When the House adjourned last night I was going to describe what was actually taking place at the diggings and why legislation of this nature became necessary. I referred to the cutting up of farms and the effect of it. I think it wise we should realize the importance of the diggings as an industry to the public at large. The diggings in Lichtenburg produce in one month more wealth than the whole of the wine industry in a year. £600,000 worth of stones are recovered in a month in Lichtenburg and the total of the wine industry is half a million a year. Consider what it means with all this enormous wealth distributed amongst the people. It is earned at the diggings but is spent through the whole of the Union in the purchase of goods, food and clothing. It creates a market for the surrounding farmers many miles away from the diggings. With the thousands of people who are making a livelihood, directly and indirectly, from these diggings, it is, to my mind, essential that nothing should be done to close down the industry. It absorbs an enormous number of men who otherwise would be 5s. a day men, who would become absolutely poor whites and who would go on to relief works upon such pay as the Government would give them.

What about the demoralizing effects of the diggings?

Let me assure my hon. friend that I have lived on diggings myself for years as a member representing a diggers’ constituency, and that if you take the man who has been digging for a year and drawing blanks and living in abject poverty and compare him with the 5s. a day man, you will find that the digger is 100 per cent. better in general appearance than the 5s. a day man. The 5s. a day man has lost all hope of getting any further, and he degenerates and deteriorates. The digger, with all his trials and tribulations, still has hope from day to day that he is going to find a diamond next day. It is that hope, and the assistance that he gets from his neighbours, that keep him going and he remains a good, solid citizen of the State. It is quite a mistake to imagine that diggings should be condemned, and I do not agree with that. It has, of course, been a sort of fashion to condemn the digger, merely because he is a digger, but these men are producing wealth and they are an asset to the country in every possible respect. I have referred to the effect on trade of these diggings with their production of £7,000,000 worth of diamonds a year. Take the employment side. Not only do the diggings find work for men who would otherwise be without employment, but there are a large number who make a profitable living in supplying the requirements of the diggers in various ways. The system which has been in vogue has been the formation of small syndicates with interests all over the Union. These syndicates have been working there as they considered quite honestly. They have bought, and they are selling. These men are also making money. I do not suppose there are actually 7,000 diggers on the diggings, but you have, in addition, thousands and thousands of men who are properly and fittingly employed in various ways—motor-car drivers, butchers, bakers, mechanics, garage men, and so forth.

It is not permanent employment.

As regards that point, my opinion is that these diggings will go on for the next ten years. That is why we have such a large number of farms being cut up-to-day, and I quite agree with the Minister that that must be stopped. It is an abuse of the law. The reasons why such a large number of farms are being cut up to-day is because your speculator believes that this thing is going to last for many years. As long as those diamonds are there, I feel that it would be disastrous to stop the production. Limit the production to a proper scale, and stop the indiscriminate sale by all means, but you must always remember that we are dealing with a very big asset here. I know there are hon. members in this House who feel that the diggings ought to be closed down, but do hon. members realize what the position would be if, as a result of legislation, these diggings were to be closed down in six months? Do they realize what an enormous number of men would be thrown out of employment?

But suppose the diamond market were to go down?

I admit that steps must be taken to control the production. If a central body of responsible men, men interested in the diamond trade, were to be the sole buyers of all diamonds, whether alluvial or otherwise, and were to be the sole disposers thereof, then you could control the business. I am sorry to see that the Minister does not take power under this Bill to establish such a body, which would be the sole buyer. If some scheme could be evolved whereby an advance could be given to the diggers on diamonds as they were purchased from them, then I think the matter could be put on a sound footing. There should be a central body controlling the disposal of al] diamonds in the Union.

Then you must be prepared with five- or six millions.

Is it not possible? Here you have got an industry which is producing £7,000,000 worth of diamonds annually. Surely to finance that with five millions is not an impossible proposition? I am quite satisfied that the hon. member for Kimberley (Sir Ernest Oppenheimer), if he had the sole disposition and sole control of all the alluvial diamonds, would have no difficulty in raising five millions to control an annual production of £7,000,000. If the hon. member could do that, why couldn’t the Government do it? The Government at present draws 10 per cent. from this wealth production, quite apart from any other taxes like income tax, poll tax and other taxes drawn, directly or indirectly, from those people. I maintain that the Government do not do enough for the population on the diggings. Growing up on these diggings, not only in the past but also to-day, you have poor whites from the cradle, because they are not being educated. You have great rushes to farms of 10,000 or 20,000 people, and not the slightest provision made for the schooling of the children. If you are going to have these diggings there at all, I say that it is our duty to see that the children there are educated. The Government receives quite enough money for the purpose. It receives as much as £700,000 export tax alone from the diggings. I am sorry that this Bill, although it proposes to deal with the question of the diggings, does not try to do something with regard to the education of the children. I may be told that that is a matter that belongs to the functions of the Minister of the Interior, but the liquor trade is the function of the Minister of Justice, and why is that dealt with in this Bill? I would have liked to see a Bill of a much more comprehensive character, dealing with various aspects of life on the diggings. We are not considering a question of diggings where you find gravel three or four feet below the surface, for here you have great deep mines going down 60 or 70 feet. Then there is also the question of public health. There is not nearly sufficient money spent for the purpose of protecting the health of the people on the diggings. They are a big population, a big financial asset to the State, and if an epidemic breaks out there to-morrow, heaven only knows where it is going to end. I think it is time the Government did something and appointed a commission to enquire thoroughly into the matter. The diggers have always felt that they have not had a square deal. I would like to say a word on the question of claims. Farms have been cut up into infinitesimal portions. Tiny little blocks of land, in some cases measuring 25 or 30 morgen, have been given the name of a farm and proclaimed as such. What one finds very often is that the digger who has to face all these hardships and tribulations is the man who gets the poorest claim. I trust that under the system of allotting claims which this Bill lays down, the Government will not allot claims indiscriminately to these poor diggers. These men should have allotted to them claims on which they would have a fair chance of making a livelihood. Why cannot the Government have an inspection of claims before they are allotted to these people?

How can you inspect a claim without actually digging on it?

Of course, you have the piece of ground and inspection could be made by a man from the Mines Department who understands these things. The diggers deserve, and their children deserve, our consideration. Coming to the Bill itself, Section 20 prohibits the cutting up of farms. The whole of the Grasfontein population are entirely in agreement with the principle embodied in this section. They recognize that the indiscriminate cutting up of farms has acted against the digger. I do not say this Bill is not hard on the owner. It is, and I think it goes too far. I am definitely against making any of these retrospects. Retrospective legislation is always bad because you never know what rights you are attacking or what innocent men you are injuring, but I agree that the evil must be stopped. There are only one or two farms outside of the proclaimed areas where discoverers’ certificates and owners’ claims have already been allotted and set aside. Let me refer to one farm of which I have knowledge, Welverdiend. It is cut up into 53 portions. Each portion is 125 morgen. Some of these portions have again been redivided into three or four portions. In respect of six or eight portions of the 53 portions, discoverer’s claims have been granted. Other companies have become interested and shares have been sold. In some cases the ground was sold outright after subdivision to a company and there are five or six different companies who have purchased or acquired rights in respect of the farm. Innocent shareholders in Johannesburg and Pretoria knowing the enormous wealth of some of these claims, have bought shares. If this section is applied let us see what is going to be the result. In respect of which particular ownership are we going to grant the 50 claims? The discoverers’ claims were granted as late as January and in some cases February of this year. They belong to different owners, and entirely different shareholders are interested. Who is going to be the lucky company or shareholder to get the allotment of discoverer’s claims? I merely point this out to show the difficulties of applying a section of this nature quite apart from the justice or injustice of it. Section 63 prevents the digger from being assisted financially or working in partnership. There are a very large number of diggers who would never be able to work their claims if they could not get assistance from somebody. When we give the right to the owner as we do under this Bill of choosing 250 claims on a farm one can be sure that the best claims will be chosen and the rest, generally speaking, will be of very low value. The poor’ digger cannot buy these claims and the owner is not going to give them away for nothing, nor can he work with the digger on a percentage basis. The digger must become the owner of the claim apparently. He cannot have a partner who is not a digger himself. I think that is very hard. It may be well to say that the digger must not be there at all because he has no money, but we must remember that in this country there are men who, owing to circumstances outside their control, to drought and war, and who are certainly uneducated, have no means of employment unless they accept three shillings a day and bring up their children as poor whites-, but they do have a chance on these diggings.’ I think the Minister ought to give a little more consideration to that. He should consider whether it is wise to say that they cannot have assistance, because it will go on in any case. It is no use making crimes and criminals by statute. If a man is on the diggings and has drawn a blank and has no money he is sure to have some friend who will advance the money on a percentage basis. A crime will be then committed because this Bill has made it a crime, whereas it is merely only a friendly act to a poor devil who is down on his luck. I want to deal next with the position of the owner. This Bill does not give the owner a fair deal. Let us see what the position of the owner was before. He was entitled to 200 claims which was usually made 250 claims by adding the discoverer’s claims, He was entitled to pick out the best claims the farm could produce. Under this Bill, and I think rightly, he only gets 200 claims in one block. So he has lost the privilege of picking all over—as I say rightly—but he gets less rights than he had before. In addition to that the policy of this Bill is that the owner has no longer got an open market for the disposal of his 200 claims. Under the old law he had an open market; he could sell singly or in bulk to a company or a syndicate or to rich men and have the best market for his claims. Under this Bill only a certified digger can work his claims unless he works them himself, and so the market for the owner’s claims is restricted very materially. If the result is to bring down the diggings to smaller proportions the owner will be compelled to sell claims to a man who cannot afford to pay much for those claims The owner is getting a smaller deal. The question is whether it is good policy to make what he gets out of the proclamation so restricted that he will never make anything out of it at all. After all it is his property. On a farm of 1,000 morgen or more he gets 5 morgen allotted to him. That is all. In the Lichtenburg area there are great shafts sunk and the farms there are useless for farming purposes after everything has been taken out; there is nothing left. You ought to give him an open market for his claims, and companies and syndicates should be entitled to work these claims, but should be excluded from the open claims thrown open for the digger. The owner is after all entitled to some consideration. If a farm is more than l,000 morgen I think the owner ought to get proportionately more claims, and I am satisfied the digger would not object to anything like that. I am in favour of keeping the diggings for the digger, but always with a sense of justice for the owner. It is bad policy to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs. There is Section 23, which I have rather a difficulty in understanding. It deals with water rights. Although power should be taken as regards water for the diggings, if there is water, there must be stringent safeguards as to the men who are entitled to the use of the water. The water problem is very important, and I am glad to see powers are taken to control it. Enormous fortunes are being made out of drinking, machine and washing water. I do not think it is justified to make these huge profits, and that should be controlled. With regard to Section 73, I do not know whether the introduction of a section like that is sound. It is retrospective. I agree entirely with the principle that corporate bodies and syndicates should be excluded in future, but do not interfere with vested rights. Grasfontein was validly proclaimed and, if I remember rightly, it was not so long ago when official notice was given in the press that the cutting up of Grasfontein was perfectly valid. A large number bought claims there. In this Bill it is stated that unless you obtained these rights by a certain date the whole transaction is void, and if you continue, all the diamonds shall be confiscated and you commit a crime. Here is a case where you make the penalty retrospective, and surely the Minister must know that that is impossible legislation. You cannot make a criminal retrospectively. You cannot be called a criminal to-day for what you did yesterday when what you did yesterday was perfectly legal. You cannot have legislation without a penalty. You are making the legislation and the penalty retrospective, which is a bad principle. I think the case can be met entirely by saying that as and from a certain date this all conies into operation. Even then you confiscate thousands. [Time limit, extended.] The Minister is against syndicates. He tells me that the laws hitherto have recognized none but persons. But in all the previous laws a company or a corporate body could have an interest in a certified digger and hold the claim in trust. In many gold mining companies the claim licence is held by the secretary; that we know very well. They cannot have a claim licence, but there is nothing to prevent their holding an interest in claims. It is because of that flaw in the Bill that a large number of innocent persons will be injured by the enactment of Section 73. If the Minister had taken the trouble to go to the diggings and see for himself all the people who were buying claims from day to day, quite validly and honestly, with the hope of making something out of these claims, he would be astonished. He does not know to-day what a large number of small, not big men, are doing. There is an exception made with regard to river diggings. I do not want to injure the digger, but there should be justice in legislation, and if we have the power to injure people if it is only one person, we must exercise care not to do so. There is only one further point with which I want to deal, and that is the flotation of companies. Let us assume they were based on a semi-fraudulent intent, that farms were cut up with the deliberate intent of doubling, trebling or even by multiplying by thirty to forty times the number of claims the law meant they should have. Innocent persons came—speculators, of course—and bought shares. Speculation is no crime. I suppose 50 per cent. of hon. members have bought shares in their time because they got what they thought was a good tip, and, perhaps, 50 per cent. of them lost money in that way. But that is not a crime. It may be foolish, but we are not here to punish the foolish man. In the case I am instancing, the real speculator has “got away with it.” I feel Parliament ought to have due regard for the interests of those who remain. In retrospective legislation you do not know what people you are injuring. I do urge, and I hope the House will accept, that it is absolutely essential to stop the cutting up of farms, and the surest way of killing this industry is to deprive diggers of a decent chance. I think the Minister will have the hearty support of all hon. members that that cutting up ought to be stopped.

After listening to the eloquent speech of the hon. member for Delarey (Mr. van Hees), I suppose I must also be convinced that overproduction is an accomplished fact, but then I begin to think back. Overproduction was not here last year or the year before, before the companies started in Lichtenburg. According to the hon. member for Delarey, they are not diggings, but mines. They are not diggings worked by real diggers. They are worked by mines, companies and syndicates. Then I must certainly take it he is pleading the cause of the syndicates—the very men who are making over-production, but this is at the expense of the people I am representing. This law is not going to take these syndicates’ claims or farmers’ claims from them. If the farmer gets 200 he will have a longer time to work out in. The more I hear the more I feel that the Bill cannot pass too quickly, because Namaqualand will have no chance if this Bill does not become law. The Bill has clauses in it which are repugnant to the interests of Namaqualand, but I am not going to tackle it in the manner of the hon. member for Delarey this afternoon. I will take my chance when the Bill is in committee and then I shall more fully go into it. If we believe over-production will take place, and we must restrict it in some way or form, we must restrict somebody. We have heard the hon. member for Kimberley (Sir Ernest Oppenheimer) say that the mines’ quota, which he represents, is £8,200,000. We know that the market can take 12 millions and up to 13 millions, but I understand the mines can produce enough to fill all that if they put sufficient men on. They are tied down to their quota, and, if necessary, the House would take that away and reduce it to six millions, if it is going to stop a slump on the market. It is also to their interest, and they will not quarrel with the Government. When you see the scandalous way the lobbies are besieged here with company promoters who bring their coteries with them—one day it was common talk, there were men representing 12 millions, syndicates in Lichtenburg—I think we should have a rule that these men should be excluded from the lobbies, and that they should not get access, because the thing has become scandalous. They usually come to the men they know. I do not want to say anything now, as my time is short. They do not come to me—they are wiser. Every farmer I have spoken to in Namaqualand is willing to be restricted, provided the restriction is the same as to everybody in the alluvial diggings. There are no real diggers who will cavil at a restriction to sixteen men. A syndicate, in fact, and a digger in appearance will cavil. He will come to the lobby and say he is a digger. In Namaqualand we are willing to have the diamond output restricted, but in Maraisburg, although not a single diamond has been found, the place has been declared a closed area. People are so clever that they peg claims for gypsum under the Base Minerals Act, and under the pretence of looking for gypsum they look for diamonds. To give colour to their actions they have put in the low tender of 15s. to the factory at De Hoop. You have these people trying all sorts of dodges. I was in favour of sending this Bill to a select committee until I saw the lobby. All you have to say is that there is a likelihood of diamonds being found, and to-morrow the proclamation is out. No Government can allow the diamond market to slump. The Minister yesterday said that he was taking certain powers and he gave Namaqualand as an example. Namaqualand has been badly treated since 1866. I have a list of the members who represented that constituency since 1866. If Namaqualand had been better treated by its former members of Parliament the wealth of the country would have been brought to light at a time when South Africa wanted that wealth most. The Cape Copper Company took out copper to the value of £30,000,000, and when the disappointed politicians in the different parties of the Opposition had nowhere else to go the Cape Copper Company found them a seat in Namaqualand. Thereat of Namaqualand was not considered, because it was people from places like Johannesburg or Cape Town who represented Namaqualand, and they did exactly as these copper princes would have them do. In 1908 or 1910 we had two members, one was a young advocate who wanted a cheap advertisement, and he stood for Namaqualand, and we had the late Mr. Merriman standing for Victoria West. When the railway from Hutchinson to Calvinia was sanctioned Mr. Merriman said it would be extended from Calvinia to Klaver. They sold Namaqualand. This same young advocate —I think his name was Henry Stephanus van Zyl—got some official capacity in the House in 1910. Whether he sold them Namaqualand cheap, whether Namaqualand was a pawn in the game, and he swopped the, seat for the position he had—it looks rather like it—

This is rather off the Bill.

I am sorry, Mr. Speaker. It is only this Government that extended the railway to Bitterfontein; the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) was wild when they got this railway; he said it would not pay. The “Cape Argus” described it as a country the Lord forgot. No, God blessed it but man forgot it and especially the two wings of the Opposition.

The hon. member should discuss the Bill, not railways.

This much decried Namaqualand has now been found possessed of riches exceeding even those of Lichtenburg. When I came here, everybody told me what a sandy waste Namaqualand was, but now they cannot hear enough about it. I must help the Minister to get the Bill through, so as to open up Namaqualand and have Lichtenburg restricted to the same extent. I shall not rest until Namaqualand is opened up. As far as rushes and lotteries are concerned, it is only reasonable that men who have suffered all these years at the hands of the townsmen and who have paid taxes to build schools should have preferential treatment. The time has now arrived when the Namaqualanders should be able to enjoy the riches of their country for themselves, and not for the townsmen to flock in and crowd the country people out.

I hope the Bill will not pass without a considerable amount of amendment in one or two very vital principles. We all must realize that at present, though perhaps it is unfortunate, South Africa depends very largely on its minerals. We realize the position of the diamond industry, and both sides of the House agree that some control has to be exercised to protect the industry and prevent a position arising which would not only probably ruin the digger, but would also have a very detrimental effect on the country’s revenue. But it does not necessarily follow that we accept the Bill in the form in which it has been introduced. I wish to confine my criticism to the question of the proposed confiscation of land owners’ mineral rights. I allude, of course, to Clause 2 of the Bill. The Minister told us that this affects only a few farms on the Griqualand West border, but does he not realize that it will affect numerous farms throughout the length and breadth of the Cape Province? Does the Minister know that practically the whole of the farmers in Griqualand East have full rights to their minerals and precious stones? There are three forms of title in Griqualand East—A, B and C. The majority, the A titles, are the original titles obtained from the Griquas, which give the owners full rights to all minerals.

Why should they have them?

Because they paid for them. Do you want a better right? The Minister intends to deprive the owners of a right which is inalienably theirs. This is one of the most vital principles the House has ever been asked to decide. We have always respected the rights of private property, yet here we are striking at the root of fixed tenure. It does not affect Cape farmers only, but every landowner in South Africa, and we do not know where it is going to encl. Expropriation is a recognized principle up to a certain point. Sometimes it is necessary to expropriate land in the public interest; for instance, when railways are constructed, but that is done after most careful consideration, and liberal compensation is paid. Does the Minister propose to pay compensation when he takes away vested interests? Not a bit of it. It is sheer spoliation.

What about all your mineral leases in the past?

I am speaking of taking away rights under titles granted in the past. It is not the actual damage that will be done to individuals, but it is the principle we are laying down.

It has been laid down before.

Never in the Cape, and I hope we shall not do it now, for it is against all principles of right justice. I thoroughly support every member who has made this point on both sides of the House, and it seems to me the Minister has very few friends in this matter. I have not even heard the faint praise that damns. I have heard a few faint damns that praise, and often very emphatic damns. Every member realizes the danger that we are faced with in this matter, but when I said that the Minister had no friends, I made one mistake. I do not see many Labourites in their benches; they have remained strangely silent, sitting like a lot of cats which have stolen the cream. Why are they silent? It is because they look upon this measure as an instalment of that socialism they are so keen about.

Don’t be so silly.

The hon. member says—

Then it is clear that the hon. member does not represent the landowners in this country. I cannot help wondering what this country will say about this measure. They will probably say—

I am pleased to see the Minister is smiling; it is interesting to make the Minister of Mines smile, he usually sneers. Is that the gentleman who stood for Caledon? Did he tell them there that he stood for principles like these, for an attack upon vested rights and upon private property of the landowners?

But they wouldn’t have you at Caledon, would they?

I really do think, if the Minister is going to be swayed by pressure of this kind, and if this is going to be the trend of legislation in the future, the right place for the Minister is on the cross benches of the House. That is how I feel in this matter. It is not the actual value of what is being taken to-day under this clause, but it is the socialistic principle we are establishing, the principle of socialistic confiscation and of spoliation, and that is the danger of the future. The sanctity of private property is being attacked. It is true it is only the Cape to-day, but let me remind you of the old Latin tag—

“To-day for me, to-morrow for you.” It is diamonds to-day, but in the future it may be gold, petroleum, platinum, or any other substance. Is it in the interests of the country, under pressure of the socialist party, that wherever minerals are found they shall become the property of the State; that they shall be forcibly taken from the landowners whose property under certain titles they are, and parcelled out as such a Government may decide, and, above all, without any compensation? It is a wrong principle, and I hope the landowners of this House will set their faces against it, and will say that they will not have this precedent of spoliation and this attacking of vested interests laid down. The integrity of land and the sanctity of private property has been the very bible of the voortrekkers, and by legislation of this kind, interfering with this right, you are knocking down the foundation-stone of the whole Union.

But the voortrekker laws reserved the mineral rights.

The hon. member never seems to be pertinent in his interruptions. If you reserve the mineral rights when you sell the land, that is all right; but after selling the land with the mineral rights, you have no right to take them away again. The hon. member must agree that that principle is sound. One point has struck me with regard to legislation in this House this session, and that is, certain gentlemen on the opposite benches were the first to stand up when the interests of the farmers were attacked. They said they would never give in such matters, they would fight to the end. I hope the same spirit is going to permeate the hon. members opposite now. I hope now that private property and vested interests are attacked, they will stand firm and oppose this principle, and assist us to get rid of the objectionable clauses in the Bill. We all admit that control of the diamond industry is necessary, but what is the object in a Bill of this sort of introducing a principle such as we are discussing now? Where is the necessity for it? If the matter of control is so vitally urgent, then cut out these controversial matters and bring in a Bill to control the industry, a Bill that will not attempt to lay down and establish a principle which is of no importance in this connection. It is only a minor matter in connection with the control of the industry, and yet in a Bill which, we all admit, we ought to pass expeditiously, the Minister throws down a bone of contention and introduces principles we shall regret in the future if we pass them to-day. There are many of us sitting in the House who, so far as the land is concerned, have borne the heat and burden of the day. We have endured heat, and hardship and privation, but we have held on to our land which was given to us with the mineral rights, and yet the Minister says now that those who have been in possession of those rights all these years are now to lose those rights, and they are to get no compensation in return. I hope tile House will ponder deeply before taking this step. I hope the Minister will meet us on this point, and strike out this clause, and will not ask us to lay down a principle which we shall be sorry for in the future. There is only one other point, and I want to say a word with regard to the retrospective clause of the Bill. I think it is one of its fatal faults. It will destroy the confidence of the country if you are faced with the principle in future that, although you have entered into perfectly legal contracts, legal at the time they are made, yet the State may step in and say that it is in the interests of the country that such agreements shall not stand, and will be cancelled. You will undermine the confidence investors have in the country, and you will unjustly penalize men who have in good faith to-day put their money into diamonds or other similar ventures. I think those two clauses are the blots on this Bill, namely, the socialistic idea of confiscation of private rights, and the mistaken policy of making legislation of this sort retrospective. I do not believe there is any party feeling in this matter at all. You will, I hope, get the perfectly candid opinion of those who are landowners in this House, and of those who respect the sanctity of private property. I hope the conservative element in this House will prevail, and the advanced ideas of the cross benches will not sway the Minister in a matter like this, and I hope members are going to stand for the sanctity of private property and vested interests in this country.

I had the opportunity during the last week of again visiting the diggings, and I think that hon. members who have not yet seen the diggings cannot appreciate why we are passing this legislation No one can imagine the state of things there unless he has seen them for himself. I held a meeting there on Thursday night, at which members of the diggers’ committee and a large number of diggers were present, and I tried to explain the Bill to them. I, however, at once discovered that it was not necessary, because they know it just as well as we members of Parliament. The Bill deals with their interests, and they have made it their business to study it. I further discovered that there were no great grievances among the diggers in connection with the Bill, and if they did have grievances they did not mention them that night. The result of the meeting was that a resolution proposed and seconded by members of the diggers’ committee was passed to the effect that that meeting of diggers at Grasfontein accepted the Bill as drawn, with the small exception that the number of natives in a digger’s service should be increased from 10 to 20. I can therefore say that the diggers are at least satisfied with the Bill. In connection with the closing of the diggings, the hon. member for Delarey (Mr. van Hees) said that some hon. members wished it. That was also my view until I became personally acquainted with the diggings. Hon. members who support the closing must remember the difficult problem of what is to become of the thousands and thousands of people when the diggings are closed. The closing will be very detrimental to them. Formerly the diggers used to make a very poor living, and J felt it would be better if the diggings were closed, but now finally rich discoveries have been made through which many farmers in my constituency have been enabled to redeem the bonds on their farms with the money they have made on the diggings. It must not be said that the diggings should be closed because the education of the children is neglected there. We ought rather to remove the evils on the diggings. The hon. member for Delarey said, in connection with education, that the parents did not care what became of the education of their children, but I think he is wrong. The parents do indeed care, but proper provision is not made. It is the duty of the Provincial Administration in the Transvaal, or of any province where there are diggings to attend to the matter, and if this is not done it is our duty to intervene in order to see that education is not entirely neglected. It is not the parents that are neglectful, because they take the greatest trouble. It, however, happens that some farms nave already’ been proclaimed for months, and that hundreds of children walk about idle before a school is established, and some farms are completely worked out without a school being established. We must see to it that that portion of our people does not entirely retrogress through education being neglected. The hon. member for Delarey also mentioned the rights of owners. I took some trouble at a meeting I had with owners to ascertain their views, and there were owners present whose ground had been proclaimed. Their grievances were very insignificant, and the chief ones were in connection with curtailing the water rights of the owners. On the stony farms most of the water is in pans, and according to the Bill, the diggers will be entitled to have access to, and to use the water. The diggers will therefore be able to take all the water, because it is impossible to get water there by boring. This is practically the only point about which the owners complained, which it is necessary for me to mention. The deep shafts and the destruction of the ground have also been mentioned. As a farmer, I, however, may say that the stony ground of Lichtenburg has never been used for farming. If it were not for the diamonds, it could be bought for a few shillings a morgen. I may tell those who speak about the ruining of the ground that it is not used for agricultural purposes. The hon. member for Delarey says, further, that the owners’ rights are being so curtailed that they have to take their claims in a block, and that they can only sell them to natural persons, and not to syndicates. I do not know why’ the hon. member spoke on behalf of the syndicates, and I wonder whether it is owing to his love for the owners. He also spoke about the small companies, and there I agree with him. There are bywoners who can no longer make a living on the farms and go to the diggings. They are, however, not strong enough to go alone, and if they did so they would have to take an engagement at a few shillings per day, so that it would be difficult for them and their families to exist. Now such a bywoner could possibly go into partnership with other bywoners in his neighbourhood to go to the diggings, or a father can with his sons form a small partnership to go digging. I hope the Minister will see his way to meet us in the case of the poor man who has to work together with others in order to make a living. If it is not permitted, many a poor digger will not be assisted, but will actually be driven away from the diggings by the Bill. I now come to the retrospective force of the Bill. I am not a lawyer, but feel that if that is not done the permanent digger, who has all these years been making a very modest living as a digger and for whom finally the sun is rising in Lichtenburg will again be thrust into misery. Just when his chance had come, the capitalists and companies came along and took everything away from the grasp of the digger. The farm was cut up and bought up, and if we cannot make the clause about subdivision have retrospective force, then the poor digger will again not be able to touch the pest and the paying claims, because all the best ground will have been taken by people who really have no need of the money. That would be a great injustice to the diggers. With regard to the effect of retrospective force on the syndicates, I just want to say that I have had a little experience of syndicates, and of the shares which are sold by them. I have met many people and friends who have shares, but I have not met one who has been paid back a penny there.

Do they get them for nothing?

I do not know, but I have seen a document according to which certain shares were issued for services rendered, etc. They were possibly lawful services, but it is no good speaking in such cases of the poor shareholders who have spent their money, and who, by making the Bill of retrospective effect, will lose it. Some of the shares have been broadcasted throughout the whole country, because they knew that if they were in one parcel they would not be able to successfully ask this House for protection, unless they had more support behind them. As a group they would not have been listened to very much in this House. They created shares, but retained half or more than half of the shares. We must not allow such a state of things to continue. Now those people are shielding behind the poor innocent persons spoken of by the hon. member for Delarey who actually bought the shares. But are we then to deprive the poor diggers of their whole future? Which weighs heavier, the interests of all the diggers, or the interests of the few innocent shareholders referred to by the hon. member for Delarey, of whom the largest number have never paid a penny for their shares. I hope the Minister will remain firm, and will show himself worthy of the confidence reposed in him by the diggers on the alluvial diggings, irrespective of party.

It has been repeatedly pointed out by this side that we realize the necessity for legislation in order to deal with the crisis in the diamond trade and the emergency on the alluvial diggings, but, whilst recognizing this, we should guard against being rushed into panic legislation. We must take care in our haste to cope with what is purely a passing phase, and a local trouble, that we do not permanently infringe private rights. It seems to me that in this Bill as it stands there is internal evidence of having been drawn up with undue haste and on immature consideration. We are not looking at the Bill from any party point of view; we are desirous of helping the Minister to get it through. We realize that it should go through this session, and that is why we have not pressed for a select committee. Let us come to the first instance, to my mind, of hasty legislation. That is the very contentious Clause 2, this confiscatory clause where the Minister is taking power to confiscate private rights. This is a Bill which deals or purports to deal with a crisis in the alluvial industry; it is a Bill which deals with an emergency. But whatever the crisis may be on the alluvial diggings, it is not affected one iota by this question of Free State titles. So there was no necessity to introduce this contentious clause into the Bill at all. We must remember that Clause 2 deals with private rights, and it has been a long standing principle that where private owners’ interests are threatened they should have the right to be heard first. As the Bill stands they cannot be heard, because we realize the exigency of the case, which does not permit of the Bill going before the select committee. I hold that the Minister should delete this clause; it is not relevant to the crisis on the alluvial diggings, and it is unfair on the owners in question, because they have never been consulted, and it is wrong in principle. The Minister would be well advised to delete this clause for the sake of his Bill. It is not only that we are desirous of protecting the individual owners of these particular farms, but we are desirous of protecting the principle of not allowing the Government to confiscate private property without giving private owners a chance to be heard in their own defence. The second instance where, to my mind, this Bill has been drawn up too hastily, is the clause excluding civil servants from participating in alluvial diggings. I wonder why the Minister has taken such a sudden dislike to civil servants. A civil servant is no better than any other citizen, but he is no worse. I presume the interest taken in alluvial diggings by the civil service collectively must be infinitesimal. Then why put this stigma on the civil service? He is merely going out of his way to insult the service. The Minister said—

I think the civil service will greatly resent that imputation on their integrity. If a lawyer or a member of Parliament, or a chartered accountant is allowed to have an interest in alluvial diggings, why should civil servants be excluded? I remember the Minister of Posts and Telegraphs during election time, when the civil service was being courted, went out of his way to tell them that he was in favour of giving them every possible right. The Minister of Justice has done the same. Then why this petty little exclusion? If the civil servant is entitled to put money in gold mines or diamond mines, on what principle is he to be excluded from the alluvial diggings? It is not going to affect the alluvial diggings in any way, but it is a stigma on the entire service, and I hope the Minister will remove it. My point is that the Minister, in a somewhat panicky state of mind, has included in this Bill a considerable number of provisions for which there was no necessity at all. Here again the principle is wrong, to discriminate against one section of the population. The third matter on which the Minister has been over hasty is this question of syndicates and companies, Section 73. I do not know why the Minister has, likewise, suddenly taken a violent dislike to companies and syndicates. After all, what is the principle of a company or a syndicate or a partnership? It is simply collective effort. The Government is continually imploring the people of this country to co-operate. Then why should he suddenly turn round and say—

Most of the members on his own side who come from alluvial areas have pointed out that this prohibition is going to hit the digger pretty hard. In a great many instances expensive machinery has to be erected; they have to dig shafts, and in a number of cases I know of outside money has had to be employed in order to make the digging a success. If a syndicate or a partnership or a company can validly operate in any other direction, then on what principle should they be excluded here? Again I think it is panic legislation. It is over-hasty legislation. Then there is this much-vexed retrospective question. I am quite sure the Minister must realize by now what a mistake he has made. With the exception of the last speaker, who seemed singularly ill-informed as to the opinion in his own area and the rest of the country, he must realize this principle is very unfavourably looked upon, not only in this House, but outside. In Johannesburg business circles it has greatly shocked and shaken public confidence. The public are saying—

Let us assume for a moment that the hon. member for Klerksdorp (Mr. P. C. de Villiers) was quite right with regard to these Grasfontein subdivisions, and that the spirit of the law was knowingly abused. Then I still say it is wrong in principle to penalise people for doing what the law allows them to do. The Minister yesterday, I understood, told us that he is introducing a provision in this Bill making a prospector disgorge a certain percentage of his diamond finds. Dr. Merensky and Dr. Reuner found £150,000 worth of diamonds the other day —more power to their elbow, and I wish I had half their luck—but the Minister is not going to make them disgorge those diamonds. On the same principle, what right has he to penalise the Grasfontein companies?

They evaded the law.

Thom, the miners’ leader, stated at a public meeting that the Minister of Justice had told them that this subdivision was perfectly valid and legal.

It is a palpable evasion of the spirit of the law.

That has no legal effect. We understand the Minister warned them. I repeat what the hon. member for Cape Town (Gardens) (Mr. Coulter) said: Who gives the Minister the right of warning anyone, and what validity has his warning?

It was not a question of warning, but these people were told it was the fixed intention of the Government to put a stop to this sort of thing.

Who gives the Minister the right of warning regarding legislation without the sanction of Parliament?

It was fully explained that the Government intended to legislate.

That has no legal effect. I am assuming that the last speaker was correct, that these people had abused the spirit of the law, but there is a far greater principle. This question of retrospective legislation will have repercussions far beyond Grasfontein. The Government is now establishing the principle of retrospective punishment—that is what it amounts to. There will be no security in any direction. Assuming the Minister is going to take these people by their throats and make them disgorge, what is going to happen to the proceeds of their claims? Who will do the allotting after he has made them disgorge? Has the Minister thought of that? Even if Grasfontein were restored to its original unsubdivided condition, how is the Minister going to deal with these claims; to whom is he going to give them back, and in what ratio? To take De Beers, they started with individual diggers, and if companies had not been allowed they would not have been in existence to-day. It is only because of the companies that they could delve as deeply as they did.

That is a mine.

The whole system of the number of claims being irrespective of the size of the farm is an illogical one, and the difficulty of subdivision will be avoided if the Minister includes a provision in the Bill granting the owner, say, one claim per morgen of proclaimed ground. It might be more. There are, roughly, 45 claims per morgen, and if he grants the owner two claims per morgen that will give him only 1 per cent. in the proclaimed area. Surely the present system is illogical, and I am surprised it has survived so long. You not only do away with an absurd system, but you do away with this subdivision difficulty which affects, not only Grasfontein, but has wider ramifications. It affects the whole system of land tenure.

The difference in the provinces are so great that you are not justified in laying down a uniform basis.

I do not see what objection there can be. I did not understand the Minister’s explanation on the subject. But I don’t think any landowner likes the prohibition of subdivision—he see in that the infringement of his right to subdivide. Another instance of hasty legislation is limiting the number of diggers. If the conditions make it economically beneficial to employ 20 natives or diggers rather than one, surely it is an infringement of the economic law to inhibit a man from using the best or the most labour he likes. Why can a gold mine use all the labour it likes, but a digger cannot? We must not legislate for a purely temporary evil. Then an owner is deprived of working his farm after de-proclamation. Here, again, it is taking away a private right quite arbitrarily and unnecessarily, and I would like to have the Minister’s explanation why that has been done. Then I think all members on this side of the House are in agreement that the rights of owners are not liberal enough under this Bill. The Minister must remember that he is taking away from the owner a very great right in depriving him of the right of selecting his claims in the different areas. The owner will be deprived of a very considerable source of profit. The Minister spoke about the owner having 90,000 square feet. That sounds a lot, but really the owner gets a very small slice of his own land. Under Schedule 5 the owners in the Cape, the Transvaal and the Free State are all differently treated, but as this is a consolidating law the Minister should level up, rather than level down, the rights of the owners. It is a mistake to introduce in consolidating legislation the principle that a man may be better or worse off because he happens to live in one or another province. The Minister has not treated the landowners sufficiently liberally; the owners’s rights should be consolidated and made uniform at 400 claims. Under Clause 4 the Minister has the right to stop prospecting. He says prospectors’ rights are safeguarded, but I do not think that is so, for if a year hence land over which prespecting has stopped is re-proclaimed, the prospectors’ rights have lapsed. Will the prospector in that event get the claims he would have had, had prospecting not been stopped?

That is not the intention, and it is not the law to-day. A prospector has no rights to-day either.

That is a point we can discuss in committee. With regard to Sections 74 and 76, which deal with the method of disposing of alluvial areas and restricting working an alluvial diggings, the mining leases board system should be extended. The leasing of alluvial areas should be carried out through a board, either by tender or public auction. I understand the Minister, under the Bill, will have the sole right to decide leases, and could lease the whole of Namaqualand.

The Governor-General has the right. The Mining Leases Board is only an advisory body.

As the law stands, the Minister has the sole unfettered right to lease to whom he likes, at any price he likes, what are probably the most valuable diamond deposits the world has ever known. Yet the Minister of Lands cannot dispose of a square inch of land on his own initiative. I am not talking about the Minister personally, but the proposal is a wrong principle to embody in any law.

You want that principle if you wish to retain the small men, who otherwise would be outbid by big syndicates.

Taking Namaqualand, which we have on the brain at the present time as an instance, I do not think it right that a single Minister should have power to lease it to anyone he likes at what figure he likes. Another matter that strikes me as rather curious, although it is not an innovation, is the character clause. To dig, a man must be passed as of good character. Yet a man can enter Parliament and become a Cabinet Minister without any enquiry into his character.

In the case of a Cabinet Minister you have the check of public opinion.

That check does not seem to have been very effective. I know diggers’ committees have had this right. In order to before a digger, you are subjected to this inquisitorial inquiry. I suppose they want to know the applicant’s religion, and whether he has his marriage lines. Why should it be necessary for a digger to wear the white flower of a blameless life, whereas people in other callings have not to submit to a similar inquisition? The danger is that this power may be abused. The Minister may say in these rough areas that police control is not so effective as on the ordinary mine. It is open to abuse, and I submit it should not be left to the arbitrary discretion of the miners’ committee, but that these specific instances referred to in the Bill shall constitute the disqualification. In the Bill the Minister lays them down as a guide only. The diggers’ committee may have before it a miner who had been an i.d.b., and they say—

but in another case, because they don’t like the look of his face they turn his down.

The diggers’ community themselves approve this test, and they have done so for years.

Even the diggers’ community has sometimes to be protected against itself. If we have a character clause these specific instances should be embodied, not as a guide, but as a specific disqualification. I was disturbed by the Minister’s statement yesterday afternoon when he spoke about taking wide powers, and said he was taking the power which would give him the right of specially selecting certain sections of the citizens of this country for preferential treatment. He instanced drought-stricken Namaqualand to which he could say they had had a hard time, so now they can go and dig diamonds. It opens up a disturbing vista if, for instance, the Minister can say, under this power, that Oudtshoorn has had a lean time with ostrich feathers, so we will put them on the diggings. Once that section is accepted it may lead to dangers we do not realize. I may be Minister of Mines myself someday, and I might say that the South African party have had a lean time lately, so I will put them on the diggings. Every citizen of the country has an equal chance for mining on Crown lands. So this is once more a case of the Minister hastily infringing long-established principles of land tenure and other principles for the sake of dealing with a local remedy. No Minister should have even potential rights to use our mineral wealth as a perquisite of office. I do not suggest the Minister would do so, but we are dealing now with broad principles. The minerals of this country and the Crown land belong to all the citizens, and I was disturbed to hear him say that he was claiming the right to give these to one section or another. I am afraid in these circumstances the alluvial diggings might become a monstrous political machine just as oil in the United States of America has from time to time become a monstrous political machine we must guard against, these discoveries being misused and abused. I do not think it will be, and I hope it will not, but we have to safeguard against it. These are some of the points which have occurred to me as evidence of hasty action on the part of the Minister, and most of them are important enough to merit the Minister’s serious consideration in committee. We are going to assist him in getting this Bill through this session, but there are some important principles infringed in this Bill which we cannot give away. None of them go to the root of the Bill, the dropping of any of them will not prevent the Minister from dealing with the crisis in the diamond trade or with the conditions on the alluvial diggings, and so I hope the Minister is not going to be adamant on many of these clauses, and I hope that when he replies to the debate he will indicate on what lines, and in which directions, he is prepared to make concessions.

I think the country in general, and the diggers in particular, can be thankful to the Minister for the Bill which is now before the House, because the alluvial diggings have changed so much recently, and have been filled with a spirit of speculation which leads to great frauds. In the past there was always a chance on the diggings for the poor whites. Many made a living there, and even farmers whose harvests had failed could go to the diggings and make a living. Owing to the altered circumstances legislation is now necessary. This Bill certainly is urgent, and it would have been a good thing if the Minister had had such a Bill passed last year, because the change in the alluvial diggings into the spirit of speculation which led to so much fraud took place last year. I hope the Minister will be sufficiently patient and give us an opportunity to make the Bill as useful as possible to the diggings. I noticed that the Minister is opposed to the Bill going to a select committee, but I hope he will yield on this point so that a select committee can deal with certain phases. We had an Act dealing with diggings, and last year the Minister introduced a Bill. This year, however, he finds that it will not serve his purpose, and he now introduces a new Bill. I fear that if we do not see that it is a thorough one we shall find out after a year that we shall have to pass further legislation. Conditions change very quickly, and it is necessary for us to have the opportunity of making the Bill as good as possible. Clause 63 provides that persons on the diggings may not work in co-partnership. I want to suggest the amendment of that clause because it will press very heavily on the poor diggers. A father and his sons work in partnership, or two or three diggers, who do not possess the necessary means, work together on a claim. The Minister ought to permit them in such cases to continue working. Clause 73 prohibits the forming of syndicates. It is very necessary to put an end to that because we know how they have practically squeezed out the small digger. On the other hand, there are syndicates that have been formed by poor diggers, and I hope the Minister will make pro vision so that they can be protected under the Bill. I want to suggest that the number of machines should be limited, instead of syndicates being prohibited. Allow the syndicates to continue, but provide that no syndicate or digger should be permitted to have more than one machine.

Then you will have a number of syndicates all with one machine, but all combined under one capital. Then you will have the very evil that you want to avoid.

I think that if the syndicates limited to one machine, then so many diamonds will not be washed, and then the poor digger will not be squeezed cut. With regard to the rush to the diggings, no provision is made in the Bill. We think provision should be made. Notice is given in the “Government Gazette” that a certain farm will be proclaimed as a digging, and then people flock there from all parts of the country. When they get there, however, they find that thousands of people want to take part in the rush, although there are not even 100 claims. The Minister makes provision in this connection for a lottery of the claims, but it is provided that those who want to take part must be personally present I cannot understand how this will prevent the flocking to the diggings I think that, when a farm is proclaimed as a digging, and the discoverers’ and owners’ claims have been allotted, there should not be a lottery or a rush, but that a diggers’ committee should be appointed to grant the claims according to the number there are. It may consist of two diggers, two Government officials, and the owner of the ground, and the committee can have supervision of the diggings and grant claims from time to time in proportion as it sees that there are diamonds. That will, to a certain extent, prevent the overcrowding. I have another difficulty in connection with the owners of what was originally Crown land. The Bill provides that settlers shall only be entitled to 50 discoverers’ and 100 owners’ claims, while the ordinary land owners get 50 discoverers’ and 200 owners’ claims. I think this is very unfair towards the settlers, because the Bill provides that the settlers’ land cannot be proclaimed as a diggings unless he has clear title, and has paid the purchase price to the State. I think that that is very unfair, because I cannot see why a difference should be made between those people and ordinary landowners. The former have also to but their ground before it can be proclaimed as a diggings, and I should like the Minister to consider whether they cannot get the same number of claims as ordinary landowners. Another point has already been often mentioned during the debate, viz., the introduction of the percentage basis, which has my entire support. One of the great difficulties is to find a fair recompense for the owners for the inconvenience caused to them by turning their ground into alluvial diggings. Under the old law it was provided—and the Minister is following that policy—that such an owner and discoverer shall be entitled to 250 owners’ claims in all. This worked well in the past, because the owners could then subdivide. I am not one of those who approves of subdivision but as that right is taken away, I do not think it is right for the Minister to give the person who has five morgen of ground the same number of claims as the man who has 5,000 morgen. Therefore. I advocate the percentage basis. Then the man with five morgen should get his share, and the man owning a big farm proportionately more. Many difficulties in connection with subdivision will disappear, and also a large part of the illicit diamond traffic that exists to-day. Another provision which, in my opinion, should be altered is Clause 51, which lays down that diggers must have been digging for six months before they can be taken into consideration in the granting of claims. That is undesirable and superfluous. There are persons who have been driven to the diggings by misfortune without any fault of their own, and why should the man who has always been digging, and, perhaps, made hundreds of pounds, be preferred to the person who gets into difficulties through misfortune. Clause 8, also which provides that the number of labourers in prospecting and digging for diamonds many only be ten per digger is not fair. The number ought to be raised, and I want to ask the Minister if he cannot fix it at 20. At least 20 men are required for the machine, and why should the small man not be given an opportunity of using a machine? Clause 92, which deals with water rights has also been already debated. I think the mining commissioner is being given too much power, and that too much encroachment in relation to water is being made on the rights of landowners. We cannot permit the owners’ rights to be interfered with too much. We proceed from the point of view that the State has a right to the precious stones, but it is not fair that the mining commissioner should dispose at his discretion of the water rights. With regard to Clause 114, about public servants, I think it is very good that they are prevented from digging, but I should like to suggest that the restriction should be extended, and that all persons who pay income tax should also be excluded. Such persons have no need to dig. I hope the Minister will give us an opportunity through a select committee or a. Committee of the Whole House to put the Bill into such a form that it will answer its purpose.

I sympathize a great deal with the position in which the Minister finds himself. He has one of the most difficult problems to consolidate the laws we have got. He has a host of vested interests to deal with, and he has had deputations and correspondence. I think, by the thousand. I know they have all received a very courteous hearing or reply, although they have by no means got what they asked for. He has certainly dealt with the problem in a courageous way. The clauses in the Bill most strongly attacked are more strongly attacked on his side of the House than from any other quarter. One should pay the Minister the tribute that he has tackled this problem in what he considers to be the interests of the country. I do not agree with all these clauses, but I think it may be fairly said that the necessity for this Bill has been advanced from all sections of the House. Something to deal with the abnormal position which has arisen as a result of the recent alluvial discoveries is very necessary. Some of the criticism that has been advanced does not show a very accurate knowledge of the law. I would just mention the criticism of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) (Col. D. Reitz), who said that the Governor-General means the Minister, who can do as he likes. He has evidently overlooked the definition of Governor-General in the Interpretation Act, so that criticism falls away entirely, because the responsibility will not be the responsibility of the Minister, but the responsibility of the whole Cabinet; it will have to go to the executive council. I may crystallize the various points I want to deal with. In the first place, a strong case has been made out for some sort of inquiry before the Bill is made law. I would like to deal with the suggestion of a select committee, to which the objection of the Minister is that it will delay the Bill for another year. If that is going to be the result I am with him, and it would be well to consider in that case whether it would not be better to go through the inconvenience of the ordinary committee stage. This is an urgent matter, and when urgent matters have come before the House previously we have given the select committee a time limit. Suppose this Bill was sent to select committee with a time limit of a fortnight in which to report. These people who are concerned and whose rights are affected would easily be able to put their views before the select committee. The Bill would easily go through this session, and that fortnight would certainly save discussion on the detailed clauses in committee. The Minister stated that there have been select committees before; but I take it that this committee would only deal with entirely new things that previous committees knew nothing about. If they confined themselves to the new matter in the Bill, then I think they could easily get through their work within a fortnight. The Minister, in his speech upon the second reading, gave nine reasons for the Bill. I do not quarrel with any one of them, but there was no necessity, as I see it in dealing with these nine reasons to deal with this question of retrospectivity. With regard to the retrospective character of the Bill, I think hon. members who look back will remember that every time any Bill was made retrospective I opposed it. I have always been against retrospective legislation, and in the present instance I see no reason why the Bill should not be carried through with full recognition of existing rights. We have a precedent which exactly illustrates what Parliament should do when dealing with questions of evasions of the law. I am going to refer to an appellate case where the whole question was gone into. We had the very same problem in 1919 when a complaint was made on a petition introduced in this House and an amendment was moved by the hon. member for Dundee (Sir T. Watt), then Minister of the Interior, that Asiatics in the Transvaal were evading the law which said they could not own land by forming companies. The matter was hotly debated, and considered in select committee, and what was the final result? I submit that Act 37 of 1919 is the way matters should be dealt with. They said that with regard to companies holding land after the 1st of May, 1919, or practically the day the report was before the House, no such companies should be allowed to hold land. But we said nothing as to what should happen to the companies up to that date. If what they have done was illegal, it could be set aside by the Supreme Court. The retrospective provisions in this Bill seem to recognize that these people were within the law. Either those subdivisions have been legal, and you have no right to interfere, or they have been illegal, in which case you do not need retrospective legislation, and the courts after due motion will set them aside. How can one say that these things were illegal? In the first place, they were registered by the officials of this country, after the deeds had been submitted.

The Act you cite is retrospective.

It was retrospective as between the 1st of May and the 3rd of July, the date of commencement. A warning was, however, given in this House by the report. If the Minister made this Bill retrospective to the day on which the Bill was on the Table of the House, I would not object to that. In 1919 they made it retrospective only to the day the select committee’s report was divulged in Parliament. That is really not retrospective legislation, and is a perfectly fair way of dealing with it. Let me say a word on this question of evasion. People talk loosely of an evasion of the law. To my mind, it is a confusion of thought, and it puzzles not only the ordinary layman, but even the judges. In the case in the Transvaal, Judge Wessels and Judge Curlewis who sat with him, said it was an evasion of the law; but when the case came before the appeal court, Judges Innes, Solomon. Juta and Maasdorp held it was no evasion, and Judge de Villiers held it was an evasion. In the judgment of the previous Chief Justice and of the present Chief Justice, we get some illuminating passages that it was not an evasion of the law at all, but using the machinery of the law. The Act had not been made wide enough to deal with it. It was a weakness of the law, that did not provide for it, and people took advantage of it. People are presumed to carry out the law, and not what was intended to be the law. The Chief Justice, in his judgment, said—

Mr. Justice Solomon, in the course of his judgment, said—

These people found that under the law they could subdivide as much as they liked. To say it is an evasion of the law is confusing the issue entirely. What was done was done within the law, but it appears that the law was inadequate to deal with the matter, and that you must have another law. To say that this is an evasion of the law is saying something which is incorrect. Asiatics were prohibited from holding land in the Transvaal, but because the Act did not prohibit companies formed of Asiatics buying land, the court held that such companies did not evade the law when they made land purchases. As to the prevention of subdivision, the original owners of the farms will not be penalised under the Bill, for they have sold their land and received the money. Does the Minister propose to penalise the people who bought from the original owners? This retrospective clause will not hurt the man who is supposed to have evaded the law, but will hurt the people who have put their money quite legitimately into syndicates which bought the ground from the original owners.

They knew the Bill was coming on.

My friend must have the knowledge of the prophets when he says that these people knew that this legislation was going to be introduced, or he does not know what he is talking about

Lewis and Marks!

They are the people who will not suffer under the clause, as they sold out. The hon. member has big people on the brain. The people I am referring to are those who took shares in concerns which bought ground from the original owners. It should be provided that an alluvial digging or mine duly proclaimed under a prior law should not be affected by the Bill. A claim lawfully pegged under the old law should not be affected. Retrospective legislation is unfair, and I have always opposed it. Another very serious feature of the Bill which I do not like is the prohibition of public servants having interests in diamond syndicates. I regard this as a stigma on the public servants. I am not advocating that they should be allowed to give away information, and if they do they can be punished under the existing law. If a public servant misuses his position, he may be very severely dealt with. Why should not public servants be allowed to invest their money like anybody else?

They have not got any.

They may have a little to put into a diamond venture. I have a letter from a gentleman who recently occupied the position of president of the Public Servants’ Association, and it is obvious that they feel affronted by the Minister’s proposal. They regard themselves as being quite capable of carrying out their duties without the introduction of a clause in the Bill which seems to imply that they are not to be trusted. It may be said that they will neglect their duties as public servants, but if they do they can be dealt with under existing legislation. A large section of the public servants have been clamouring for greater political rights, but here their ordinary civilian rights are being restricted in a very serious respect. I have always been in favour of public servants having exactly the same rights—political and otherwise —as the ordinary citizens have. We know there are some members of Parliament who give their whole time to public work, but some of us attend also to our own private affairs. There is one very important matter the Minister dealt with, namely, the question of rushes and the substituting of lotteries. I thoroughly agree with that, and the Minister deserves credit for having in this Bill done away with the terrible scandal of these tremendous diamond rushes. In that respect the Bill will do splendid work. In conclusion, I want to raise, in a definite form, a point raised by the hon. member for Cape Town (Gardens) (Mr. Coulter). It is necessary to do it. The hon. member for Gardens" thought it enough to raise the point and to discuss it again if necessary at another stage, and he did not develop it; that is, he did not raise the question definitely of this being a hybrid Bill. You must do that before the second reading; it is too late after the second reading. If it is raised, it must be referred to an examiner. Here we have owners of Free State title having their rights affected by this particular measure, and I call your attention, sir, before sitting down, to Standing Orders 181 to 183, which deal with the subject, and provide that if a measure is a hybrid Bill it must, after the first reading, be referred to the examiner and to a select committee after the second reading. This is a public Bill, but it affects private owners of land who have free title in minerals, and it takes away those rights, and they have no opportunity, unless the rules with regard to hybrid Bills are brought into operation, to state their case to a committee of this House. Also, with regard to retrospectivity of the law, it is admitted that as a result of subdivisions registered in the deeds office, thousands of people have invested money in companies properly established in this country, and it is admitted all these investments are rendered null and void by legislation that blots them out as if they had never existed, and I submit that this is a very serious interference with private rights and interests under Standing Orders 181 to 183. I ask your ruling whether this is a hybrid Bill, and whether the Government must not, under the standing orders, refer it to an examiner before the second reading, and then refer it to a select committee in order that private persons interested may have an opportunity of making representations.