yourself in the flag next.

You be quiet.

Is there any machinery that would ensure such a motion being reached, or would it necessarily share the fate of private members’ notices and never be reached if the matter arose late in the session? Unless there is some such machinery, the matter would never come up again, and the effect of Minister refusing to answer would practically end the matter as far as the House is concerned.

I think that the ordinary procedure which is followed in regard to all questions of confidence—for I take it that any such motion would be regarded as one of no confidence in the Minister—would be adopted, and therefore would have precedence.

I am sorry to have to intrude again, but I want to know what penalties could be imposed by the House against a Minister, and how they could be enforced?

I don’t think that that question requires an answer.

The question is, is there an option of a fine?

In regard to the particular refusal on which Mr. Speaker’s ruling is founded, the Minister of Justice said—

Some of us understand that the Minister could exercise his undoubted privilege to refuse to answer supplementary questions, but would this mean that if the Minister meant that for the future he would answer no more questions on this particular subject, that no questions could be put on the Paper bearing on that particular matter? Think what that might lead to. At the beginning of a session, a Minister might say that he would refuse to answer any questions on this or that subject. Hon. members would then be deprived of one of their most valuable privileges—that of obtaining information. The procedure is very largely in conflict with that of the House of Commons, where extensive use is made of this privilege.

I think it would be rather dangerous if I were to generalize. I think each individual case should be treated on its merits. As far as this case is concerned, I think the question should not have been put. As far as the House of Commons is concerned, there are cases in which Mr. Speaker has said, after a Minister has indicated that he is not prepared to answer any further questions, it would be futile to put them. As far as the point raised by the hon. member for Rondebosch (Mr. Close) is concerned, I shall deal with matters as they arise; each matter will have to be dealt with on its merits. The Clerk will read the first Order.

I am very glad to see that the Minister of Finance has decided to put £6,000 on the Additional Estimates for sanitary services on the diamond fields. I must say that the sanitary services on the diggings leave much to be desired. As one fairly well acquainted with the diggings, I can assure the House that great inconvenience is suffered on the diggings in connection therewith. I am therefore glad about this item, and I hope that proper provision is being made. It is a difficult problem, especially because the diggings are of such a nature that the diggers are here to-day and there to-morrow. I think, however, that the problem can be solved by proper movable buildings or w.c.’s which can be removed, just as the diggers remove their houses from one digging to another. Something must be done for the health of the diggers. Then I should like to direct the attention to education on the diggings.

The hon. member can only discuss sanitary services on the diggings and the payment of premiums on iron and steel produced in the Union.

Then I will let the other matter rest for another opportunity.

I want to support what the hon. member for Ventersdorp (Mr. Boshof) has said. I honestly think that the Minister and the responsible department are not doing their duty to the diggings. When one thinks how many people there are, and that only £5,000 more is asked for sanitary services on the diggings, it is very sad. Unfortunately, the Minister of Mines and Industries is not now in the House, because I should like to put a few questions to him. I will, however, put them to the Minister of Finance, and perhaps he will do me the favour of answering them. I particularly want information about the Lichtenburg diggings, and want to ask whether the Minister of Mines and Industries still intends introducing a new diamond Bill?

The hon. member cannot now ask the question, because it does not come under the matter under discussion.

I will deal with the matter later. If there ever was a part of the population in the country for whom proper provision is not made, then it is the diggers at Lichtenburg.

Do you think that because you are working claims there?

The hon. member for Namaqualand ought not to try and joke about it when one is discussing a serious matter. I am speaking here in the general interests. The diggings are an industry which has arisen in the country and is a blessing. There are thousands of people who are trying to make their living there, and to whom Providence has there given an opportunity. In my opinion, the Government is proceeding very slowly there.

If the hon. member does not confine himself to the vote, then I must ask him to sit down.

I say that the Government is doing too little for the people on the diggings.

I want to rise to a point of order. The Minister in charge of this vote is not present in the House.

I am quite prepared to answer any questions on this vote.

I think the amount of £6,000 appearing on these Estimates for sanitary services on the diamond diggings is very insignificant because I hear that there is a very large number of diggers on the Lichtenburg diggings, so many that the Government is urged to go so far as to erect hospitals. I should like to ask, however, how it is that in one part of the country the diggers are assisted with Union capital while in other parts the sanitary work is done by divisional councils who use local capital of the division where the digging is situated. Those divisional councils have no benefit whatever from the diggings. All they get out of it is that the roads are worn out by the transport wagons and other vehicles, and that they have to repair them. Hon. members must not think that I am opposed to the vote for sanitary services. On the contrary I think it is a first-class thing the Government is doing, but I think that this work ought to be done by the Government throughout the Union, and that it should not be done in one district by the Government and in another by a divisional council.

I also am glad that there is an additional sum of £5,000 for sanitary services on the Estimates, but we must not forget that the Government can only know the conditions when they are brought under its notice. That was duly done by the hon. member who represents that part, but now the hon. member for Johannesburg (North) (Mr. Geldenhuys) comes to carry off the credit and honour for what the hon. member has done. He induced the Government to see that the sanitary needs on the diggings were looked after, but because the hon. member for Johannesburg ( North) has claims or shares there he wants to rob the representative of that constituency of the honour. This is going a little too far, because we want the man who did the work to also have the honour. We must not forget that in the case of the hon. member for Johannesburg ( North) it is a matter of self interest.

The hon. member for Namaqualand ( Mr. Mostert) takes up the matter in an entirely wrong way in saying that I want to rob the hon. member representing the constituency of the credit. That is not so at all. The hon. member for Namaqualand said that I spoke from self interest, but he is certainly convinced of it that he sometimes speaks from self interest in the House. I am not speaking from self interest, but in the interest of the country and the people on the diggings. The hon. member said that I come from Johannesburg, but I can tell him that there many Johannesburg people go to the diggings, even from my constituency. It is in the interests of the country that an end should be made to the sub-division of farms.

I want to tell the hon. member for the last time that if he does not confine himself to the subject under discussion, viz., sanitary services on the diggings, he will have to sit down.

I just want to further tell the hon. member for Namaqualand that there is room on the diggings for him if he wishes to go there.

I do not think that there is any question here of depriving any member of credit. I do not take it amiss in the hon. member for Johannesburg (North) (Mr. Geldenhuys) speaking about this question. He also is interested in the diamond diggings, and let me say that the hon. member for Johannesburg (North) did very well on the diggings. The hon. member for Namaqualand (Mr. Mostert) has the same right, but just let me remind him that the credit here does not belong to one or other member, but that a large congress was held in Pretoria in October last to which persons concerned came from all parts of the Union and from the diggings, and where matters were discussed with a view to the maintenance of the interests of the diggings, and one of the matters discussed was sanitation. At the conference then held in Pretoria recommendations were made as regards sanitary arrangements which the Minister is now giving effect to. What is more, health inspectors were appointed to make better provision for the health of the people. It is noticeable on the diggings that where there is a large congregation of people the health conditions are still what they are to-day. This is remarkable, but it is because the people work in the open air, and that class of people is not so delicate as we are in the towns who require provision for everything. It is a hardened class of people who understand battling with nature. Hon. members may believe me that many of us would require more than health inspectors on the diggings. Proper food and drink would, in the first place, be necessary, and, as regards housing, great improvements would also be necessary. All these things were discussed at the Pretoria conference, of which I had the honour of being a member. Those people on the diggings are bravely facing the difficulty with which they have to fight, and they are satisfied that sanitary arrangements are being made. All that is necessary further is to provide hospital accommodation. Movable hospitals would do very well.

The hon. member must confine himself to sanitary services.

Hospitals come under that.

Hospitals can be debated under the third order of the day when a Bill with regard to hospitals will be introduced for the second reading.

I shall not confine myself then to the large buildings, but to the little buildings. What was advocated by persons concerned at the Pretoria conference is now being carried out, and I think that it will give great satisfaction.

In connection with this matter it is difficult to understand that only an additional sum of £5,000 is asked for sanitary services on the diggings. I was there myself four months, and travelled through the diggings time and again. One can, to some extent, imagine the conditions by supposing the Cape Peninsula had, to-morrow, to do without any sanitary arrangements. What would be the position then? Just imagine that the town council of Cape Town had to try to make proper arrangements for all the people in its area with an amount of £6,000. The population on those diggings to-day is 80,000. The sum is quite inadequate. I will not now fully describe the position there, because I shall have an opportunity later. The officials there are doing their best, but if we at all understand the position with a number of white men and their wives and children, the native labourers and native girls who are there, then we will understand that conditions are indescribable. I want to tell the Government that the position there must be improved, and that it cannot be done with an additional sum of £5,000. I cannot propose an increase, for that is not permissible for a private member, but I want to ask the Minister of Mines and Industries to take into proper consideration, after consulting his department, the placing of a large sum on the Estimates for this purpose. Hon. members must remember that there is no water on the diggings, and that every drop has to be brought by motors for miles. It is, therefore, easy to see what will happen if a drought or epidemic should come. I want very earnestly to warn the Government to spend more money on sanitary services. The people pay for them. The diggers pay a 10 per cent. export tax, and at the moment diamonds to a value of £600,000 per month are produced there. That production will still be increased. The diggings provide a large income for many people, and that is the reason why the hon. member for Johannesburg (North) (Mr. Geldenhuys) and his children, as well as hundreds of other people, have interests there. The population consists of persons of all occupations, inter alia, attorneys, advocates, and syndicates in Johannesburg and Cape Town are interested there. Large incomes are obtained on the diggings and on the incomes alone 5 per cent. tax is paid. Then there are the transport riders who pay motor licences.

How much is not lost there?

The State does not lose a penny, and can easily spend more money for the health of the children.

I just want to clear up matters at once. The Government is well aware of the serious state of affairs on the diggings, and has taken the necessary steps. My hon. friend is apparently under a wrong impression. £11,000 will be spent in this financial year, but we are providing £18,000 for next year. What is more, we have obtained one of the best men, viz., Mr. Bid well who has been very kindly lent us by the Johannesburg Town Council to take charge of the sanitary service on the diggings and to take effective action, and Mr. Bidwell has rendered excellent services.

With the little money at his disposal he did excellent work, but if he had done twenty times as much it would not yet have been enough.

If he had done a hundred times as much it would possibly not have been enough according to the view of some people and sections. But Mr. Bidwell reported that from a health point of view the position was saved, and the Government attaches great importance to his report, and it was on account of his special experience and competency that he was sent there. As regards the future of the sanitary service, we hope that the legislation we are introducing will improve the position still further, and I ask hon. members not to anticipate matters on the general question in discussing this vote. During the debate on the consolidating Bill which is before the House, there will be an opportunity to discuss the whole matter, and if hon. members will look at Order for the Day No. 3 they will see that a Bill on public health will be proposed by the Minister of Public Health for second reading, and in that way a further attempt is being made to solve difficulties. In conclusion, I just wish to add on what the hon. member said about big financiers, companies and syndicates, and that they also should come under stricter control from a sanitary point of view, and that, as regards the Bill there will be a future for the small man, and that the object is to, as far as possible, exclude the large companies, syndicates and financiers from those diggings.

I am sorry I was not here last night when a reply was made by the Minister to a question by the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) in connection with the item payment of iron and steel bounty, £15,000. I would like the Minister to tell the House whether any bounty has been paid, and, if not, why not? I would be obliged to the Minister if he would tell me exactly what the position is in regard to the payment of this bounty.

I should like, first of all, to answer that question. No bonus on iron or steel has yet been paid under the law. The estimate here is based on a possible 20,000 tons in respect of which a bonus may be paid at 15s. per ton. That makes £15,000, but according to the 1922 Act, the Minister has to be satisfied that the factory, that the industry is capable of producing at least 50,000 per annum. Now the Minister has not yet been satisfied about that, and the reasons for his opinion why he has not yet been satisfied are given in a letter to the company directly concerned, i.e., the Union Steel Corporation, Limited. I must, therefore, ask my hon. friend to get it from them unless he wishes me to read out the correspondence here, and I take it he does not wish that.

I am not a bit afraid of the correspondence. So far the Minister has refused to give any information; why I do not know. I do not know whether it is a personal matter against myself, but I have been met with great discourtesy throughout. I ask him to place that certificate on the Table which has been granted by Mr. Reece, who is regarded as one of the foremost blast furnace engineers in the world. He granted a certificate that the Newcastle iron and steel blast furnaces were capable of producing 50,000 to 60,000 tons of pig iron a year. A quibble has been raised under this law with the object of trying to evade the payment of this bounty. The law distinctly lays down that—

I put it to the Minister what does that section mean? The Minister says, as I understand him, that it is only intended under that section that payment of a bounty should be made to a concern capable of producing 50,000 to 60,000 tons a year. He said it is intended that any industry established should be capable of producing at least 100,000 tons. The thing is as plain as a pikestaff. The law is perfectly clear. Last year when he set the dates back, what was his intention? Did he not have in mind the payment of this bounty to the Newcastle iron and steel works? I submit the attitude of the Minister is not one in the spirit of the Bounty Act of 1922. The Bounty Act of 1922 makes it perfectly clear that if the producer can satisfy the Minister that the works are capable of producing 50,000 to 60,000 tons every year that the bounty should be paid. What has happened? The blast furnace at the Newcastle iron and steel works, which was only started last July, has, within the first six months, produced 22,467 tons of pig iron. The Minister must bear in mind that the first few months of a furnace are spent in overcoming mechanical difficulties which arise. It is quite true that this furnace did not produce up to its full capacity, but you have the certificate of Mr. Reece stating that the blast furnace at Newcastle is capable of producing 50,000 to 60,000 tons a year. Why does the Minister quibble? Why does he not pay to these people what they are entitled to? Is it in anticipation of this new Bill that they are to be throttled? The Newcastle iron and steel works have had very great difficulties to contend against, and at this stage to raise a quibble I do not think is fair. It is not in the terms of the Act.

Let them sue then.

Why should they sue? The Act is perfectly clear. I do not know whether my learned friend would like to have the case. I am entitled to ask the Minister for due consideration. Is it not true that last year, when he set back the date of payment for this bounty, he had in view the payment of the bounty to the Newcastle iron and steel works? If not, what was his idea? Had he some other company in view? I hope the Minister will treat this matter fairly and not try and raise a legal quibble, which I say is not tenable. I submit that on the certificate which the Minister has there is no reason whatever why the Minister should not grant and pay this bounty.

I think if the hon. member professes to have the interests of the Union Steel Corporation and Newcastle at heart, the latter may well call out, “Save me from my friends.” If his speech is based on the assumption that the Act of last year was a mere blind, and that I have been quibbling, I have nothing further to say but to repudiate it with the contempt it deserves. The hon. member appeals to me for fair play, and how does he treat me? He starts on an assumption of bad faith on my part. Now, I ask him, is he starting on that assumption or not? I want the hon. member to answer that now. Is the hon. member proceeding on the assumption that I am quibbling and that there is bad faith on my part?

Why refuse to pay the bounty?

I ask him that plain question, and if he says “yes,” I won’t say a word further; I will treat it with the contempt it deserves.

I am surprised at the attitude which the Minister takes up. I cannot understand why he should always treat me with the contempt he does. I say that right throughout he has treated me with contempt; I do not know why.

That is absolutely untrue.

That is the feeling I have. If he says it is untrue I will accept it, but that is the impression I have had throughout. I have never had any sympathy from him. I submit that since the blast furnace was started at Newcastle there has never been any inspection of it by any expert. Is that so? I ask the Minister that question.

I refuse to answer any question until the hon. member is gentleman enough to withdraw his insinuation of bad faith.

I would like to say I am just as fine a gentleman as the Minister. It is not necessary for me to prove I am a gentleman. I come from just as good stock, perhaps better, than the Minister. I do not see there is any need for me to make any apology, or to withdraw anything I have said. At all events, I am not afraid of him. I am quite willing to go on any public platform and prove what I say. I have only asked the Minister for fair play. I do not know why the Minister has this personal feeling against me.

That is also an assumption of your imagination.

I can only assume it because I have never had any sympathy from the Minister. The Minister has always tried to throw cold water on anything I have done. I am sorry the Minister refuses to reply, but I am only getting what I have had from the outset. In the interests of these people I do not see why the Minister should take up the attitude he does. If the Minister has anything personal against me, I would like him to tell me what it is. Is it the industry he is against then? Since the blast furnace at Newcastle blew in, no Minister has ever been there to see what is happening. The Minister, when invited to be there on the opening day, never turned up. Not a single Minister of the Crown turned up at Newcastle when an important industry was started.

I got my invitation the day it was opened.

Well, what day did the Minister of Mines and Industries get his invitation? He knew about it in advance. If the Minister could not go, surely he could have got some other Minister to attend in his place. But no, this matter has been treated as if it were of no concern, and of no interest or importance to the country. If the Minister has anything personal against me, I ask him not to vent his feelings on the industry.

The hon. member for Newcastle himself acknowledged that to-day there was not yet being produced an amount of 50,000 tons of pig iron in the high furnaces of Newcastle. He says that it is possible to deliver that quantity and that a certificate from an expert or an engineer confirms that statement. That makes me think of an engineer who said that a certain sluit could carry 100 cusecs of water, but after that was said it could not carry 80. I can still remember how the iron factory at Vereeniging a few years ago was only using scrap iron and the person who wanted to float the concern could not get the capital for it when he came to Cape Town. He subsequently died of a broken heart and one can allege that he was murdered. It seems to me that all our difficulties come from Natal.

The hon. member is wandering from the point.

The hon. member for Newcastle now wants a Government grant to which the high furnaces at Newcastle are not entitled because the production is under 50.000. He says that that quantity can be produced but why then is it not done? It must first be done and then I will believe it and the Minister will be convinced. He must not just produce a certificate and expect the taxpayer to pay on that. If the conditions are carried out then the grant will be obtained easily enough.

I cannot understand the hon. member for Newcastle (Mr. Nel), who knows as well as I do that I visited Newcastle and Utrecht last year at his own request. I inspected the public buildings there, and made certain arrangements for improvements at the post office and other public buildings in his own constituency. I was at Newcastle just before the furnace was finished, just before it was opened. I have not been there since it was opened. The invitation came too late, and they apologized for sending it so late. The hon. member is not justified in making the wild charges of lack of interest on the part of Ministers, and on my part in particular.

I just want to thank the Minister for the information he has given us with reference to the sanitary conditions on the diggings, and that he intends improving them under the new Bill. I am also glad that he said that he would introduce a motion to keep the big men and the syndicates out. That is what the people on the diggings expect. Therefore I want to ask the Minister to introduce the Bill as soon as possible because this is a very important matter and has still to go to a Select Committee. We notice that between 30,000 and 40,000 are prepared for the rush to-morrow, and I do not wish any postponement. The matter must be disposed of this year.

I would like to know what the answer of the Minister is to these points which have been raised. The Minister says he is not going to give any information because he has been insulted by the hon. member for Newcastle (Mr. Nel). Well, I listened to the speech of my hon. friend behind me, and I construed no insult from the words he used. The argument of the hon. member was this— he assumed that the Act of last year extended the bounty system, that it was passed in good faith, and that it was intended to assist that particular industry. At that time there was no other in the country and no other intended, and there must have been some specific object in passing that Bill. The hon. member says “Why therefore not help us?” There is no insult in that. I am sure that if there had been any insult or imputation of bad faith on the part of any Minister, you, Mr. Chairman, would not have allowed it—it would have been a gross breach of the rules. It is a question in which not only the hon. member is interested but the rest of us are interested. We want to know to what extent the existing industry at Newcastle can look for bounties under that Act. It concerns not only the hon. member but the Committee and the country, and I sincerely trust the Minister will reply, and not think that because he has been insulted no information is to be given to the Committee. I think it is a substantial and important point that has been raised. There has been a public debate on it, and it has been dealt with in the press. The people dealt with are under a grievance, and they think they have been dealt with unjustly by the Government.

Of course, if any other hon. member gets up and raises the same point, as the right hon. member (Gen. Smuts) has done, it is only right that the Minister should reply, and I am quite prepared now to reply. The hon. member for Newcastle (Mr. Nel) stated that a Mr. Rees had given a certificate, and that he is an expert of standing. It is obvious there is an equal duty on the part of the Government also to get the advice of its technical advisers, and although the Act speaks of the Minister being satisfied, it is clear that the Minister should give his technical advisers an opportunity of reporting on the situation and be guided by their report. With regard to the Act of last year, obviously to meet Newcastle and Vereeniging still further we altered the schedule and shifted the years forward. The Committee must not be under a misapprehension. The amount of £15,000 mentioned refers only to the period to 31st March, 1927—the current year—it does not affect their right or opportunity of applying for a bounty in respect of next year. The Act says (Section 1 of Act 41)—

The Act aimed, both in letter and in spirit, at this, that there should be a capability of producing at least 50,000 tons per annum. The whole idea was to stimulate the industry so as to produce a considerable quantity above 50,000 tons per annum, although that was the minimum. This matter was referred, amongst others, to the Board of Trade and Industries, which went carefully into it and reported on it, and as a result of the consideration by the Minister of that report, and also after consulting the Government Mining Engineer, this letter dated the 21st February, 1927, has been written to the Chairman of the Union Steel Corporation There has been previous correspondence and it was left an open question. The letter reads—

The reasons set forth in this letter are reasons which have been weighed and discussed, and that is the conclusion to which the Minister has come. I hope, therefore, that the hon. member for Newcastle (Mr. Nel) will appreciate that this is the conclusion come to after much consideration and discussion and interchange of views between the Union Steel Corporation and the department. If the hon. member is under the impression that the department has any grudge against him personally, or against the Union Steel Corporation or against Newcastle he is entirely mistaken. I think the hon. member is the first member of this House who has accused me since I have been a Minister of discourtesy or of personal feeling in any matter of public concern. This is the simple explanation of the whole position.

What is the vote for?

It was put on before this letter was written. If the Union Steel Corporation should come forward with any further arguments I am willing to reconsider the matter, although for the time being the subject is decided. I have an open mind and there is no matter of feeling at all. It is a little puerile for the hon. member to talk in that way. We don’t advance the country by imputing personal feelings.

You did the same to the hon. member.

No. The only reason for withholding information was that the Bill was drafted. To-day I laid on the Table reports from officials of my department which as a rule are never divulged.

I do not wish to carry on any ill-feeling, and I accept fully the Minister’s statement that there is no personal feeling in the matter. If he thinks I have in any way done anything which is intended to be discourteous to him I will withdraw.

I am quite satisfied.

I want to thank the Minister for placing on the Table the reports for which I have been asking for a considerable time. We shall now be able to see exactly what the attitude of his department is in regard to the iron works at Newcastle.

I wish to call attention to Item D 2, contributions to pensions and provident funds including grants in respect of officers transferred from provincial administrations, £5,500. Does that refer to Stellenbosch?

Last year we took over from the provincial administrations a large number of schools, and subsequently we passed an Act stating that as far as salaries and pensions were concerned members of the staffs of these schools should not suffer in any way through the transfer. This vote merely makes provision for that.

I wish to call attention to the grants to certified institutions and maintenance of children under the Children’s Protection Acts, 1913 and 1921. These grants were originally estimated at £110,000, but an additional £5,000 is now being asked for. I expect the minister will want more money on the main Estimates. How many children has the Minister under his charge?

Fortunately when the Children’s Protection Acts were passed I was not a member of Parliament but the hon. member was, and he voted for them. These Acts having been passed the department cannot help itself. The children are committed by the magistrates and the department is bound under the law to take care of them. Although these Acts came into operation a number of years ago some time elapsed before their benefits became known to the public generally. I think, however, that the people concerned in the class of children affected are now making the fullest use of the Acts, and we can reasonably expect that the increase of expenditure will more or less come to a standstill. The increase is certainly slowing down. In 1921-’22 the increased expenditure under the Acts was 82 per cent. above the previous year; in 1922-’23 the increase was 19 per cent. in 1923-’24, 15 per cent.; 1924-’25, 8 per cent.; and 1925-’26, 6½ per cent.

How long do you keep the children?

Generally until they are sixteen years of age, but they may be kept until they are eighteen.

With regard to K 4, Administration expenses of scheme for granting assistance to tenant farmers, £2,500, this is a new item, and we should have some explanation how the money is going to be spent.

Last year Parliament voted £30,000 for the assistance of tenant farmers. That money was handed to the Land Bank to supply draught animals, and this amount of £2,500 is to pay for the different commissions appointed in the districts and also for inspectors to supervise the expenditure. The amount of £2,500 seems a little bit high, but commissions have had to be appointed in the districts where the schemes are being carried out, and the Land Bank has to see that the purchasers are not overcharged.

How is the scheme working out?

It has been started only this year, but as far as I can see it is carrying on very well.

I want to ask the Minister how the money is being spent, because I understand the Land Bank is responsible for the matter.

Hon. members will remember that when the scheme was approved by Parliament last year, and £30,000 voted, I made it clear that the Land Bank would be responsible for the administration. This is not, however, the ordinary work of the Land Bank, and it merely acts as agent of the Agricultural Department. The Land Bank undertakes the administration, and sees that the interests of the taxpayers are properly protected. The administration is an extraordinary expense of the Land Bank and the money is now being voted so that the country can know what is being spent.

Is it, therefore, a matter for the Land Bank?

Yes, the Government have nothing to do with the administration, but the cost of it must be covered from the funds of the Agricultural Department.

Will the Minister explain the relation between this scheme and that being carried out by the Labour Department? It looks as if two parallel schemes are being carried out by different departments, one by the Land Bank on behalf of the Agricultural Department, and the other by the Labour Department.

The nature of this scheme is quite different to that undertaken by the Labour Department. Here special assistance is being granted to bywoners who can obtain land from the landowners, and the money is granted in small amounts with a maximum of £30 to £50 to buy draught and stud animals, which will enable them to live on the ground.

What about the tenant farmers’ scheme?

That is not the same. This scheme is a continuation of the old Transvaal one under the late Gen. Botha where cattle were given to certain classes of bywoners to plough and to be able to remain on the ground. It is quite a different thing to the Labour Department’s scheme.

Is the tenant farmers’ scheme continuing?

The Minister of Labour will be able to give information about the way his department is acting. At Lospersfontein and Brits the tenant farmers’ scheme is being employed.

Is this scheme, which is being administered by the Land Bank, confined to certain districts?

Yes, it is confined to certain districts where it can be applied. It can, e.g., not be applied in cattle districts, but only in grain and maize districts where the people can plough and require cattle for the purpose.

In the Free State as well?

Yes.

Has application been made for certain districts?

After the scheme was approved last year certain districts applied to come under it. It was then laid down that districts in which the Drought Emergency Loan Act applied would not be included, various districts applied and were included under the scheme, including districts in the Free State. £30,000, however, does not go far, but we tried to assist the districts who required it the most and who made application. Districts with East Coast fever were excluded because the fighting of that disease may cause damage to people. This is not a tenant farmers’ scheme, but is practically the same scheme as that introduced by the Botha Government in the Transvaal to give a team of oxen to certain people who could not help themselves, where they were able to live on the farm of a landowner.

I do not know how application is made, because I do not know whether my district (Ermelo) had a chance of coming in under this scheme. I did not understand that I had to apply for my district to come under it.

The hon. member himself voted last year for the £30,000, but he never sent in an application for Ermelo. Consequently, I thought it was not required in that district.

That is why I asked whether the Minister awaited applications.

If the hon. member had applied his application would have been considered.

The matter seems very strange to me.

I would like to ask the Minister on what terms these moneys are advanced, and if any security is given by the farmers.

The things bought by the farmer remain the property of the Land Bank until they are paid for.

Do you get any guarantee?

No, the only security is the cattle which have been bought.

I understand from the Minister that East Coast fever districts are excluded from the scheme, because there is danger of the cattle dying. If the Minister is, however, convinced that the landowners on whose arm the bywoners are, are progressive farmers, then he will see that there is not much danger of the cattle dying. The bywoners who would be assisted are actually with progressive farmers who regularly dip their cattle, and who see that their bywoners and natives do it regularly. The Minister can, therefore, quite safely include-East Coast fever districts in the scheme.

I do not know whether it comes under the vote.

The Minister replied as to which districts could come in under the scheme, and which could not, and, therefore, I am pleading that East Coast fever districts should not be excluded. Care should only be taken that the cattle are regularly dipped, and that can be made a condition.

I should like to know whether £30,000 is all we can vote for this scheme. I must say that the poor people-on the countryside appreciate it greatly. Prominent farmers are selected and the magistrate also decides whether the farmers are the right ones to have bywoners under this scheme on their farms. The scheme has worked very well, and I do not think that undeserving persons have been assisted. A large percentage of the people have, however, not yet been assisted. Under the Botha Government in the Transvaal the previous scheme worked fairly well, although there was not so much supervision and inspection. To-day the Land Bank is strict in seeing that the cattle remain in good condition. I do not think the amount should be limited to £30,000, because much more is spent under the tenant farmers’ scheme of the Labour Department. We should try to assist the poor people on the countryside.

I should like to ask the Minister of Finance about the amount of £2,500 which is expended in administering the £30,000. Can it not be done cheaper? The administration costs nearly I0 per cent. of the amount voted, and it seems to me as if the services of the Land Bank are very expensive. The money is made available to assist poor people and I0 per cent. is too much to pay for the administration.

The hon. member will see that the matter has nothing to do with my department, because the Land Bank acts as agents of the Agricultural Department. I think, however, that if we had voted twice as much the cost of administration would have remained the same. On a former occasion in connection with the Drought Emergency Loan Bill, I discussed the question of supervision with the general manager of the Land Bank and also the appointment of inspectors. I said that it was impossible to spend £20,000 and pay £5,000 for proper supervision. The general manager assured me that if strict supervision was not kept the Government would lose money. I was at first not inclined to agree with him, but I thought that Mr. Herold had more experience about the matter than I and, therefore, approved of his action. My experience now is that Mr. Herold was right, and if such supervision had not existed, the State would have suffered much more damage. The Land Bank is very careful, and I can assure the hon. member that no more money is spent than is necessary to protect the money of the taxpayer.

I take it that this expenditure is incurred in connection with the new system started last year of having the agricultural college under the department to which the previous Agricultural Faculty of Stellenbosch was incorporated. I expected that would cause a reduction in the grant to the Stellenbosch University, but I find that this has gone up. I see from Vote 26 the grant to Stellenbosch University has been increased. I expected, under this new scheme, when the whole faculty of agriculture was taken away from Stellenbosch, the general grant would have been diminished.

For the present the vote is being increased. The cost of Elsenburg amalgamation with the Faculty of Stellenbosch will cost a considerable sum more than it used to cost, but we expect in the years to come it will be cheaper. The faculties of universities were entitled to 10 per cent. increase every year, so in ten years’ time we doubled the amount. This will not be the case with Elsenburg and Stellenbosch now. The only increase will be if it is necessary to appoint a new professor or lecturer in one or the other place. The members of the faculty are also taking a part of the extension work, so that we can have more extension over other parts of the Union. The professors were getting a smaller salary on account of their working only nine months. The Civil Service Commission was approached because they now work for twelve months and had to be paid three months extra. New appointments had to be made to make the faculty a good one, and that is why the increase has come about. £7.500 of the" £12,500 is the 10 per cent. which they had to get, and so the vote is really only £5,000. also the income from their experimental farms comes to the State, so that the increase is not so big.

I see this is a request for increases in salaries, wages and allowances. I thought there was a meeting between the Minister of Posts and Telegraphs and the employees and that he told them their demands were too modest. Is this the result of that? On the vote last year we gave £98,000 increase and now you come forward for another £15,000 on this item. I consider that was a highly improper address to give to his employees; there was no consideration for the taxpayers in it. I notice also there was a difference between the employees and the Minister on the question of the appointment of a welfare officer. What is a welfare officer at the Post Office for? Is he a new attache to the Treasury crib? Another question on which I want information. What has happened with regard to broadcasting in Johannesburg which has broken down? I see a leading gentleman in Johannesburg is proposing to take it over providing he can bring in Durban and Cape Town. He will not get Cape Town. Of that I am sure. We are satisfied. Then the Minister proposed to bring in an amendment to the law to assist the broadcasting station at Johannesburg. I would like to know about it. I don’t understand this thing myself. I would like to ascertain also what the Minister is doing about automatic telephones. Has education advanced in that matter?

You can deal with that on the main estimates.

Perhaps the Minister might let us know whether his education has advanced.

Order. May I point out to the hon. member that we are now voting salaries, wages and allowances?

I have not the remotest shadow of doubt that this vote includes wages of some of the telephone operators.

The hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) has raised a question which has rather perturbed the minds of these associations in connection with the appointment of Mr. Foley as welfare officer in the post office. I hold in my hand a report of an important interview which they had with the Minister on the 19th November last—most instructive and amusing. I believe it has the Minister’s own imprimatur and I would like to give the House some extracts from this report. It appears to have been written up immediately or from notes made just after the interview.

That Is what they said, not what I said.

The deputation, which consisted of the general secretary (Mr. Whittaker) and another gentleman, waited by appointment on the Minister at Pretoria. The Minister was rather hurried because he had an executive council appointment at 10.30. There was something said about the appointment of this welfare officer, Mr. Foley. With the hon. member for Cape Town (Central), I would like to know who Mr. Foley is, where he came from and—

Order. I am not quite certain whether Mr. Foley’s salary is included in this sum of £15,000.

The hon. member will be perfectly in order, for Mr. Foley’s salary comes under this vote.

I would like to know who Mr. Foley is, where he comes from, what qualifications he possesses, is he bi-lingual, and above all, what his duties are. The Minister will perhaps tell us in regard to the words “welfare officer,” whether “ welfare” is a word that he has coined, or whether there is any officer in any other part of the world holding a similar appointment. This report states that the Minister, in answer to Mr. Whittaker, who is the general secretary of the association, said that Mr. Foley had been instructed to call on the association’s secretary and would give the fullest information regarding its duties. The Minister was asked then and there to state what the duties were of this gentleman, to which he replied that he was not going to write out a detailed schedule of duties. Mr. Foley would work harmoniously with the associations If desired, and would give them all the information if given the opportunity. The Minister then said to Mr. Whittaker—

Whereupon Mr. Whittaker said—

Apparently the organizations were not consulted or referred to before the appointment was made. Then the Minister said—

Then Mr. Whittaker said—

Lower down the Minister gave a statement, in reply to which Mr. Whittaker said—

The Minister said—

Mr. Whittaker replied—

I am afraid that is an expression which the Minister is rather fond of using.

Not to you.

Then Mr. Whittaker said—

Later on the Minister said—

Mr. Whittaker said—

Why did the Minister not on that occasion give that information? Had he done so, it would not have been necessary for us to detain the Committee this afternoon. At a later stage the Minister said—

Mr. Whittaker then said—

The Minister said—

Mr. Whittaker said—

The Minister said—

This is the only time I have sympathized with the Minister in the awkward position that he occupies, that they should have cold-shouldered him.

Read the last paragraph.

That is the last paragraph. Reference has been made to the Graham Commission report which suggested that we should get rid of one-third of the officials and pay the other men better. Not content with importing a private secretary from outside, he imports this gentleman too from outside. I am sure he won’t have the audacity to say that there was no man fully qualified, with experience in the post office, who could not have filled this position. I consider it was manifestly unjust to the service to import a man from outside and I hope the Minister will explain his attitude in the matter.

I would like to put my question this way. Apart from his promiment position in the Labour party at Benoni, what other qualifications did Mr. Foley possess besides legal ones? Among other merits he had the merit of being among the life long devoted followers of the Minister personally.

That is a very good trait in his character.

No doubt, but I would like to know what additional qualifications he had. I want to know, when making an appointment of this exceptional nature, whether the Minister made inquiry as to whether there were suitable applicants in the ranks of the service, what the results of the inquiry were, and were they such as to lead him to the conclusion that the only person in South Africa to whom the appointment could be offered was Mr. Foley. If he had to go outside the service, why was an opportunity not given to persons who had done welfare work to apply? Was Mr. Foley the secretary of the local Y.M.C.A. or the leader of the Boys’ Brigade, or had he shown any signs of being acutely interested in the welfare of his fellow beings apart from the welfare of the Labour party? Beyond that, what particular indication had he given to lead the Minister to the irresistible conclusion that alone in South Africa this Mr. Attorney Foley was the right person for this appointment? Personally, I am much gratified at the compliment to the legal profession. But seriously, the Minister must realize that this appointment made outside the service to a post—I take it a lucrative post .........

£600.

. . . is keenly resented by the whole body of postal servants throughout South Africa. In so far as they are voters they have expressed their resentment. It is hard for the ordinary rank and file of post office employees to be told, when a special appointment of this nature is made, that they are not considered in regard to it and that the Minister goes outside the service. If he had the assurance from his departmental chiefs that there was not a man who could suitably fill the position there would be some justification for going outside. Is Mr. Foley a member of the public service? Is his post such as now to make him a member of the public service of this country? If so, what action was taken by the Public Service Commission in regard to it? Were they consulted? Did they make any recommendation or did they put the usual rubber stamp on that we were hearing about last night?

May I at the outset refer to a matter which is so important that I feel that I should draw attention to it in the House. It is an article that appeared in the “Cape Times” a few days ago, the 21st to be precise, headed—

where they go on by a process of analysis to make deductions from certain statements issued by the Debt Commissioners rather inimical to the position of the savings bank account in the post office. This is one of those cases where I am able to allay any anxiety that has resulted. I do so emphatically. This is one of the cases where the adage is proved to be correct that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Those who have analysed this have gone on a wrong basis altogether. One of the statements made in this article goes as follows—

That is not all the tale. It does not apply to deposits in the savings bank at all. It applies to the deposit that is made by the Postmaster-General himself from deposits made in the savings bank with the Public Debt Commissioners and the withdrawal referred to is a lump sum withdrawal made periodically by the Postmaster-General which he immediately places in his own account and these withdrawals are based on the estimated requirements for repayments of withdrawals by depositors and have only an indirect relation with the actual deposits and withdrawals by depositors and with-drawers in the savings bank. As a matter of fact the statement is so far wrong that I am able to say, and I do so with the utmost pleasure, that since Union, during the whole of the savings bank operations, there has only been one occasion when the withdrawals exceeded the deposits. In 1919-’20 the amount deposited was £4,374,458 and the amount withdrawn was very nearly five millions. That is the only occasion in the whole of our Union experience where withdrawals have exceeded deposits, and so far from its being true to-day we have a balance, and each year before that and since that we have had a balance in favour. The amount deposited in 1925-’26 was £3,564,888 and the amount withdrawn was £3,368.425, and that I hope will dispose in the minds of the country of any fear that the position was such as was indicated. Further it goes on to say that investments of post office savings bank money have depreciated. That is perfectly true.

What is the total of the deposits?

To-day, 1926-’27, it is £3,664.304 and estimated to be withdrawn, £3,533,782. There need be no fear in the public mind that either the withdrawals have exceeded the deposits, either last year or this year—on the contrary we have a balance in hand which is increasing—or that the depreciation of the investments is going to affect the solvency at all. If there is a run on the bank we have always the public Treasury behind us.

A State bank?

If we had a State bank it is clear the situation would never arise, and it never arose in Australia. The hon. member for Cape Town (Central) ( Mr. Jagger) animadverted somewhat on my expression of opinion when I was addressing the Postmen’s Conference.

A highly improper statement to make.

Whatever I say in public I am always prepared to stand to, even in the face of the objection—reasonable objection made by the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) from his point of view. I was doing, on this occasion, what I was doing so often before, which the hon. member for Bezuidenhout ( Mr. Blackwell) suggests I should stop doing—supporting the trade union point of view. I was speaking in a general way and wanted to know whether I was reconciled to my employees; or rather I do not look upon them as my employees—that is the way hon. members on the other side look upon them, and they and I have a diametrically opposite outlook.

What are they?

Comrades.

Fellow workers.

My hon. friend will never be a comrade and a worker. I still hold my old trade union belief that a man is a man whatever office he may hold. I know the hon. member for Newlands (Mr. Stuttaford) regards his employees as different clay. I do not.

You are saying something which is absolutely untrue.

I have just the same feeling towards the men amongst whom I worked for many years now that I am in the position I occupy as I had then. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell) and the hon. member for Von Brandis ( Mr. Nathan) will be only too happy to hear that reconciliation is complete.

Kiss in the ring!

My hon. friend is a past master in the art of osculation! Coming to the question of broadcasting, it is true that broadcasting in Johannesburg went by the board. Even those men who composed the original company will admit, I think, that they were not business men, and if my hon. friend would see the accounts he would agree that they were not. They were public-spirited gentlemen, and they felt that this was a sort of thing that ought to be introduced. I want to pay a tribute to these men for putting their money into it. It was little more than a society of their own, and I am afraid that unfortunately they will lose every penny of their money. In spite of efforts to bolster it up it went to the ground. Different people came to see me to restart the scheme, including the Mayor of Johannesburg. I could not see my way clear to agree to the suggestions that were made. A suggestion was made that the Johannesburg municipality should take it over and run it like the Durban municipality. That appealed to me. It was suggested to me that Mr. Schlesinger should take it over, but I did not like that idea, and I refused. I had an interview with various people interested—the Mayor, the Publicity Association, and members of scientific and technical societies, and, later on, with Mr. Schlesinger himself, who made an amended proposal, with which I am inclined to agree. He suggested that a public company might be formed and that the Government might have one representative on it. I stipulated for two members, and the hon. member will agree that it is wiser.

One more than half the number.

A public company is to be formed and the Government will have a censorship over the programme to see that nothing is wrong. He will start equipping a better station than the one which is already in existence in Johannesburg. Originally his suggestion was, and he made it a sine qua non, that he should have a monopoly over the whole Union, and I said straight out that I would not be a party to that and to taking away the Cape Town and Durban licences from their municipalities, but I did make a promise that, if the House agrees, piracy should not occur any more with the company than with the others. I do not think we shall require legislation as the Act is sufficiently comprehensive. If other stations relayed programmes sent out by Mr. Schlesinger that would be piracy. I am prepared to stop that.

Is the post office going to take any shares?

No. We are getting two representatives on the board of directors. I suppose I must answer the questions of the hon. member for Von Brandis ( Mr. Nathan) although I suppose they are a joke. He asked me who is Foley? Well, he was at one time a solicitor practising in Benoni and he is a very fine man. He comes from an old Kimberley family and has a tremendous fund of human kindness, which is essential to a man engaged in welfare work.

What social work was he engaged at in Benoni?

He was chairman of the East Rand School Board and has always taken a vital interest in education. He is a man of many parts and many magnitudes; an all-round gentleman, and admittedly is of advanced ideas coinciding with my own. That may of course be regarded as a disqualification by some hon. members! but to me naturally a qualification. He served his country in the late war—if that is still regarded as a qualification. He lost everything; as the result of going to the front his practice going to Hades. I substantiate what was said by the hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell). He is completely bilingual. My hon. friend has displayed a lamentable ignorance of the world’s advancement when he said he never heard of any similar post.

I never said that!

In America, which is so highly industrialized from a private enterprise point of view, they find that it is the finest thing from the point of view of efficiency and with a tendency towards putting more money in their pockets to appoint welfare officers. All over the States factories find that a welfare officer not only serves a very useful purpose from the point of view of the workers but from the point of view of those controlling the industry.

Why did you go outside the service?

I will come to that in a minute. Whether hon. members believe me or not I take an intense interest in the welfare of the people engaged in the post office. I saw so many deleterious things that it was nobody’s business to bring to the notice of the authorities and which were having a cumulative effect. Why did I go outside the service? It is essential to success that the work and the man should fit. I was not going to create a post just for the sake of doing so, and I wanted the appointment to be successful. I knew the gentleman I appointed and knew that he would make the thing a success, and I decided to appoint him. After all the public maintain the public service, and it appears rather unfair to say to the members of the public, “You shall not have an entrée to the public service.”

Is he on the fixed establishment?

No, it is a non-prescribed post in the general division. The salary is £600 rising by annual increments to £700. It is not too much. He has made several enquiries into the conditions in the department and has put in some very valuable reports which will be published in the “Live Wire” and if the “Post and Telegraph Gazette” wants to publish them I shall be only too happy. Although there was a little bit of prejudice at first against this appointment that has been broken down, and they are all working most harmoniously together, with the result that conditions will considerably improve.

I am glad to hear there is a prospect of broadcasting being restored in Johannesburg, for broadcasting adds considerably to the amenities of life, particularly in country districts. The Minister’s information regarding the proposed company is, however, rather vague. Can he tell us what is to be the basis of the flotation? Will the State have any control? Will the public be allowed to subscribe at par for shares, and for how long will the contract be? The Minister declared himself to be opposed to a monopoly, but he seems to have granted a monopoly in this case, the only control he retains being the appointment of two directors, but that will not mean much on a board of five or more directors.

It cannot be a monopoly, as he can only work Johannesburg.

It is a monopoly for Johannesburg.

Oh, yes! So was the Broadcasting Company. Where you have a centre, big or small, there must be a monopoly, otherwise the whole thing would be a failure. A monopoly to the company, and not to Schlesinger. It is to be a public company, and the public will be invited to take shares, more particularly the listeners-in. They are to be induced to take an interest in the company.

Are all the shares open for the public to subscribe?

The whole thing is not fixed yet. I have given an undertaking that for five years, the period allowed by law, the licence will be untouched. That is, they will have a monopoly of that licence, unless some untoward circumstance arises which militates against the interests of the public, for example, in times of national emergency. We do not control the board of directors, but we do control the licence. For five years it is secured to them. For the second five years it is also secured, except that we can take it away for State purposes, and Mr. Schlesinger agrees that if the State wants it for its own purposes, it should be allowed to take it. The whole thing is on a quite sound basis. The company’s share of profit is limited to 10 per cent. and any overplus must be equally divided between the company, the State, and the listeners-in.

I have permitted the Minister to reply to the question, but members will observe that both the question and answer are irrelevant to the vote. I hope, therefore, the discussion will be dropped.

I don’t know why the Minister preceded his answer to my question by the remark he made.

I thought you were joking. Acquit me of anything like that.

Although we have had a volume of words from the Minister, he has carefully avoided telling us what the duties of the welfare officer are. The Minister says that everything is nice in the garden now, and all the difficulties have been settled.

Yes, the flowers are growing beautifully.

Well, they were not on the I9th of November. Judging from the quotation I read from this publication, everything didn’t seem to be lovely in the garden. When Mr. Whittaker asked this question, he was apparently not aware that a similar office was in existence in other parts of the world. Surely Mr. Whittaker should have made known to him the duties of an officer of this nature. We have not been told either whether there was or was not an officer in the service who could have filled the position. We do know now that Mr. Foley was a friend of the Minister, that he knew him from top to bottom. I am totally opposed to importing people from outside. The Minister has been the greatest sinner in this respect. He takes a gentleman whom I don’t know, excepting that I knew there was a gentleman named Foley, a partner in a firm in Benoni. I am glad to know that Mr. Foley is a returned soldier, but surely the firm of which he was a member would have been loyal enough to keep him in the firm when he came back from active service. I am not concerned with Foley as an individual, or with what he earned before, but I am concerned with the fact that the gentleman was imported from outside, and that no other member of the service was given an opportunity to get this appointment.

When the hon. member for Von Brandis (Mr. Nathan) keeps on repeating that the Minister has imported men from outside, he shows up the distinction between the Ministers of the present Government and that of the previous Cabinet. They didn’t import men; they confined their activities to deporting men. This welfare officer, I have heard, is referred to as—

but I don’t agree with that, because I think it is advisable to have welfare officers, and, as has been pointed out, the practice is in vogue in all well-conducted establishments throughout the world. I, however, want the Minister to give the House the assurance that the duties of his welfare officer will not interfere in any way with the functions of the staff organizations connected with the post office. It has been represented to me that, if an employee in the post office has a grievance, he or she can have it well represented, provided he or she is a member of an organization, and I would therefore like the Minister’s assurance on the point raised.

Yes, I can give that assurance, the first instruction, though it was not necessary to give an instruction, was that he should himself, before doing anything else, meet the executive and the secretaries of the four societies represented in the post office. He was to work with them, and in every way make for as much harmony as possible. The reverse effect from what the hon. member fears will take place, and the undertaking is emphasized by one of the secretaries, the secretary of the Telegraph and Telephone Association, who wrote Mr. Foley, welcoming him to the service, and wishing him success. Mr. Foley replied—

I would like to say to the hon. member for Von Brandis (Mr. Nathan) that I have here a double-sided column giving a complete list of the qualifications of Mr. Foley.

Mr. Foley says in the letter that he hopes he will be of service to the association. I understood that he was a Government employee, and I hope he will be of service to the Government.

I would like to say to the hon. member (Mr. Nathan) that a man who is of service to his fellow-men in Government employ is of service to the State.

I would like to ask what is the meaning of this amount of £4,000 for the Goedemoed labour colony? This colony has been owing £28,000 to the State for years and years, I should think close on 20 years. I am not quite sure that they have ever paid interest even.

The item F, Payment to National Parks Board of Trustees, is a new vote, and I think the House is entitled to some information in regard to it. I know this expenditure was incurred by the board of trustees appointed under the Act of 1926 in carrying out the control and maintenance of the Kruger National Park. I would ask the Minister whether this board of trustees has taken any steps in the direction of bringing the Natal Park within the scope of the Act of 1926, and also whether the board of trustees has paid a visit of inspection to the National Park in Natal?

In reply to the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger), I would state that this is a very old colony established by the Church. It is wrongly called a labour colony. It is just an ordinary colony like Kakamas. It owes us a lot of money, and is in a very bad way.

I believe they owe £28,000.

Yes.

Have they ever paid interest?

I do not think so.

Why give them more?

This is a lesson to them. When they came to me, they said they have got 53 families there, and they put three proposals before me. One was to sell the place to the highest bidder, another was that we should pay them another £12,000 and take the place over, and the third was that we should give them £5,000 and let them carry on. Under the Act which we passed last year, they are entitled to a subsidy of £12 per family. At my request, the board made an inspection, and in their report they strongly recommended that we should give these people £5,000 so that they could start in a proper way and provide themselves with trek cattle, implements, etc. I thought this was the best way out of the difficulty. I agreed to give this sum on condition that they would not be entitled to the grant of £12, and on the further condition that they had to appoint a superintendent who is an agricultural expert, and of whom I shall have to approve, so that I know that the place will be properly run. The Cabinet decided that would be the best way out of the difficulty, and so £4,000 has been placed on the estimates. In reply to the hon. member for Klip River (Mr. Anderson), I may mention that the Act which we passed last year, the National Parks Act, contains a clause which empowers me, as Minister of Lands, to declare any other park or game reserve as a national park, and then it would fall under the administration of the board appointed. But, of course, there is a great deal of expense connected with the matter. The provincial authorities in the Transvaal spent £7,000 a year on the Kruger National Park. I approached the provincial authorities in the Transvaal and said, seeing that I had taken this place out of their hands, would they be prepared to pay £3,000 a year, and I would pay £4,000? They agreed to that. There is certain revenue which they can obtain from this place, but they will only get that when they have constructed roads and so on, and I can quite understand that under the circumstances they have not started operations. The board have not yet made a recommendation to me with regard to the inclusion of other parks. That matter is entirely in their hands. There is, of course, a national park in Natal administered by the provincial authorities and with the assistance of an advisory committee, and in the same locality is the game reserve at Giant’s Castle. The whole question is of course, one for the board to consider. There are these parks in Natal, and it is for the National Parks Board to come afterwards and tell me how many, if any, and which particular ones should be made national parks, as soon as the revenue justifies, and then I will bring the matter before Parliament.

I only hope my hon. friend, when he takes over any more national parks, will see that the local authorities will also contribute to the expense and the maintenance. They should do so.

That is so.

In regard to the Goedemoed labour colony, this has been in existence for twenty years. They owe about £28,000 of Government money, and they have paid no interest on it, nor have they paid sixpence off as far as the records show. They have gradually got down and down, and have to come for Government assistance. With great respect I want to say that it is a grave reflection on the capacity of the Dutch Reformed Church not to be able to manage the thing better. I hope my hon. friend will tell them that this £4,000 is the last they will get. Surely there must be some public-spirited members in the church with the capacity to put it on its feet.

Do I understand the Minister to say that there is an element of doubt in the game reserves in Natal—

I allowed that question to be put and answered, but it is really not pertinent to the vote. This vote does not deal with the Natal Park at all. I am sorry, but I cannot allow any discussion on it.

I want to ask the Minister a question about the National Park. I hope there is no shadow of doubt in the Minister’s mind as to which should be the National Park in Natal. The Giant’s Castle has nothing to do with it at all. The national park in Natal is Mont-Aux-Sources, with the most beautiful scenery—

I am sorry I cannot allow the hon. member to discuss that.

I hope there will never be any confusion between this and the game reserves. This is a national park, and one that South Africa can be proud of.

This is a new item, and we ought to have some explanation as to whether the Government is embarking upon something new. Is this the last of the expenditure under this heading?

I explained to the House that this is not a new item at all. It is one of those items that the Auditor-General disallowed—although Parliament approved of the expedition—because the expedition was undertaken outside our boundaries. It is one of those technical things and we have to deal with it in this way.

Will there be a repetition of this?

No. A private gentleman with great generosity came forward and contributed a certain amount.

Vote put and agreed to.

Vote 37, “Public Service Commission,” £2,640, put and agreed to.

Some time ago the statement appeared in the press that the Minister of Public Works had issued instructions that all unskilled labour was to be paid for at a shilling an hour.

Nothing to do with the vote.

Why not? I want to ask if that is one of the causes of the increase in this demand.

No, they are new services. It has nothing to do with any change of policy that necessitated the extra expenditure. These are all cases where Governor-General’s warrants were obtained. They are new services that could not be postponed without detriment to the public interest. I will justify every one of them. Take the case of Lichtenburg. That is the result of the diamond diggings there. They are all new services.

That may be the case, but I suppose in these services the labour is paid for. Take the public offices at Lichtenburg. I want to know if this new rule of paying a shilling an hour for unskilled labour is not the cause of these things. There appeared in the paper an announcement that the Minister had issued instructions that all unskilled labour should be paid a shilling an hour. I want to know whether that is correct. Was it done with the assent of the Cabinet? It is a very serious thing, I should imagine, for the country.

The hon. member may ask a question, but I cannot allow him to discuss it.

I merely want to know the position.

The fact is as stated by the hon. gentleman, that one shilling an hour on all public works contracts has to be paid for unskilled labour. The majority of the builders, particularly in the Transvaal, were in favour; they agreed that the time has arrived when we should uplift the general standard of those who are regarded as unskilled labourers in this country. But strong representations were made to me to confine its application to whites; in other words, that we should have a clause in our contracts laying it down that the shilling an hour should be paid for unskilled labour, but it must be white labour.

Grossly unjust.

It is unjust, and I point blank refused. In point of fact one firm down here in the Cape, which had tendered on those conditions, immediately afterwards wanted to go back to native labour at 7½d. I appealed to them to help us in this new policy of a general uplift. They agreed, and tried it only for two days. They discharged all their civilized labour and took on natives again and made the same request. My hon. friend the hon. member for Worcester (Mr. Heatlie) says they pass it on. I can give you one specific case—that of the Kimberley post office—the estimate for which was £38,000, based on 7½d. per hour unskilled labour, and the tender was, for 1s. an hour unskilled labour, £34,000, by Messrs Church & McLachlan. The fact remains that in the majority of instances, except where the labour was unobtainable, the tenders were lower than the estimates. The Kimberley post office is a fair example, and is a big work. Mr. Church told me when I was in Kimberley that the work would have cost him three times as much if he had had the use of raw unskilled native labour.

He must have been pulling your leg.

You are not querying my veracity?

He must have been drawing your nether limb.

In that case he generally gets the lower extremity of the limb up against another portion of his anatomy. I do not think for one moment he tried to extend my nether limb.

I must, after the statement made by the Minister, from which it appears that the increase is partly due to this new policy, allow the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) to continue.

If you will forgive me, Mr. Chairman, I must combat that. None of this is due to that.

I should like to ask the Minister, has unskilled work been paid for at the rate of 1s. an hour on any of these items?

I beg the Chairman’s pardon; the probability is the sum is included there.

I must allow the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) to discuss that point.

Will the Minister tell us whether he has discussed that policy with the other Ministers of the Cabinet, and whether the Minister of Railways and Harbours has decided to pay all his unskilled labour at the rate of 1s. an hour, otherwise it seems to me it will work very unfairly between one class of labour and another.

My hon. friend must forgive me, but I cannot give the result of the deliberations. If you wish to attack the vote, attack it.

Perhaps the Minister of Finance can tell us—is this policy to apply to the Railway Department as well?

Why is there one policy in the Public Works Department and another in the Railway Department?

You are making a great mistake in trying to introduce it all round at once; therefore it is foredoomed to failure whatever inherent advantage it may have. Surely you proceed in a small way at first, and the proof of the pudding is in the eating, as I assure my hon. friend.

This is a serious statement my hon. friend has made. He has put up the rate for unskilled labour, and I hope they can afford to pay for it.

We not applying it in the country—I interjected when my hon. friend was speaking. In the department we are going cautiously to work, and except for one or two contracts we are not insisting upon this because of the unattainability of civilized labour there, and we do not want to complicate the position as far as native labour is concerned.

Is civilized labour generally interpreted as white labour in the Transvaal? There is a difficulty in getting white labour.

My hon. friend has his argument rather vitiated. When two deputations of master builders practically insisted that it should be confined to whites, I refused. I said you should pay for the work done, and if you employ natives that is your look out. The choice rests with the employer.

Is it not a fact that in Natal representations were made to the Minister that it was impossible to get civilized labour—what we understand by civilized labour —coloured or white labour—and that the Minister agreed to the use of natives provided they agreed to a reduction in price.

I did not like the experiment at all. I did not do it.

When I was at Kimberley a fortnight ago I had a stroll along the new post office and the clerk of works or the man who was in charge who did not know who I was—

What!

This seems to be the silly season, as the silly remarks always seem to come from that corner of the House. I had a stroll round the works before breakfast and saw a lot of white men doing labouring work. I asked the man in charge how they were doing and he said they were doing splendidly, and were more economical and more satisfactory than uncivilized labour, the foreman preferring them from every point of view. One advantage was, he said, that they did not have to be bossed all the time.

Does the clause in the contract say that all civilized labour must be paid a shilling an hour? Or is it generally interpreted that unskilled labour should be white labour? It is so understood in the North.

I know it is so in the North where it may be interpreted as meaning white, while down here it would be interpreted as meaning coloured or white. That, however, I cannot help.

I should like the Minister to tell me whether a building is being put up in a district and the contractor is obliged to pay the nativesin his service is an hour just as in the town? If a school is built must 1s. be paid to natives on the countryside?

I think the hon. member was not here when I explained that we were tempering our justice with mercy. Where it is difficult to obtain civilized labour we endeavour to meet the position. This clause does not apply to private buildings, but only to public works.

In the Transkei there has been considerable doubt as to how this wage proclamation applies. At first a shilling an hour was offered, and then it was withdrawn, and the position seems rather obscure. At any rate in those territories no obstacles should be placed in the way of natives obtaining employment.

That is one of the cases I am referring to. In the native territories we recognize that the native has a first claim on the work, and where we find that a high rate of pay militates against their employment, we vary the conditions.

There is no shilling an hour contract in the native territories?

No.

I should like to know the view of the Minister of Finance on this matter. It seems to me to be very unjust and against all the ordinary tenets of the Labour movement that in the same town for the same work there is a difference of 50 per cent, in the wages paid. For instance, the Government is employing on the extension of the parliamentary buildings unskilled labour at 1s. an hour, but if a man works on the railway at the bottom of Adderley Street, he receives only 7½d. an hour for exactly the same work. Will the Minister give some indication as to the Government’s attitude in this matter, or are we to understand that each Government department sets up its own standard rates of pay? It seems to me to be a hopeless position. Every man working on the railway will be trying to crowd into a post office job.

There has been no indication of that.

I take it that the men do not know the difference yet, but they have quite enough sense to appreciate the fact when they learn it, that in one Government department they will be paid 1s. an hour, and in other departments, only 7½d.

In the building trade there is no continuity of labour, the work being very intermittent.

The hon. member for Newlands (Mr. Stuttaford) has mentioned the wages of railway labourers, but it must not be forgotten that public works are done in a village possibly only once in five years. In Cape Town there may be public works to-day but none during the following three years. Therefore the operations of the Public Works Department cannot be compared with the Railway Service.

I understand the Minister of Public Works to say that in his department in connection with public works, contractors must agree to pay unskilled labour 1s. an hour, and that that has been carried out with the full approval of the Cabinet. I would ask the Minister of Finance if this applies to all other Government departments, and, if not, why not? Why Government should discriminate in this matter we cannot understand. This is a subject of extreme importance, especially to the farming population.

The cases are not analagous by any means. The Public Works Department stands on an entirely different footing. In the building trade, work is intermittent, so a man may get a job for six months, and be out of work for the next three or four months. The rail-way employee, however, is on a different standing altogether. He is employed, first of all, as an unskilled labourer, with a prospect of permanent employment. There are avenues of promotion open to him.

Four thousand have been promoted.

So your unskilled labourer’s job on the railway may be a foundation and a training ground for a higher post in the service. In the Public Works Department, however, every job is a self-contained one.

The explanation seems inconclusive. Has anyone taken the actuarial valuation of the prospect of the labourers who have not got permanent employment and may be turned off? While this prospect may not be quite so precarious as those of the Public Works Department, nevertheless his prospects are precarious. Does the Minister want us to think the difference is compensated for at the rate of 7½d. an hour in one case and 1s. an hour in the other? It seems unintelligible to me. We ought to ask the Minister of Finance to give an explanation as to how it is these apparently conflicting and irreconcilable conditions of pay exist in the different departments of the Government. It is important, and he is the one with his hand on the switchboard. In one department we have the Minister applying his extremist views in extreme ways. We find certain qualifications here and in the Transvaal, others in Natal and in the Transkei, and we heard how at the beginning, with a flourish of trumpets, he was carrying out his policy of civilized labour. We have the spectacle of very different rates of pay in the department of the Minister himself. We have the spectacle of different rates of pay between the town and the country, and we ask him for some light, based on the pure gospel of extreme socialism, which will justify this departure from the truth in the very extraordinary ways he mentioned, and I would like him to reconcile the views that have been expressed.

Is the new fair-wage clause being observed in all these building contracts—the clause which was introduced by your predecessors?

I understand that the Minister said that conditions were different in the public works to those in the railway. Is the Minister unaware that the Railway Department employ a large number of casual labourers, and that they would be in exactly the same position to which the Minister refers? Is the Minister unaware of the fact that the Railway Department in carrying out their building work often call for public tenders, and have stations and other buildings constructed by public contract? Do the Railway Department insist on the same terms as those in the department of my hon. friend? Are they pledged to pay 1s. a day for labour, the same as the Public Works Department?

Our experience so far has been a very short one, but it is contrary to what the hon. member prognosticates. I have indicated that so far, in the main, we have proved this method is turning out cheaper.

Then why don’t you increase the wages all round? It will be cheaper still.

It would do my hon. friend good to read about high wages in America written by two young engineers. Take Ford’s. They pay high wages, and they are getting the production for it.

Then why don’t the railway do it?

I have told you these contracts are in the nature of an experiment. If we had gone holus bolus for the new policy in all directions, we should have had condemnation from the other side, and should have been told that we had made a great error. It is under discussion now, and because it is only an experiment, that is why it has not been introduced on the railway. We are giving it a trial. We have casual labour in the post office, but it is casual labour for which there are openings up the ladder. In the railway it is the same. In the Public Works Department it is only casual. They are taken on for a contract, and they finish when the job finishes.

The railway put out work by contract. Have you not converted that department yet?

The whole question is under discussion. At present it is on trial, and there has been no effort to convert the Railway Department. It I tried to introduce this policy all round, my hon. friend would fail to estimate my mental capacity we should have been called all sorts of fool’s if we had taken that course. It is only the beginning, and if it proves a success, it will follow all round.

When it comes to a question of building from the Native Development Fund, money put up by natives themselves, do you lay down restrictions in those contracts to enforce the use of white labour? There seems no doubt that in these contracts certain clauses have been inserted which tend to restrict, if not to prohibit, the use of native labour, and I feel sure that the Minister must agree with me that such restriction is very unfair, especially when these works are being built with money raised by direct taxation from the natives themselves. I ask the Minister to give me his assurance that he will look into the matter so that any contracts in the future do not include any such clauses.

The question is not within my knowledge at the moment, but I cannot conceive it possible.

Business suspended at 6 p.m., and resumed at 8.9 p.m.

Before the adjournment I was mentioning to the Minister the matter of certain buildings erected from funds provided through the Native Development Fund, and a provision in the contracts that was designed rather to encourage the employment of white labour on those buildings and the exclusion of native labour. The Minister has assured me that as far as he knows that is not the fact. I hope he will look into the question because I think he will find that there are cases where that has happened and I believe he will agree with me that where money has been raised by taxation placed upon themselves, the natives should at least have the opportunity of providing the unskilled labour required on those buildings. I would ask the Minister to give the matter a thorough investigation. There is another matter somewhat in the same connection in regard to the construction of telephone lines. We were assured very definitely that in the native territories preference would be given to native labour for rough work and that unskilled white labour was not going to be used in the territories for the construction of telephone lines.

Order. The hon. member will notice that there is nothing about telephone lines under this vote.

I will not say anything further in that connection. No doubt the Minister will give it his attention.

I promise the hon. member that I will go into the matter. If I find there is anything in what he says, I will see that it is rectified. If I may be allowed to say so, the same thing applies to telephone construction.

I should like to ask the Minister a question about telephones.

The hon. member cannot do it now.

Then I shall do so later. Further I should like to have information from the Minister about the payment of 1s. per hour for unskilled labour on public works. That will throw a great burden on the farming population. There are many persons working for farmers who as a result of this arrangement will leave their service and come to the towns. The result will be that there will be no progress in farming matters. They will now be compelled to pay 1s. per hour for unskilled labour. As a business man I can see that if the labourers can earn as much as 1s. an hour on public works then they will not want to work on farms. I am sorry that I was not in the House this afternoon, but I should like to know the attitude of the Minister because our farmers have become frightened of the provision that unskilled labourers on public works are to receive 1s. an hour.

I have already explained to the Committee and I will do so again to the hon. gentleman (Mr. Buirski) that it does not have that effect. I am sorry that I cannot reply in the language in which the hon. gentleman addressed me.

Why not?

Because I am, unfortunately, incapable of so doing.

You have had lots of time to study it.

No, I have still less time than ever. As I was saying, this does not apply to farmers and will have no effect on farmers. If it would do so, so would the already existing rate of 5s. I put it to the hon. gentleman that the employment in numbers on any given undertaking under the Public Works Department is small and limited, and, in addition to that, the time occupied is small, and we do not erect two buildings consecutively in one place, so that there is not much danger in what the hon. member says.

No, but for the Minister to argue that the farmer could not be affected by this declaration of his in all Government contracts for Government buildings is entirely erroneous. He must bear in mind that farmers do not always continue to farm out in the district. They often come into the towns to build their residences. In my own constituency a new part of the Caledon township is being laid out and large numbers of farmers are putting up their residences there. In another part of the township the Minister is constructing a building where he is paying unskilled labour, irrespective of colour, 8s. a day. In that very same township a farmer or any other citizen is building a building for his own private use. Does the Minister think in a comparatively small township that the fact of his paying 8s. a day on a Government structure is not going to affect the wages the private builder is going to pay? The Minister must have a very peculiar idea of human psychology if he thinks that. What I object to is this, that we, as taxpayers in this country are being saddled in the case of all Government buildings with extra expenditure. Every contractor when he tenders for Government contracts will have to take into account 8s. a day for unskilled labour. In the country districts there is no demand for this exorbitant wage. I can only now, in the name of my constituents, protest against this innovation which has been brought about by the Minister in all Government contracts in regard to public buildings. We are now calling for tenders in connection with the Caledon hospital, for nurses’ quarters. The provincial authorities have agreed to give us a certain fixed amount towards that. We have to provide the balance necessary. We have got that by private subscription; we have about £1,500 in hand, which is the estimated cost. Now the Minister comes along and he says—

The result is we should have to go back to the public for additional donations in order to cover the Minister’s wage regulation. I can assure the Minister that this is a most unpopular regulation and he will hear a great deal more of this new departure in taking away the right of the contractor, the right of the principal who is responsible to the contractor, the right of people to pay according to circumstances in different parts of the country. I protest against this new regulation.

I want to say to the hon. member for Caledon (Mr. Krige) that he is behind the times and out of line with modern thought. His speech is based on the assumption that paying a civilized wage is going to add to the cost of the building. It is going to do nothing of the kind. I suggest to him that he reads a book, “The Life of Lord Brassey,” written by his son. He was the largest constructor of railway works in the world and he says that in India they employed very cheap labour on the contract; then they had to do work in Canada, where they had to take men from the British isles and pay them a very high wage and at the end of the contract their labour costs were no greater in Canada on the high wage than they were in India on the low wage. The idea of the hon. member was exploded long ago. By paying a civilized wage you encourage a man to put the best that is in him into the job, and by paying a low wage you perpetuate the system of the employer paying the lowest wage he can pay and the workman doing the least work he can. I approve of the line the Minister has taken on economic grounds, because in the long run it is going to be much cheaper and better for South Africa to base its labour on a civilized standard.

I agree with the hon. member for Germiston ( Mr. G. Brown) that we ought to pay a man a wage on which he can live. But here we find that the Minister compels the contractors to adopt a provision in the contract that they will pay unskilled labourers 1s. an hour. If a provision is to-day put in the contract that unskilled white labourers are to receive 1s. an hour, then I should have nothing to say against it. We know, however, what the position in the Transvaal is, viz., there are white and native labourers. The provision in the contract does not stipulate that only the white labourer is to receive 1s. The present provisions encourages the natives to demand the same wages everywhere as what are paid for unskilled white labourers. I think the Minister’s principle is dangerous in the Transvaal. If the contract provides that white labourers are to receive 1s. an hour and native labourers a little less, e.g., the half, then the contractor can be compelled to use a better class of labourer. If, however, the natives are paid at the same rate as the whites, then I consider it a hopeless principle. The effect of it will be felt in the future. The natives will go to the villages where large buildings are being put up. The contractor will say that he prefers to use native labourers, because he will be able to push them, and we know that a white man will not willingly permit that. This policy in the Transvaal will result in something we do not anticipate to-day.

The speech of the hon. member for Germiston (Mr. G. Brown) is typical of the Labour party. Directly anyone puts forward the agricultural point of view you get these gentlemen of the Labour party saying they don’t know what they’re talking about, and they are fools to talk like that. I grant that we are fools to allow the Labour party to get their grip round our neck in the way they do. They repeat these platitudes, and they do not know what they are talking about. It is just like putting a gramophone on the floor of the House and letting it reel out the same old tune. You might just as well put a parrot on that table and let it voice the principles of the party. It would give you just as much common sense as the Labour party would themselves. We have the platitude that when you pay a man a higher wage you get better work. That is not the point at issue at all. The point is whether it is a good and sound principle to pay a white man 1s. an hour—which is, after all, a low rate of wage—and to pay a native 6d. to 9d. an hour, which is a high rate for unskilled labour. If that is a sound principle applied to building, then it must be soundly applied right through labour in this country. The hon. member is sitting beside two farmers of the old school. Are they prepared to pay 1s. an hour for unskilled labour on their farms? Of course they’re not! These rates of wages are gradually being fastened on to us; the shackles are gradually being rivetted on to us, and the time will come when we shall not be able to shake them off. These labour doctrines and ideals are surely going to spread to the country. Then we are going to say, S.A.P. or Nationalists—

We belong to the conservatives, we farmers on both sides of the House. The hon. the Minister of Lands is smiling; he is one of the old conservatives himself, he dare not get up and support the Minister for Labour. I welcome it for this reason, that it is going to drive the conservatives of this country into one camp. Then we shall treat the Opposition then as they should be treated. The Opposition will consist of men who have not the real interests of the country at heart, but whose only aim is to squeeze the uttermost penny from the taxpayer and the wage-earner of this country. When they have squeezed them dry they will pack up their tools and go to another country. The hon. member for Witbank (Mr. A. I. E. de Villiers) has a broad smile on his face. He is going to be in the same boat as we; in common parlance, we shall be left to “nurse the baby.”

I can understand the speech of the hon. member for Germiston (Mr. G. Brown). It is all right to pay 8s. a day when it is earned, but does he tell me the native labourer will earn 8s. a day on this job. Let it be paid when the wage is earned; no fair-minded man would object to that, but to go and pay it to unskilled labour when it is not earned is another story altogether. This move of the Minister’s is going to have two effects. First of all the farmers will be affected because they employ unskilled labour on their farms, and everyone knows perfectly well the farmer cannot afford to pay 8s. a day or anything like it. There is another point my hon. friend seems to have overlooked entirely. The skilled man in this country gets the highest wages in the world outside the United States, simply because the wages of unskilled labour are the lowest in the world probably.

What about unskilled labour in the States?

They are paid for results there.

They have high unskilled wages in the States.

We pay for skilled labour higher than they do in Australia, New Zealand and Great Britain, or any country outside the United States. If you raise the wages of the unskilled man, the wages of the skilled man tend to fall.

The Minister has adopted a very dangerous principle in this clause. In Natal the unskilled man gets 4s. a day, if you adopt this principle he will ask to be paid 8s. a day, and it is going to affect native labour throughout the whole country. At the docks at Durban Zulu labourers are paid 4s. a day. I want to warn the Minister. If it is paid to natives under civilized conditions, I have nothing to say. If this is applied, however, to the native who works on a building in Natal, you will find your costs very largely increased, the I.C.U. being very busy in Durban rendering the hitherto good relations generally existing between master and servant.

What is the position in the United States? The farming and commercial community there recognize to-day that higher wages mean prosperity to the commercial community and the farmer. When my hon. friend suggested that bankruptcies occur in the United-States amongst farmers, the reason is that many of them are mortgaged. It was rather amusing to hear the hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson) attempt hereniging in this House, and say that his hon. friends of the Nationalist-party were wrong in associating with members of the Labour party, and he was trying to get at the Minister of Public Works because he is a good Labour man and a good socialist. The hon. member waxed so eloquent that his eloquence ran away with his discretion, or any reason we might have expected from him. That they get so wroth with the Minister of Public Works is the best indication that he is doing his job well, and carrying out his principles. I am quite sure that when the Minister has been in office for many years, as we hope, the fruit and results of his work will be shown. It has been proved and emphasized that if you crush down the lowest paid workers, you create a depression throughout the whole of your system, with the exception of a few highly-placed people who control and manipulate finance and industry, but apart from these, the policy of the Minister will stand the test of time. The small shopkeepers in Cape Town, Durban and Johannesburg, or in towns of any size that are dealing with industrial workers or wage-earners, need not fear the policy of the Minister. The only people who will suffer to a certain extent are the large employers.

I have received a letter from Johannesburg concerning which I hope the Minister will give me a reply as to whether the statements are correct. The letter says—

The first statement cannot, I think, be controverted. Is the next statement correct? I cannot vouch for the correctness of that statement, but the Minister will know whether it is correct, and, if so, is furnishes a scathing commentary on this white labour policy. If the statement is correct the less said about the civilized labour policy the better.

I quite agree with the hon. member—if those statements are correct I will join with him in denunciation. If any section of the community preaches one thing and does another it is hypocritical. If I find it is true, my voice will not be the softest in denunciation. I do not know whether it is true.

You ought to resign if it is true.

My hon. friend is not going to catch me in that.

A forlorn hope!

Yes, that I should resign, and that you should get the job! But are we to understand that the other side of the House is not in favour of uplifting the natives? When I told the Committee in answer to the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) that I was not making differentiations, the hon. member applauded, not my fairness, but my decision.

All unskilled labour is alike, whatever the colour of the skin.

You applauded the decision that you should not make a differentiation between colour. I want to know whether this is shared by the other side of the House—the attack has come from there. Is it the generally accepted opinion on that side of the House that we shall not uplift the native but shall differentiate as between white, coloured and natives? Hansard bristles with speeches made by hon. members opposite charging the Labour Party with attempting to depress the natives.

Quite true. There is the Colour Bar Act.

Antecedent to that. You cannot have two diametrically opposed intentions contained in the same thing.

You have two opposites in the Pact.

My hon. friend evidently was not present this afternoon when I announced that I had been urged by the master builders to apply the shilling-an-hour condition to whites only. I refused to accept that and went to men in the Labour Party and the trade unions, and they were unanimous in their decision.

Why did you allow it in Natal?

The very people who are now objecting asked me to vary it. I also announced in the House to-day that this was in the nature of an experiment. I did not like any variation, but even in the skilled trades the unions suggested that in the countryside we should be prepared to vary. They signified their wholehearted co-operation in this direction as they did not want to make the position difficult for the farmers. They are anxious to make the thing a success and to uplift the bottom dog, but we don’t want to do it all at once. That is why I have agreed to variations. I don’t want to make the thing a failure by endeavouring to bite off the whole lot at once. The result is calculated to be quite the reverse to what the hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson) seems to anticipate. Let me say to the hon. member for Caledon (Mr. Krige) that this policy has already proved cheaper, the reason being that when employers were able to employ cheap labour they wasted it, but directly they had to pay for their labour they chose the best available. I am speaking of industry now. The Minister of Labour this afternoon was able to bear that out in regard to the building of the post office at Kimberley which is a very fair test indeed, because of its magnitude.

The club at Johannesburg is the fairest test of your sincerity.

I have not had proof of that yet.

There are several Rand Labour members here who know.

The hon. member will have an opportunity of again addressing the Committee.

I ask the hon. member to be fair. If he proves it I will take up my stand in obtaining what one might call rectitude. The ordinary native labourer is now being released for farm work. The activities of the Public Works Department are so small compared with the activities of the countryside as not to be worth considering.

You set the example.

I agree. The hon. member who purports to represent the natives in this House suggests that we are perpetually trying to keep the natives down.

Give them a chance.

That is what I am trying to do.

The colour bar.

There is no colour bar in this, and that is what is annoying the hon. gentleman. We are demonstrating administratively that we are not out for a colour bar and that all people should be fairly dealt with without a colour bar. I would like him to go back to the Native Territories and tell the people there the attitude he has taken up here. No case has been made out against the imposition of the shilling-an-hour rate. At first I thought it could be applied generally, but I found there was a tremendous fear that by introducing it in the countryside it would affect the natives. I accepted that view. My judgment is perhaps not perfect. I know my hon. friend is very sorry to hear it, but I am prepared to concede something to other people’s judgment, and that being so I came to the conclusion that it would meet the needs of all concerned if I made the scheme at the start apply only to the big towns, but in the countryside to make variations. The difficulties the hon. members fear will never eventuate. As to the point raised by the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg the fair wage clause still exists.

I want to ask the hon. member for Somerset East (Mr. Vosloo) and the hon. member for Oudtshoorn (Mr. le Roux), who represent the farmers, to endorse the views we have heard from the Minister, who says that he is starting the principle that in the towns the natives must receive the civilized wage—the shilling an hour. We have heard two extremist doctrines. We had the Prime Minister telling us that we must develop the native in his own area along his own lines. We have the Minister of Labour saying—

Can the hon. Minister reconcile these two views? We in the country have to live with this so-called uncivilized labour—our existence depends on these natives and the existence of the native depends on his living and developing in the country, for he is often led astray by coming into the town. The best natives are invariably those who live in the country. The greatest enemy that the native has are those gentlemen who tell him that when he comes to the towns he can earn a shilling an hour, put on a white collar, and call himself a white man, and forget his own home and people. I appeal to any Nationalist member from the country who understands the natives to get up and support the doctrines we have heard to-night, if he honestly can.

You understand exploiting the natives.

Let the hon. member exploit the Labour party. What is civilized labour? Let us have some definition. The colour of a man’s skin? Is that the test?—for that is the civilized labour policy the Minister has preached to-day. What is happening here in Cape Town? The Administrator has been told that he can undertake the excavation of the site for a new hospital at Groot Schuur provided he uses “civilized labour,” but it must not be black. That is the distinction as far as I can find out from the Minister; as long as a man’s skin is black, he cannot be civilized. Is that the doctrine the Minister preaches when he makes the proviso in his contract that no man, whatever his civilized standard may be or his educational attainments, so long as his skin is black, he cannot be employed? Is that the doctrine of the Labour party?

No.

What about the colour bar?

I have no time for the colour bar.

You voted for it.

I did.

I don’t believe one member of the Labour party has any honest desire for colour bar legislation, because it is unjust. I must ask the Minister again how he defines civilized labour? I come from the Transkeian territories, where we have one million natives chiefly depending on the labour of their own hands. I find contractors coming from Johannesburg to build a hospital for the natives themselves out of funds that we vote here, and the condition is that it must be constructed with civilized labour costing 1s. per hour, which means that natives are practically debarred.

What do you want?

I want the natives to have a fair chance of earning their living in decent conditions, and of rising in that scale of civilization of which the hon. Minister has preached to-day. What is happening in Johannesburg? There they are erecting a native location under the Native Urban Areas Act, but the natives have to pay a rental for the buildings, and the conditions are that those buildings shall be erected by civilized labour, which means white labour. Every native knows they could be erected at half the price by black labour, and they also know they have ultimately to pay the cost. Is that right? Cannot I appeal to any former on that side? No. Then I issue a challenge to any member of the farming fraternity on the Nationalist benches to rise and support the doctrine which the hon. Minister has just preached. If this challenge is accepted, it will be one of the greatest surprises of my life. I ask the hon. Minister not to get up straightaway, out to give any of those gentlemen an opportunity of rising before he gets up himself.

Members on the Opposition side must have reason to congratulate themselves on the advancement of their cause by the attitude of the last speaker. Clements Kadalie will find a lot of assistance from the contents of that speech. In this House we advocate the dominance of the white people, and we say the native is a ward of ours, and we are his wardens. Yet you hear a representative of the natives in this House stand up and say we depend upon the native for our existence. Whether he means economic or social existence I do not know, but it is the most degrading declaration I have ever heard from a European. We, of the Labour party, have never confessed that we depended upon the native or any inferior race. We look upon a people who are unable to maintain themselves by their own exertions as inferior. Many of those who deem themselves our superiors, we look upon as inferiors. I would like to refer the hon. gentleman to the biggest industry in the country, owned and controlled by his political friends on this side. I do not remember him coining back and raising an outcry when he went through the compounds and saw natives working in the time offices and hospitals, and wearing collars, and paid a wage which enabled them to live up to a standard of decency. Nor, on the other hand, did he cry out in protest against human beings being herded together by the thousand like animals, scientifically well fed for their tasks, separated from their women kind in the prime of manhood, with immorality rife all round, and unspeakable practices rampant amongst them. We did not hear that outcry, but we do hear an outcry when a Labour Minister tries to pay for labour what it is worth. Have you proved the labour is not worth the price he pays? Have you attacked him on that economic point? Such a speech is calculated to raise the anger of those who the hon. member and his friends say we must look upon as our economic and social inferiors. You do not attack the Minister on the grounds that we have wasted public money by paying a bigger price for labour than it is worth. In conclusion, when our friend wants to convince this House and the public that he is sincere, let him put his finger on the political, social and economic sores which exist, and let him point out to the House, as well as to utilize the press of the country to broadcast, the fact that those sores do exist. The credit of this House rests upon its sincerity. If the credit of this House rests upon its sincerity, and if the public becomes convinced that this House is simply an arena to cast backwards and forwards insinuations for the purpose of scoring political advantage, then the House is going to fall into discredit. The native question is much too serious in this country to be used for that purpose. By taking the line he has taken, he has injured his reputation, and it does not redound to the credit of the hon. member when he seizes the occasion of proper remuneration to the native to speak this way, and does not recognize that all labour, European or native, is worth its hire.

When the hon. member for Pretoria (West) (Mr. Hay) said the farmers were exploiting the natives for threepence a day, I looked to hon. members to repudiate it. No greater calumny can be used than that.

To a point of order. I am charged with a statement which I deny making. I asked the hon. member for Tembuland (Mr. Payn), when he was speaking, if he wanted natives paid threepence a day. I never said we wanted to pay that wage.

I accept the hon. member’s apology. For the edification of the members of the cross benches, who are so loud in their protestation that labour should be adequately paid, I ask them is there one hon. member who will support the policy of piece-work?

What has that got to do with it?

It has this to do with it. That is policy which is controlling labour conditions in regard to the farmers in Natal and all parts of South Africa. Every native in every line of agriculture is paid by results. In my district they earn half-a-crown a day and their keep. I hope farmers on the other side will see the point of the pernicious policy of the hon. Minister. The hon. Minister advocates a minimum wage of a shilling a day in the towns. Does he know there is a movement on foot among the natives to amalgamate and join together, and it will not be long before they demand these conditions on the farms? What will happen to the farmers then? The backbone of this country are the farmers. We have made this country with the aid of native cheap labour, and we are expected to compete in the markets of the world, which we are able to do owing to cheap labour. We realize that native labour is our best asset, and we have built up the wealth of the country with it. Some of these hon. gentlemen, the flotsam and jetsam of other countries, would not have been here to-day but for the native. The South African farmer appreciates that asset, and is anxious to treat the native fairly. One hon. gentleman from the cross benches shouted—

The minimum wage on farms for unskilled labour in Australia is two shillings an hour, and what about the condition of the population in Australia? Two-thirds of that population are in the towns, and that is because of the high rate for unskilled labour and the taxation of socialistic Governments, which have driven men from the country to the towns.

Where did you get that from?

I have just come from there.

Then don’t decry your host.

I am not decrying my host. I am stating facts. Hon. members want to know why the people from the rural areas in Australia are flocking into the towns. It is because of the socialistic Governments they have there. Every piece of land in the six States of Australia has got to bear five taxes. The small farmer, with that taxation and the high rate of pay for unskilled labour, cannot make a living, and he is driven into the towns, and there employment is created for him by socialistic Governments, who are entrenching themselves by finding jobs for these people. I would appeal to my friends on the opposite benches who have the same calling as I have to regard this as the writing on the wall. Do not let our experience be the same as that of Australia. The South African farmer will not give place to anyone with regard to his fair treatment and fair payment of native labour.

I would like to inform the Minister that a school had to be erected in one of the up-country villages and a contractor undertook the work. When he got there he asked the masons living in the place what they generally received for their work as masons. They said “10s. a day.” He engaged as many as he could get at 10s. a day. Before long an inspector from the Public Works Department came along and asked the masons what they were getting. They said 10s. He told them they were not allowed to do that and that they must get at least 2s. 9d. per hour and must not work for more than 8 hours a day. What was the result? The contractor said that if he had to pay that rate of wages he would lose on the contract. He had to sack all his men. They afterwards came back and said that they were prepared to work for 10s. a day.

Where was this?

At Britstown. It was impossible for this contractor to pay 2s. 9d. per hour and the men had to go without work. This policy is going to have a serious effect upon agricultural employment in this country and especially the regulation that unskilled work must be paid at least 1s. an hour. We know that the greater portion of the farmer’s income depends upon world conditions while the cost of his produce is determined by domestic conditions. A contractor can in the next instance put in a higher tender so that he is able to pay these higher wages, but what is the farmer going to do? He cannot raise the price of his produce because that is fixed by world conditions. With reference to the remarks of the hon. member for Langlaagte (Mr. Christie) the hon. gentleman held up the United States where high wages were paid not only in the towns but also in the rural districts. I have here a dispatch from Washington based on the report of the department of agriculture in the United States which shows that in 1925 there was a net loss to the farm population of 900,000 persons on account of the increasing drift to the towns. In 1924 the net movement away from the farms was 697.000 persons. An appeal was made by the hon. member for Tembuland (Mr. Payn) to farmers’ representatives on the opposite side. I did not rise then, because I thought I would give them an opportunity of speaking, but they have preserved an absolute silence. Their faces, however, told the story when the appeal was made. They know as well as we on this side know that this policy is going to seriously affect the agricultural industry in this country.

There would appear to be a good deal of widespread misconception as to the object with which this clause was inserted by the Minister in his labour conditions. I confess that in my simplicity I thought the object was to exclude native labour; but the Minister has indicated to the House that his object was directly the contrary. He intended to convey the idea that the proviso was put in for the purpose of increasing native wages. I think that is pure cant. The hon. member did not mean that. That is not the object of putting in this 1s. per hour; the object clearly is to squeeze the native out of this sphere of labour and possibly a good many coloured people also. Here, again, is another colour bar. There is no question about it. The effect of this provision, apart from other aspects, is to exclude the native and a good many coloured people also from getting employment. I submit that, after all, the native has some claim to our consideration. I heard hon. members on that side talk with tears in their voices about the white man being the guardian of the native. There is no evidence of that now. The Minister is being supported in what is another colour bar. I want to indicate further what the effect of this will be. I happen to be interested in a native township near Johannesburg. It is a purely native and coloured township.

Yes, a shocking township it is too.

To show how much the hon. member knows about it, that township has the blessing of members of the Native Affairs Commission and the Native Affairs Department. Some of the natives are better housed than many white people. They have got their own properties, and there are many decent natives amongst them. Unhappily there are many who are corrupted by the white man.

The most drunken place in the universe.

That is not correct either. I can only say that the Native Affairs Commission and others familiar with the matter favour that solution of the native problem. The health committee of that township want to put up an office. They have sufficient funds to do so, if it can be erected by people resident in the township. There are natives sufficiently skilled to do the work, but this is an area to which the wage board provisions apply, and they cannot do it unless they pay the very high wages laid down. So you see the operation of this. There is no doubt that you cannot lay down prices of labour in regard to one industry and not another. So many of us lose sight of the fact that this country has been built up largely by native labour, cheap labour. If you eliminate that and go up to high prices, you have to pay the penalty. The time will come when these increased prices of labour will be forced upon the country people. Farmers have a hard enough time already with droughts and other drawbacks. Now they have this spectre in the background of their native labour being tampered with by pernicious contract clauses being initiated.

The hon. member for Umvoti (Mr. Deane) asked farmers on this side to see the writing on the wall. A few days ago some hon. member on that side put the writing on the wall of the lobby, but he could not even spell it. The same applies now. They are trying to tell us the old, old story of a low wage being the best asset the country could have. It has been proved time and time again that that is a fallacy. I say this, that low wages in this country are one of the curses of the country, and anything we can do to increase the standard of wages and the consumption that follows will be one of the best things we can do for South Africa. The farmers have not a very high record in regard to the wages they pay—

Give us some instances.

We had an instance in the Oudtshoorn district where it was held up as a public scandal, and quite a number of cases have been reported in recent months where farmers and other employers of native labour do not pay sufficient wages. If the great mass of the working people of this country could get a higher standard, the interests of the country would benefit to a great extent. But they do not want that on the other side. All they want is cheap labour and exploitation. The hon. member for Umvoti talked about a declining agriculture in Australia. Is the wheat-growing any less? Are the agricultural products of Australia becoming less and less year by year? The hon. member knows it is not so. Improved agricultural conditions and improved wages in Australia are enabling them to compete most successfully in the world’s market, just as improved conditions and wages in this country would do. With sugar produced by white labour, they can compete against Natal where coolies are paid at scandalous rates.

What are they paying for sugar? A penny a pound more.

Let me quote the Administrator of the Cape Province, Mr. Fourie, who has put white labour on his farm, and who says to-day that it pays him far better, and hr is speaking to-day as the Administrator of the Cape Province. They talk on that side about consideration for the native. As long as he is prepared to work for 2s. a day or less, they are prepared to give him consideration, but when the Government is prepared to give him 8s. a day and to raise his standard, then there is no consideration for the native on that side of the House. As long as he is a cheap, servile slave, they want him, but if he becomes a civilized man they do not want him.

I think the rapid way in which the question has swung round the full circle is astonishing. When hon. gentlemen opposite recently talked about the colour bar I predicted that the day the native asked for 6d. a day more he would know where his friends are. That day has come. To my astonishment the hon. member for Tembuland (Mr. Payn) stands up boldly to ask that the native shall not be paid anything more. Let him go back and tell his constituents that, both natives and traders. One does not want to go into the question of other countries which have made a success of high priced labour—it speaks for itself. I would like the hon. member for Umvoti (Mr. Deane) not to rest on the experience he has gained here and in Australia, but to accept the invitation of the International Harvester Company of Canada and see the film that they are going to show on the 1st March and he may realize that the solution of production is not in reducing the native to lowest priced servitude, which if not chattel slavery is economic slavery, which is perhaps worse. I want to deal with the remarks of the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus), the boastful owner of Alexandra township.

I am a shareholder, not the owner.

Well, if he will go on the road between that township and Johannesburg some Sunday evening I hope he will feel ashamed of his ownership. It is a nest of illicit liquor selling. Let him ask the Native Commissioner why the authorities did not want to give the Health Board of Natives any powers. If I was in the hon. member’s place I would conceal the fact that I had any connection with that township. I do not know another township near Johannesburg which has such an evil reputation—not even Klipspruit, which is under municipal jurisdiction, and which we ourselves are ashamed of. Let him spend a Sunday in Alexandra township and know from whence the rentals come. The pseudo friends of the natives will yet be found out, as the hon. member for Tembuland (Mr. Payn) has tonight been found out. The so-called friends of the natives merely want to exploit them at the lowest pay possible. The whole movement of the Opposition is to keep down the price of labour in the interests of their financial leaders and not out of any friendship to the farmer. The mining interests would import foodstuffs to-morrow if it paid them to do so, and added to their dividends.

My friend the hon. member for Pretoria West (Mr. Hay) is again wandering and speaking through his neck. He said that countries of high wages speak for themselves. I agree with him. Look how Australia speaks for itself—one cup of tea in Australia costs one shilling.

How much for the whisky?

The hon. member for Durban (Umbilo) (Mr. Reyburn) also was romancing a few minutes ago. He also cited Australia as a country which was increasing its exports. Let the hon. member take the statistics for Australia for 1923 and 1924, and he will see a diminution. Good seasons govern export. It is a well-known fact that two-thirds of the population are in the towns and they are driven there owing to the high cost of living and the high price of labour. With regard to what the hon. member for Pretoria West said about a film to be shown, I am the first patron of the International Harvester Company’s machines in South Africa. If any hon. member on the cross benches thinks he is going to teach the South African how to farm and saving on labour, it is like teaching the proverbial grandfather to suck eggs. By their faces hon. members on the cross benches look broken-hearted.

Why worry about it?

Because your interests and mine are the same. I am disappointed that no agricultural representative on the opposite benches has the courage to get up and repudiate the policy he condemns. Their constituents’ interests are the same as mine. Do not leave me single-handed, but get up and assist.

I certainly am a shareholder in the company that owns the Alexandra township, of which the hon. member for Pretoria West (Mr. Hay) had a great deal to say in disparagement. I am not responsible for the drunkenness of which he spoke, and of which there is a good deal. It is caused by people who have the same colour of skin as the hon. member has—white men. The white man is the illicit liquor dealer. Will the hon. member devote his energies in that direction?

What about the prosecution of some of your friends?

Who, which friends? I know of none! It is very distasteful for me to discuss my private affairs in the House, but if the hon. member has any attack to make on me let him do it openly so that I can know what he means. The township has received the blessing of individuals in a far better position to judge than he is, and the members of the Native Affairs Commission have approved of it.

I don’t want to follow the hon. member into a highly coloured talk about liquor selling. I notice that when hon. members on the cross benches get hold of something that has bitten them they always want to switch off and attack somebody personally. I have never heard a better explanation of the old proverb, “Satan rebuking sin,” than that contained in the hon. member’s speech. He accused us of being the natives’ enemy. It is admitted by hon. members on the cross benches that if the shilling an hour rate were adhered to the natives would get no work at all and that this is the object of the regulation, and then they have the hardihood to say that we are trying to do the natives out of their job. If the hon. members on the cross benches had their way there would be a clause providing that the shilling an hour should be paid only to white people. The hon. member has no more idea of how to run a farm than how To run the Roberts Victor diamond mine. We farmers, however, understand labour conditions and do not believe in the policy of making white and black compete in the labour market. The white man’s task is to perform skilled labour. A flat rate of a shilling an hour is going to do good neither to white nor to black. An hon. member has stated that the Administrator of the Cape Province has suddenly discovered the enormous advantage of employing white labour on his farm. He has done nothing of the sort. But he is working the Boere-Saamwerk with white labour.

And his farm.

The Administrator is not working his farm with white labour. Let us realize that there are plenty of jobs for white men on farms. I have proved personally that it pays to cut up a farm and instead of attempting to run a farm, say, of 6,000 acres by oneself it is better to cut it up into six different sections and to put a white man in charge of each section to direct the labourers employed on it. In this way we could absorb a lot of white labour. The rising generation should be taught that it is their task to direct native labour. Unskilled labour has been, and always will be, supplied by the native. The white man belongs to the dominant race and should realize his responsibility to direct unskilled labour. The sooner we get away from the policy of bringing them into competition and thus dragging down the white man, the better it will be for the country. An instance of the evil of attracting white men to the towns is to be found at Durban, where white men working on the railways for £7 or £8 a month are living in the most appalling conditions. Whole families are existing in one room in the most awful conditions of insanitation. I am entirely opposed to that policy, and the sooner we get the white man back on to the land and make a producer of him, the better. That is the line we should follow, and not attempt to create a minimum wage standard, which is dragging the one race down and doing the other no good at all.

I would like to ask the Minister of Public Works two or three questions. The Minister claims that in departing from the original condition regarding the payment of one shilling an hour, his desire was to uplift the native. What I should like to know is what is the practical working of the present arrangement? Does the Minister adopt the same definition of civilized labour that the Minister of Labour uses? That is Question No. 1. Whether in the working of his department he limits the people who are to work to those of the civilized standard, and whether he places the same definition as the Minister of Railways and Harbours has stated in this House, that no matter what the standard of education of the native they cannot get work under the civilized conditions. I next want to ask him whether the work that is done at Groote Schuur is not done by the provincial public works under the general direction of the Minister of Public; Works and his department who will direct this labour policy. The next question I would like to ask is whether in fact the Minister of Labour has given direction that the work of this hospital is to be performed, according to notification in the papers yesterday, by civilized labour and not native labour, and that the Government is going to pay a special subsidy for the increased cost. I want to ask next under what circumstances does the Minister or the Department of Labour interfere with the policy and control of another department such as that of the Public Works Department itself. These are three or four simple questions to which I shall be glad to get a direct answer. I ask these questions as testing questions as to the merit claimed by the Minister of Public Works that he is doing what he can to uplift the native by the policy of striking from the contract, as a matter of form, the exclusion of natives, and whether the native is not as effectively excluded by the department controlled by the Minister of Public Works itself.

I do not differentiate in the application of the 1s. an hour. A concrete example will prove it. If the hon. member goes to his own town of Valkenburg, where there are extensive alterations taking place, he will see the employer is employing natives. The choice of unskilled labour does not rest with me at all. It rests entirely with the employer. All I stipulate is that he should pay 1s an hour in the town. With regard to the Groote Schuur hospital, it is a provincial service, and the conditions are set by the province, and it has nothing to do with me. I have nothing to do with the labour. So far as interference is concerned my hon. friend does not interfere, but the Minister of Labour lays down the general conditions for labour throughout the country and, in that way, impinges on every other department.

brought up the report of the Committee reporting the Estimates of Additional Expenditure from Revenue and Loan Funds, with amendments.

Report considered and adopted as amended, and a Bill brought up.

brought up the report of the Committee appointed on 16th February, submitting a Bill in accordance with the Estimates of Additional Expenditure from Railway and Harbour Revenue Funds and on Capital and Betterment Works adopted by the House.

I would like again to appeal to the Minister in regard to the final part of this clause, wherein he definitely takes away a right, a vested interest, which certain people have enjoyed for many years. I refer to the concluding portion which reads—

I want to make it clear that the dental mechanics in the Transvaal in future will only be able to do work to the orders of a dentist. As many of these people have been doing this work all their lifetime, and doing it for the public, and have been competing against the dentist, it is quite obvious that the dentists will not give them any work to do, and that they will be victimized for all time. I called the Minister’s attention to a specific case the other evening of a man who has been practising as a dental mechanic, and who is now too old to adopt any other vocation. He will be compelled practically to go on to relief work. I suggested to the Minister that if he would be prepared to give some opening to those people in the succeeding clause, I thought that would meet the case. I would suggest to the Minister that we should let these people come in under sub-section (3) of Clause 36, and take a modified examination, and thereby be put on the same basis as those 20 dental mechanics of the Operative Dental Mechanics’ Society of the Transvaal. I would like the Minister to seriously consider that. I want to emphasize the fact that he said nothing in this Bill would take away the rights legally enjoyed by people connected with any part of the Bill, but as the Minister will see, in the saving clause there is no protection for dental mechanics. The Minister used the expression the other night that dental mechanics were evading the law in so far as they got the patient to make an impression of his mouth and then send it to the mechanic. There can be no question of evasion, because he is either breaking the law or he is carrying it out. So one can accept the position that the law allowed him to carry on his work in that way for years, and dental mechanics, many of them advanced in life, are now faced with the position of being deprived of their very existence. I do not wish to go against the clause as it is, because it is right in the interests of the public that we should close the doors for all time, but we must do something to allow these people to carry on the work they have been doing. They will gradually disappear and die out, but in the meantime, under the clause as it stands, we are doing an injury to them.

Before I reply on the amendment proposed by the hon. member for Cape Town (Hanover Street) (Mr. Alexander), and which is now partially supported by the hon. member for Langlaagte (Mr. Christie), I want first to deal with the objection raised by an hon. member in connection with certain rights granted to doctors under the old Cape Act. Under that Act ordinary medical practitioners may practise as dentists, and there is a small number of them who exercise the right. The question was whether they would be protected under the Bill. I have consulted the Government legal adviser, and he has no doubt that those people are fully protected by Clause 95. Clause 95 was actually specially drawn to protect them. As regards the clauses about dental mechanics, they were drafted by the select committee that dealt with the 1923 Bill. That select committee was very liberal with regard to certain people who were previously entitled to registration and the select committee recommended these clauses. Only one member of the committee, the hon. member for Cape Town (Hanover Street), who is now moving the amendment, opposed the clauses. Therefore, the House must not be under the impression that there was a difference of opinion at all or in a great measure on the part of the select committee in this matter. The select committee examined many witnesses, both from the point of view of the dental mechanics as from qualified dentists, and, after hearing all the witnesses, they came to Parliament with the draft Bill as it now is with regard to dentists. I think the House must very seriously consider the matter before it tampers with the clauses. Let me again say that if there is one thing lacking in South Africa then it is qualified dentists. The number must be increased, and that can only happen if we make the calling attractive to our young people. We know more and more about teeth and hear every day how people’s health depends on the health of the teeth, and how disease is attributable to bad teeth. The position to-day is regrettable, and that appears clearly from the reports of the medical inspector. If we, however, do not see that dentists get a proper livelihood, we shall not find the young people selecting that occupation; in other words, we must see that the work forming the livelihood of the dentist is actually done by him, and that the dental mechanic works under his supervision. If we do not do that, the unqualified man will do the work which the qualified man should do, and there will be no encouragement for young people to train as dentists. Let me further lay down this proposition, that under the existing laws it never was the intention that dental mechanics should do the particular work which the hon. member for Cape Town (Hanover Street) now wants to allow them to do. In the existing Acts of all four provinces, it is laid down that dental mechanics may not take an impression of the mouth, and that after the false teeth are made he may not even put them into the mouth. From this it clearly appears that the meaning of the law in the four provinces was that this sort of work should be done by qualified dentists, and not by mechanics. But what happens now? The dental mechanics have so contravened the Act that he has encroached upon the domain of the qualified dentist without the law being able to touch him. He has made sets of teeth on his own account, and then simply goes to the patient, who fits the set himself, and he also makes the patient himself take the impression of the mouth which he requires. This is undoubtedly an evasion of the whole intention of the law. The Bill to-day intends only to keep the dental mechanics in the place they were intended to take under the old Acts. Now it is said that they can be permitted to merely repair false teeth for their own account. If a dentist has made a set of teeth which require repairing, it is asked why a dental mechanic cannot do the work, or it is asked why should not a dental mechanic make false teeth on his own? If we, however, permit that, then the law can again be evaded as it is to-day. It is the easiest matter in the world. The patient can then simply again take the impression and fit in the teeth, and we feel that that is the very evil to be got rid of. Therefore, it is impossible to accept the proposals of the hon. members for Cape Town (Hanover Street) and Langlaagte. It is represented that all the dentists support the hon. member’s amendment. When I read some time ago a telegram from the Transvaal dental mechanics, it was said—

I have a telegram here from dental mechanics who do not belong to that class. They are dental mechanics who to-day work, and have always worked, under the instruction of qualified dentists. They remained inside their own circle and complied with the intention of the law as it is to-day. The telegram reads—

I think that their attitude is quite right, and that the House should not go so far as to say that we will give any person the right to make false teeth and sell them to the public. If hon. members read the succeeding clause, then they will see that the Bill goes very far in protecting vested interests in the way they should be. It is unnecessary now to go into that, but hon. members will see that there are a good many people who have done work in connection with dentistry without being properly qualified, and to whom an opening is being given to become properly qualified. There are other people again who have been working for a considerable number of years in connection with dentistry without being properly qualified, but have made a living thereby, and they also are to a great extent protected by the succeeding clause. It has been freely said here that we must follow the example of England, and that some years ago quite a lot of people who were not properly qualified were protected there simply because they had vested rights. Those hon. members want us to commence with a clean slate. The matter is not represented correctly. There is not a single dental mechanic in England who was a dental mechanic and nothing else who has been permitted to practise in the future as a dentist without his having first passed a proper examination. I want hon. members, before they vote on the matter, to be fully aware of the facilities granted in England and the protection which is there given to vested rights. We have gone as far here as has been gone in England, in the case of men who are not properly qualified but who have done the work.

I should like to have the point cleared up where the Minister says that provision is made in Clause 36 for someone who has practised as a dentist although he had no diploma and who had no other means of livelihood. The Minister said that he could be given a chance to come in under the Bill. Now I should like to know whether I understood him rightly, because on page 135 of the Votes and Proceedings I have an amendment which will be unnecessary if it is covered by Clause 36. I should therefore like to know whether a man who has for 12 years practised as a dentist without any other means of livelihood and who has never been before the court will have the right under Clause 36 to make application for registration if it appears that he is competent.

I will give an explanation when we come to the next clause.

I move—

1. (a) he is of good moral character; and
2. (b) was for any five of the seven years preceding the commencement of this Act engaged as his principal means of livelihood in the occupation of a dentist or dental mechanician in any province of the Union: Provided that any person registered under this section shall be permitted to practise only in the province where he was practising before the commencement of this Act.

Perhaps members may think this is asking a great deal, but I simply wish to put the clause forward in order principally to do bare justice to members of a society of dental mechanics in Natal. It is called the Society of Unregistered Persons in Dental Business on their own account in Natal. The membership is not very large. In fact, there are only seven of them. They are not registered, but they are fully qualified. The Minister has received a communication from one of the members. I have a copy of the letter, which reads—

(and here is the name of a, dental surgeon who was at one time well known in Pietermaritzburg)—

The time came when the dental surgeon had made sufficient money to retire, and he left South Africa to settle down in England. The dental mechanic could not obtain another position. He goes on—

I can vouch for the accuracy of this statement, and it is typical of the position of the other seven members of the society. [Time limit.]

I am very sorry to say that I am not able to accept the amendment of the hon. member, because if he thinks of it, he will see that it goes very much further than even the amendment of the hon. member for Cape Town (Hanover Street) (Mr. Alexander) which has just been rejected by the committee, and the provisions with regard to the protection of vested interests under the English Act. What the hon. gentleman asks is that a dental mechanic, for instance, can be registered as a qualified dentist if only he makes application, he is of good moral character, and for five out of seven years preceding the commencement of the Act dental work has been his principal means of livelihood. He does not even require an examination. Under the English Act not a single dental mechanic has been registered as a dentist otherwise than by passing an examination. If the hon. gentleman asks that the House is to make provision for the registration of dental mechanics without their passing any examination, I do not think we could go so far as that.

Under the Natal Dental Act of 1896 several dental assistants who were in practice as dentists were put on the register without submitting to any examination. I could give the committee the names of unregistered dental mechanics who were practising in Natal and who were put on the register without passing aim examination. The seven mechanics for whom I am appealing have set out their case in a long memorandum, and they state—

Several dental mechanics who could not find employment were obliged to set up business on their own account. Their memorandum proceeds—

A case was recently decided in which a dental mechanic, doing all the work appertaining to dental surgery, had prominently displayed in his room a notice that he was not registered under the Dental Act. The magistrate refused to convict and the Supreme Court, on appeal, upheld the magistrate’s decision. The law in Natal is that if you do not hold yourself out to be a registered dentist, you can do all the work of a dental surgeon. Owing to the entire absence of provision in Natal for a South African youth to qualify in his own country as a dental surgeon members of the society would have had to proceed to England to obtain the necessary qualification. Under such circumstances, men who have spent their lifetime in the dental profession, although unregistered, but fully qualified, should not be deprived of their only means of livelihood by any Government.

I am supporting the last speaker in an appeal for simple justice. Wherever there has been an alteration in the law affecting any particular class, there has always been exemption of those already practising. I am a trade unionist, but I do ask that men who have to make their living by the use of their training should be recognized. Their number is small, and in time would disappear. The amendment provides that the applicant must satisfy the Council, and that body is not likely to be satisfied unless it is sure that there exists legitimate ground granting an application. What will be the result if the Minister makes no exception? At present a number of men who are not registered carry on dentistry. These men would like to practise their profession honestly, but must protect themselves behind qualified dentists. They have to get some miserable broken-down dentist to give them cover. In the country districts some have practised for a long time and have become proficient. I ask the Minister to accept the amendment or else give us some assurance that he will meet the legitimate claims of men driven out largely by the action of dentists who have taken apprentices, accepted the premiums and sometimes let them go out unqualified, and these men are now a danger with regard to the prices charged. We must recognize there are such men, and they have claims for consideration as the creation of circumstances too strong for them. Until recently they could qualify in this country, in which some of them were born.

If this amendment is accepted the whole clause just passed will we rendered nugatory.

Worse than that.

What is the qualification under this proposal for a party to be registered? It appears to me he has got to be of a good moral character and a dental mechanic, a very different qualification than that under Clause 35. These few people in Natal have knowingly contravened the law of Natal, and having practised contrary to the law they now want to put in a claim to the protection of Parliament. The House will never countenance an illegality of that kind.

The Minister is anxious to have the Bill passed, but we want to see the public protected as well. My amendment wishes a person who has practised for twelve years—

The amendment only arises later.

New clause put and the Committee divided:

Ayes—13.

Allen, J.

Brown, D. M.

Brown, G.

De Villiers, A. I. E.

Hay, G. A.

Pearce, C.

Raubenheimer, I. v. W.

Reyburn, G.

Snow, W. J.

Steytler, L. J.

Van Heerden, I. P.

Tellers: Mullineux, J.; Strachan, T. G.

Noes—39.

Ballantine, R.

Basson, P. N.

Beyers, F. W.

Boshoff, L. J.

Brits, G. P.

Buirski, E.

Cilliers, A. A,

Close, R. W.

Coulter, C. W. A.

Creswell, F. H. P.

Deane, W. A.

De Wet, S. D.

Fick, M. L.

Gilson, L. D.

Giovanetti, C. W.

Havenga, N. C.

Heatlie, C. B.

Krige, C. J.

Lennox, F. J.

Malan, D. F.

Moffat, L.

Nieuwenhuize, J.

Oost, H.

Payn, A. O. B.

Roos, T. J. de V.

Roux, J. W. J. W.

Sampson, H. W

Stals, A. J.

Terreblanche, P. J.

Te Water, C. T.

Van Broekhuizen, H. D.

Van Heerden, G. O.

Van Niekerk, P. W. le R.

Van Zyl, J. J. M.

Vermooten, O. S.

Vosloo, L. J.

Wessels, J. B.

Tellers: De Jager, A. L.; Pienaar, B. J.

Proposed new clause accordingly negatived.

Business interrupted by the Chairman a 10.59 p.m.

House Resumed:

Progress reported; House to resume in Committee on 28th February.