as chairman, brought up the report of the Select Committee on the South African Nationality and Flag Bill, reporting the Bill with amendments, and specially an alteration in the title.

On the motion that the report be printed and the House to go into Committee on the Bill on 20th June,

When can the House have this, Mr. Speaker? If it is to be printed, is it possible—

You can have it on Monday.

That really gives us no time. We meet on Monday morning and it means that unless we could have this report published and circulated to-morrow we had better let the committee stage of the Bill stand over until Tuesday. I simply want hon. members to have a chance to consider the Bill before it comes before us.

I am informed that the Bill, with the amendments, will probably be out to-night. It will be in circulation tomorrow.

That is all right.

Motion put and agreed to.

as chairman, brought up the fifth report of the Select Committee on Railways and Harbours.

Report and evidence to be printed and considered on 21st June.

as acting chairman, brought up the report of the Select Committee on the subject of the Union Native Council Bill, the Coloured Persons Rights Bill, the Representation of Natives in Parliament Bill and the Natives Land (Amendment) Bill.

Proceedings and evidence to be printed.

as chairman, brought up the third (final) report of the Select Committee on Crown Lands.

Report to be considered in committee on 20th June.

That is rather a fair amount, £683 0s. 10d. Will the hon. member give us some information in regard to it?

I shall be glad to explain it. There are quite a lot of similar cases, and hon. members will see that some of them amount to more than £700, and even more than £1,000. It is the Natal Act that grants such high gratuities.

There are certain regulations. In 1906 they made a certain provision, but on the 30th of May, 1910, shortly before Union, they passed a certain regulation and this is the regulation—

I thought it was my duty to bring this to the notice of the House because there are a number of these petitions coming in. These grants are only made to Natal men in the service before Union. I wanted for my own satisfaction to know what is the opinion of the House, whether we must go on or whether we must put a stop to this. In the Second Report there is one for £791, and in the Third Report there is one for something like £1,000.

I am glad the Chairman of the Select Committee has raised this point. The Treasury has not decided to disturb the practice that has existed but I think the House should know the position. This is treatment which is accorded only to Natal servants. It was just a day before Union that this special resolution was taken by Natal. Subsequently, I understand, it was approved of by the Union Government and a special Minister’s minute was drawn up, and the practice has continued ever since. But it is for the House to give an indication to the Treasury and the Committee what it desires the practice to be in future. My own view is that it would be rather difficult to disturb a practice which has been going on for so long. Our pension laws are full of inequalities, and it is absolutely impossible to make them uniform, and accord uniform treatment to all pensioners. It is just as well that the House should know what we are doing in this regard.

I hope the Minister will not disturb this. Surely it would Be a violation of the Act.

It is no Act.

It will last for only ten years, and until then no disturbance should take place.

It is not something which will expire in ten years’ time. It will go on for ever. There is no Act, and it is illegal; and unless the Committee approves of it is ultra vires.

Was it not the intention at the time of Union that this was to be done, and was it not one of the conditions under which Natal went into Union?

They passed this resolution on the 30th May, 1910— the day before Union.

That does not alter the agreement.

In 1916-’17 the Auditor and Controller-General drew attention to this, and it was thereupon decided that it should not be automatically granted, but on petition of the widow. It was found out only after it had been in practice for some time, that it was ultra vires.

Why should the Natal officials be picked out and given this privilege, and why should other officials not have it? I think the House ought to put a stop to it.

Order! The hon. member for Pretoria District (South) (Dr. van Broekhuizen) should not speak from the Treasury benches.

It is not a Treasury bench there.

I hope we will take notice of what the financial watch dog on the other side (Mr. Jagger) has drawn attention to. I think the House should express an opinion on this, and not leave it to the consideration of the Committee in the future, as if it was a precedent. If we pass this particular item this afternoon it is going to be laid down as a precedent, and it is not a small amount either. We are carrying a burden of something like three millions in pensions that have to be met, and here we are opening up a channel for tremendous expenditure, and carrying out a precedent established so far as one province is concerned.

I must say the treasury should go thoroughly into this matter and bring up a report. This is not the only case in Natal; they passed an Act on the day before Union giving a pension to every teacher. Where is the fairness of it, as mentioned by the hon. member for Pretoria District (South) (Dr. van Broekhuizen), to give this to Natal officials, and not to the officials of the whole of the Union? I warn the Minister of Finance that if this goes through you will have petitions from officials from the other parts of the Union. This was a very unjust movement on the part of the Natal Government, to pass an Act like this on the day before Union, saddling the Union with these charges. No other province did the same thing. Where is the justice of it? I think it is about time that the treasury should not be afraid, but should tackle the job.

There is no necessity for a report. The Select Committee on Public Accounts has dealt with it on numerous occasions, and thrashed it out in 1916-’17, when it appeared that this was a regular practice in Natal and they tried to regularize it by this resolution taken on 30th May, 1910. In every province some benefits are given, but the largest benefits are given in Natal. In the Orange Free State no benefits are given at all, because they did not contribute to the pension funds. You cannot have uniformity now at all. It is a question whether we are prepared to go back on the practice in Natal, and I am not prepared to go back on a practice which has existed all these years. It is not a new thing at all. Every year similar pensions have been granted, and it is simply impossible to get uniformity in this matter now.

Will the officials who were appointed in Natal after 1910 have the same privileges?

No. Only those appointed before 1910.

Recommendation put, and Dr. Visser called for a division.

Do not; withdraw.

With the leave of the committee, I withdraw the call for a division.

Recommendation agreed to.

Recommendations (20) to (23) put and agreed to.

On recommendation (24),

I see this money is to be paid in connection with injuries in connection with the industrial disturbances of 1922; how was this man engaged, and how did he come under misfortune? Perhaps the Chairman of the committee will give us some information about this case.

I understand the man whose case is referred to by the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) was very badly injured during the disturbances, and that the pension was awarded on compassionate grounds.

Was he a striker?

No.

Was he a policeman?

No, I don’t think he was a policeman; he was amongst the innocent people who received injuries during the disturbances. We have awarded several pensions to civilians who suffered injuries in that way.

He had nothing to do with the strike, but he was hurt, I think, by the Government troops. I think he is one of the deserving cases.

During the strike bombs were dropped by aeroplanes, and this person is one of those who was hit by a bomb. His entire arm, as well as his hand, were injured. If any man deserves a grant, then it is certainly this person. He was not a striker.

I move—

Agreed to.

Recommendations (25) to (30) put and agreed to.

On Recommendation (31),

I move—

Agreed to.

Recommendation, as amended, put and agreed to.

Recommendation (24) standing over, put and agreed to.

On par. III,

I move—

I think the hon. member for Harrismith (Mr. Cilliers), who is chairman of the committee, will agree that it is only right that this should be done. This is a very hard case. It is not necessary for me to go into the details, but I have a letter from the secretary of the Prime Minister to the petitioner in which great sympathy is expressed for him. I understand from the chairman of the committee that it is very doubtful whether it is a matter with which the committee can deal, but that he would have no objection to the matter being referred to the committee for consideration.

If the Government wants to accept the motion, I have nothing to say, but I am not prepared to have the matter referred to a select committee. The petitioner served in the Orange Free State from 1875 to 1902, and under the Transvaal and Union Governments from January 1, 1903, to September 30, 1915. For services in the Orange Free State he was awarded a pension of £330 a year, which was half of his salary at that time and for services under the Transvaal and Union Government, he was awarded a pension of £267 5s. per annum.

I move—

I brought this case some time ago to the notice of the Minister of Finance. Mr. Papenfus is an ex-official of the Free State republic—

This case has been repeatedly gone into.

Still, I want to say my say. He was an official in the Free State public service and entered the services of the Transvaal Government after the war. The persons who were officials in the Transvaal before the war, and resumed their service afterwards were provided for. This was also done in the case of Free State officials who, after the war, returned into the Free State service. There is no provision made for the official who, after the war, entered the service of another province, and that is why I want this case to be reconsidered.

I hope the House will at once say that we cannot follow this procedure. If every case is to be debated over again and referred back we shall get no further. I am not prepared to accept any of the motions. The case of Mr. Papenfus has already been raised on various occasions. All the facts were put before the select committee and the application was rejected. It is absolutely useless referring his case back. I do not know the case that the hon. member! for South Peninsula (Sir Drummond Chaplin) mentioned, but if all the cases that have been rejected are to be referred to the Government for consideration then we shall have to sit here for days and days more.

Just allow me to explain about the case of Mr. Papenfus. The House will then itself be able to judge whether this kind of petition can be accepted. [Report read.] If I am certain of anything it is that the select committee of which I have the honour to be chairman has gone thoroughly into every case, and I am not therefore prepared to allow any case to be referred back. My conscience is clear that we have done our best and we are therefore unwilling for every petition to be referred back.

What has just fallen from the Chairman of the Pensions Committee makes it difficult for me to move on the question I am about to bring up now, but I feel it is my duty to do so. It is a type of case which is so often passed over by the Pensions Committee. It is case No. 18, Mr. I. J. Bosman. Mr. Bosman entered the republican service in 1882, joined the Staats Artillerie in 1884, and rose to the rank of captain in the artillery. In 1898 his health failed and he applied for two years’ leave without salary. A year’s leave was granted, but as this did not fall in with the advice of his medical adviser he was compelled to resign in 1898. In September, 1899, Mr. Bosman rejoined the artillery and served right through the Boer War. Because of that break in his service of one year he has not received a penny for the twenty years’ service he gave to his Government. To-day he is an old gentleman of 70 and as a result of his service as an artillery officer is stone deaf. I received a letter on this case in which the writer says that after twenty years’ service Bosman is left stranded with nothing and to-day has to work eight hours a day to scrape together what he can and his wife has to run a boarding house to assist him. The writer continues that he is further incapacitated by total deafness. And the letter concludes—

I know the members of the committee have argued that there are many other cases of a similar character. To this my reply is that if the committee is not prepared to condone the break under the Act of last year it can at any rate give the man a pension. The petitioner is an old man and while it would mean very little to the Treasury, it would mean a great deal to Bosman. The committee ought to have considered this more sympathetically and I move—

The hon. member now has a case which has raised his sympathy. How are we to feel who have to do with thousands of cases, one just as sad as another? We are not here to distribute charity. I know this case well and a thing that weighs strongly is that the Transvaal Government, after the grant of self-government, investigated it and rejected it in 1908. Believe me that if a break in service is condoned in one case then the Act passed last year will still cost the country thousands of pounds. We have numerous cases where persons want to connect up breaks in their service. The Transvaal Government under self-government did not grant the application in this case. The hon. member wants us to give it out of charity, but most of the petitioners are poor people in very difficult circumstances. I again repeat that we went thoroughly into these cases and that I do not see my way to accept a motion that they should be referred back to the select committee.

I should also like to say a few words about Mr. Bosman’s case. Those of us who know him know how unfortunate his position is. There are various members in the House who know what sacrifices Izak Bosman made for the Transvaal in the old days. To-day he is stone deaf. There are many officials who were for five years in the public service who have got pensions but because in his case there was a small break in service he receives no pension. I shall be very glad if the chairman of the select committee will agree to reconsider the case because it cannot be put in the same category with others.

Hon. members surely do not expect that we should deal with these cases again. We cannot do so. If the people think that their requests should be reconsidered then they can petition again next year. It will do no good to refer the cases back to the select committee because it is not holding anymore sittings

As I suspected the reason for turning the petition down is that the committee is afraid of creating a precedent. This man does deserve something. He served his country for twenty years and right through the Boer War and I want the committee to consider it from the point of view of what the petitioner deserves. I could not bring forward a case more deserving that this and I submit that the committee should support the motion and send it back for further consideration.

With reference to what fell from the Minister of Finance I agree it is impossible to ask for pensions which have been already decided by the committee to be perpetually referred back for consideration. There are circumstances about the case about which I am concerned which distinguish it from the common round of petitions. From what I understand from the chairman of the select committee it is doubtful whether this committee could deal with the matter at all. It is a matter really for compensation, or for some compassionate allowance. The Prime Minister advised the petitioner that if he could not get compensation from the Minister of Public Works he should have recourse to a petition to Parliament. The committee say they were unable to deal with the matter at all. I hope it will be referred to the Government for consideration and that the Government will not oppose this suggestion.

May I appeal to the committee to cease this discussion’ Nothing can be gained by it. If a motion is adopted referring any one of these petitions to the select committee, the select committee is not going to deal with it anymore. If it is a deserving case let the petitioner renew his application next year. As to the other motion to refer petitions to the Government, no good purpose can be achieved by that either. If a petitioner has a legal claim then he can enforce it in a court of law, or if he has not a legal claim, the Government cannot pay him anything. We can only deal with legal claims. We cannot award a man a pension if he is not entitled by law to such pension. Only Parliament can do that.

Can the chairman of the select committee tell us whether all the cases in respect of which petitions came in this year have been disposed of?

All except 33.

What became of those?

The select committee did not receive reports about those cases and they are therefore standing over. This is the smallest number that has ever yet stood over.

Will a list of these cases be published?

Yes, at the end of the third report.

I want to read out the report on the case mentioned by the hon. member for South Peninsula (Sir Drummond Chaplin). [Report read.]

I think this discussion has done some good, because hon. members who thought that petitions which are referred to the select committee are considered on their merits must now revise their opinions as to what the committee really does. This is a committee appointed by Parliament and the function of that committee, I understand, is to make legal what is illegal. Now it seems that these petitions are referred by the select committee to the department concerned or the Treasury. If the department concerned or the Treasury sees fit not to recommend, then to all intents and purposes these petitions might as well not be brought before the House. I know a genuine case of hardship, a man named Reeves, who is walking the streets, a pitable object. He petitioned Parliament and the Treasury refused to recommend the petition. I say that the Treasury, in its usual coldblooded way and simply on the score of economy or expense, should not have the final say in these cases of hardship, otherwise the presentation of petitions to this House for consideration will continue to be an absolute farce, except in a small percentage of cases.

It is quite evident that the hon. member for Salt River (Mr. Snow) knows nothing of what he is talking about. Every petition is referred to the department concerned to bring up a report. In numerous cases we have not accepted the recommendation of the Treasury. It is wrong to say that the committee simply accepts what the department says. There are a number of cases in which we have given pensions, irrespective of the report of the department. I would like to support the Chairman of the Select Committee. I think it would be establishing a very bad precedent if these petitions were referred back to the Government or to the Committee. I understand that people who have petitioned will have an opportunity of petitioning again early next session of Parliament, and hon. members who are interested in these cases will have an opportunity of laying their views before the Committee. We have dealt with about 1,000 cases, and we have always gone into the merits of each case. I have always felt that we should approach many cases on compassionate grounds. I have fought them in the Committee on those grounds, but I will say that every case has been considered on its merits and has had the undivided attention of the Committee.

It is because of remarks such as we have just heard from the hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. Buirski) that I do claim to know something about these matters. I challenge the hon. member or any member of the Committee to say what percentage of cases are dealt with by the Committee favourably to the petitioners, unless the Treasury or the department recommends. Not five per cent. If the Treasury refuses to recommend, on the ground of cold-blooded economy, then let them do it. The Committee should then be prepared to give the necessary time to go into all these cases properly, and I maintain that the Committee never has time to do that, and by saying that I do not intend of course to cast any reflection on the Committee’s work. It is the machinery provided by Parliament that I am dissatisfied with, and I wish to see a radical alteration in the system of dealing with the petitions which are presented to this House.

I do not agree with anything the hon. member for Salt River (Mr. Snow) has just said. I was Chairman of that Select Committee for many years, I know what a heart-breaking business it is, and I know what good work they have done.

I wish to refer to Item No 309, the petition of Miss Fanny Wentworth a lady who has been for many years the matron of the Pietermaritzburg College. I have information to the effect that, if this petition is referred to the Natal provincial authorities, there is every likelihood of the appeal being favourably considered. The Chairman and the members of the Committee on Pensions have, I understand, no objection to this course, and I accordingly move—

We cannot do that. Motions put and negatived.

Here we have a case of a railway servant who was injured in a train accident. He was totally incapacitated and his case was dealt with under the Workmen’s Compensation Act, and he was awarded the full compensation, £399. He now comes and petitions Parliament for a pension. Of course, it is a case deserving of every sympathy on its merits, but, if this recommendation is accepted, we are establishing a precedent and you may have hundreds of these cases. If you accept this case, then after a man has been compensated for injury sustained under the laws passed by this House he will be able to come forward again and claim a pension. I do not know whether the House is prepared to go so far as to accept a principle like that. The petitioner in this case is a comparatively young man, and his expectation of life is 32½ years. He has been recommended by the Committee for a pension of £36 a year. It seems to me that that is a liability which the Railway Department cannot undertake to shoulder, and I am afraid that, on behalf of the Administration, I must oppose this recommendation.

I think that I must explain this case. The man actually received £299 as workmen’s compensation.

£399.

But he was quite a young man and the railways in most cases give people injured in that way another job when they have an accident, but this man lost both his legs, and he was given no appointment, It is a deserving case, and the committee thought that he should be assisted.

This is one of those cases which I think the Pensions Committee has been specially created to deal with. The Minister talks about the claim. The Pensions Committee cannot deal with any case where a petitioner has a legal claim. This is a compassionate claim. Here we have a young man of 21 years who was injured in a railway accident, through no fault of his own, and deprived of portion of both legs. As a matter of fact he was so badly injured that the Railway Department, which employs thousands of men could not find a position for him, so we can take it for granted that no private employer could find him any work. He was twenty-one years of age, and he got a gratuity of £399. That is twelve years ago. In those 12 years he has spent £32 a year to maintain himself. The department now comes along and says his expectation of life is another 32½ years, and the department considers they did him justice by giving him £400 when he left the service. At that time his expectation of life was 44½ years and the department thought they were getting rid of him by paying him £8 10s. a year for the rest of his life. If ever there was a case for compassion this poor man deserves it. I hope the Minister will soften his heart and say that such a case as this should be dealt with on its merits. In a case like this the Pensions Committee and this committee should show a little compassion, and grant this man this miserable £3 a month. I am ashamed of the recommendation for a mere £3 a month, but the committee in its wisdom, thought that if they recommended anymore there would be strong opposition, and in this account the award was made merely a nominal one.

The Administration objects, on principle, to the grant of a pension, but we would not be opposed to the grant of a reasonable gratuity to this man. The Railway Administration, of course, is a business concern which functions under a special Act of Parliament. There is no liability, but if on compassionate grounds the committee wants to give this man an invalidity pension, the Railway Administration should not be saddled with it. I would be prepared on behalf of the Administration, to agree to the passing by this House of a gratuity of, say, £100. We hope, in due course, there will be invalidity pensions for such cases.

You cannot grant him legs.

I move—

I am afraid the Minister cannot move that. It may mean an increase.

I do hope the Minister will accept this recommendation. As far as the legality of the award is concerned, I would point out there are about 100 recommendations from the committee, every one of which in the same sense illegal. They are all more or less on compassionate grounds. The Minister objects on the ground that it is creating a precedent, but I want to tell the Minister the history of one petition which has been granted at the request of the department. He will see there are two pensions to the widows of the driver and fireman of a train which crashed two years ago. At the time the Minister told the House that the department would see the dependents of these men received every consideration; that there had been a wonderful act of heroism on their part, and it was a claim on the department to see that their dependents were rightly treated. That came before tile committee and we had a memorandum from the department recommending pensions to these two widows. I asked why, and I was told that this was a case of a special act of heroism on the part of these men.

The hon. member is going a little too far. He must wait for this.

It has a very big bearing, because the objection is taken, in this case, that it creates a precedent, and I am giving this case as an illustration. I said I would like to have a report in order to see what this act of heroism was. The department refused that report. We insisted, and that report came to us, and it disclosed there was no heroism at all, and the department said to the committee—

That is a case of widows and this case is dealt with by Act of Parliament.

It is laid down what all these people must get. Here is a precedent created. Surely the Minister might be generous enough to say he would not quarrel with the findings of the committee in these cases which they recommend. Is there any man in this House who would consider himself adequately compensated for the loss of two legs at the age of 21, for the loss of his earning capacity for the rest of his life, by a paltry £399? We felt the very least we could do was to give this man some means of supporting his life. The department said they could not find any work for him, and it was only then that we felt it was our duty to give the man the means to keep body and soul together. I think this is a case where the Minister might relax the stern official attitude he has taken up. It was one of the most pitiable cases we had to deal with among the thousand cases we had before us

I would suggest that it be referred back to the Administration for further consideration on condition they pay a gratuity of £100 out of the Gratuity Fund.

We are quite prepared to deal with it on those lines, but we object to establishing a precedent, because a lot of people in similar circumstances would at once come along.

In the absence of any legislation to validate such a tiling as this, I support the Minister’s proposal to give a gratuity of £100, subject to this man’s claim not being prejudiced in the event of any legislation being placed on the statute book at a future date, making provision for such cases. The Minister has made an exception to what he laid down earlier, that where the Government did not recognize any legal claim they would not make any award. The reason the Minister is doing this is because it is an extremely painful case. He is compromising with his Governmental conscience. If there is one function the Pensions Committee serves it is this—that it does bring to our notice a great deal of the misery which exists, and which is undeservedly suffered by some of the best people we have in the country. The Pensions Committee is one of the most thankless jobs any parliamentarian has to carry on. The work is sheer drudgery and the most disheartening feature is that every member knows that however much work he puts into it the mountain of labour is going to produce, as it were, a mouse of results. It is not the fault of the committee. The provision for them to deal with cases of undeserved hardship is entirely inadequate. I am quite sure the Minister is impressed with the necessity of the Government, at some time, initiating legislation which will really deal effectively with this kind of hardship.

I think the House recognizes fully the able manner in which the select committee on Pensions carries out the very often unpleasant duties that are thrust upon them. I do not think any chairman of that committee has ever carried out those duties more conscientiously than the hon. gentleman who occupies that position at the present time. My idea of that committee is this—that they have to investigate in the most careful manner every case that comes before them, but that they are not bound solely and entirely to deal with every case under the regulations and Acts as they exist at the present time. But it is the function of the committee, when they get a particular case of this character, to go into that, and then if they consider in their judgment that it is advisable that the State should do something, then they are only doing their duty to bring that case before the House. I understand from the Chairman that that was the view this committee took. I would say to the Minister in connection with many cases in which there are accidents to servants of the State, especially in the case of accidents to railway servants, that when a man loses a leg or an eye or an arm, if he proceeds under the Workmen’s Compensation Act and receives full compensation under that Act, the Railway Department always tries, if possible, to find him a billet, surely that is one of the cases in cases in which a man loses both legs and where it is impossible for the department to find him a billet, surely that is one of the masses in which even a private firm, after he had received compensation under the Workmen’s Compensation Act, would give him further compensation. It has been suggested that we should give him £100 out of another fund, which would keep him going for a few years. I do not want the State to be extravagant, but in a case of this sort it should not be more churlish than a decent firm of employers who are in a financial condition to make some contribution. I hope the committee will abide by the decision of the select committee.

I understood the Minister when he spoke was speaking as the Minister of Railways and Harbours, and that he said that if this pension went through, it would be chargeable to the Railway Administration. I do not think that is so. The recommendation of this committee is for this pension to be paid from the treasury. If that is so, the main objection made by the Minister falls away. This is a petition for a compassionate allowance.

This was against the Railway Department. If the case is dealt with as a compassionate allowance by the central Government, there would be nothing in the principle I have been advocating. I have been objecting on behalf of the Railway Administration, because this will be paid out of the Railway Pensions Fund.

So long as he gets it.

Even if it is a claim against the railway, I can see perfectly clearly it may give rise to other claims. Provided it is passed through some examining body, such as this has passed through—the select committee—we are not exposing ourselves to risk. In a case of complete disablement the compensation under the Workmen’s Compensation Act is very meagre indeed. It is not unreasonable that even the Railway Department should be made liable to pay such a compassionate allowance as an ordinary private firm would have to pay under similar circumstances. This recommendation does not lie on the side of generosity.

I must also appeal to the Minister. To give a lump sum of £100 is not encouraging thrift. It is not as sensible as to give so much per month.

It need not be paid at once. You can make arrangements how it should be paid.

If the old age pensions scheme comes into operation this man would not get anything more, if he is drawing a pension already.

There are one or two considerations I should like to put to the committee and the Minister. The scale of workmen’s compensation we fixed something like 15 years ago, when money did not have the same value as it has to-day. I have always felt that these scales are far too low, considering the value of money in these days, and I often wonder that some of my hon. friends on the cross benches have not moved to increase the scales. The maximum rate for death, which is £750, is far too low. If this workman was injured through the negligence of the railway administration, or any of its servants, if he had chosen to sue them under the common law, he would have recovered probably a sum in excess of this amount—the courts would probably have given him between £1,000 and £2,000. There are certain servants of the State who, if they are injured in the execution of their duty, are liberally compensated, like policemen, and they get a pension which reasonably compensates them for the injury suffered. The recommendation of the committee is low enough, and if we agree, we agree as a committee to treat it as a special case on its merits. I do not see why it should not go through.

I am personally acquainted with this case. The individual man was sacrificed by his father. He was a minor when the accident occurred, and when he was in the hospital his father drew the money and he is now in a practically hopeless position. He has in fact two artificial legs but all he can do is to repair buckets and do other little jobs which are given him out of charity. When he was in the hospital he was offered a sitting and intended to accept it, but before he could do so his father drew the money. I think the pension of £36 a year is small enough. If he were to be given another £100 it would again possibly fall into other hands.

I hope the Minister will repent of his first resolution to reject this item. We all know, as a matter of fact, he is as humane as anyone in the. House. I can speak from this point of view—I have appeared more frequently, probably, than any hon. member before the Select Committee on Pensions and I can testify to the fact that on no occasion do they grant a case that has not abundantly been proved. Very often I left their presence feeling that they had been altogether too hard-hearted. That is surely a guarantee that, in recommending this amount, it is not one penny more than the case deserves.

Recommendation put and agreed to.

Recommendation (4) to (22) put and agreed to.

On paragraph III,

Before we leave this report, I should like pro forma to ask that two cases be referred back to the select committee in order to get information from the chairman of the committee why these two petitions were refused. I refer to No. 51, R. Gordon Cumming, and No. 131, A. J. Humby. I may say that this Mr. Cumming is a head constable in the police, and before he joined the police he served about eight years in the Imperial Army. What he asks in his petition is that his army services should be counted for pension purposes. Last year we passed an Act providing that members of the Royal Engineers, Telegraph Battalion, who joined the service of the Union should, for pension purposes, have their years of service in the army counted. Why should the committee have turned down the application of this man? He was in the Bedfordshire Regiment. Why should a difference be made with regard to the Royal Engineers?

We passed a special law for that.

This applies to a transfer to the South African constabulary, and it can only be recognized when such service was recognized by the constabulary authorities. As they do not recognize his services in the Bedfordshire Regiment no allowance was made.

One can quite see that is the official view. In many cases this committee has counted the services of our officials in the Imperial army, and it is difficult for me to understand why the petition in this case has been turned down.

We are very strict on this. There must be certain rights before we deal with them. I may say we have any amount of these cases, and this is not the only one. Where there is no claim we do not grant it.

The explanation does not seem very convincing, but seeing that we are near the end of the session I suppose it is no use moving that the matter be referred back. However, I hope if the petition goes again to the committee next session, it will be investigated more thoroughly.

Is not this a matter of policy?

With reference to the case of A. J. Humby (No. 131) I may say that he was an engineer on the Natal railways. He had a three years’ period of probation, after which he was taken on the establishment and was subsequently pensioned in respect of the period subsequent to his three years’ probationary term. Now he petitions that the three years’ probationary period be included for pensions purposes. He got a reasonable pension, but all the other officers who served with him at the same time had their probationary period counted for pension purposes, and I think he is morally entitled to similar treatment.

There was no break in service, but the persons concerned were not allowed to contribute for the first three years of their employment on the ground that it was not permanent service. We cannot agree to the petition, for we have many people asking for increased pensions and where are we to stop?

I am informed this is the only case in which the probationary period was not counted for pension purposes.

I will give the hon. member the facts explaining the difficulty in these cases.

This is not the only case which has been rejected.

I move—

We know quite well that if the petition is filled again next year it will be said that the case has already been disposed of, and we have here to do with a special case in which new circumstances have arisen after the petition was filed. This is a case of a person who has served the country in various capacities for about fifty years, and under the Act of last year he would be entitled to a pension, but unfortunately at first he could not prove that he had been continuously in service for twelve months before the war of 1899. He could prove that from the beginning of 1899 he was in the service, but now he has acquired sufficient proof that he was a long time in the service before that date and in view of these facts he would certainly be entitled to a pension as an ex-republican official.

I hope the hon. member will withdraw the motion. I understand what he wishes but this House is not expressing any opinion on the petition. The committee rejected it, and the motion of the hon. member will not affect the matter at all, and the petition will not be prejudiced by an expression of the opinion of the House. If there are new facts he can send them into the department, and the matter will be looked into again.

In these circumstances I withdraw my motion.

I would like to ask the committee of the House to agree that case 239 be referred back to the Select Committee. It is the petition of a soldier’s widow and was presented very early in the session. I was to be called to give evidence, and I had some really very valuable documentary evidence which has never been put to the committee by reason of my not having been notified. There is a legal technicality which prevents the widow getting her rights, and I am sure the petition would have been accepted by the Select Committee and its request granted. I would ask that the course just indicated by the Minister be not insisted on—that of again petitioning in the ensuing session. This creates the impression amongst petitioners that the committee is trying to discourage them by putting them off in the hope that they will eventually give up hope and desist.

If the course suggested is adopted in this case I can foresee every member who has a constituent petitioning for a pension making exactly the same speech. This petition will be dealt with on its merits next year if there is new evidence to be brought forward. The committee cannot deal with petitions now, for their consideration must be deferred until next year.

With leave of committee motion withdrawn.

I want to draw attention to a case 153 (Miss Mary A. M. Nutt). She has devoted 23 years to the service of mercy in the army and in civil hospitals, and now she asks for a pension. Her name is well-known, for she has served in very responsible positions in this land. Why has her case not received favourable consideration?

This case, and all other cases, received every consideration, but it is manifestly impossible with the House waiting to go on with business to be able to pick out from a mass of papers those referring to any particular case. In future if members desire to traverse any of the recommendations they should mention the matter beforehand to the Chairman of the Select Committee, and ask him to have the papers ready. This case, like every other case, was exhaustively dealt with.

The department will supply the hon. member with the information.

I see under paragraph 5 the committee reports as follows—

Is this the hon. member for Potchefstroom or is there another Rev. M. L. Fick?

Why should it not be?

I want to know because I want to express my grief and pain that the case of the hon. member for Potchefstroom should be turned down by the committee.

I want to move—

This petition is very different from other petitions. This petitioner is the widow of one of the men executed in connection with the strike on the Witwatersrand in 1922. She is not only supporting her own children but also the children of another widow whose husband was also executed during the same trouble. It is essentially a case for this House and the committee if they will consider it without class prejudice. The execution of Hull was ordered by a tribunal and I am not going to comment now on that judgment. The late Government looked upon that trouble not as an industrial strike but as a political revolt.

So it was.

I am glad to hear the hon. member admit that, as it strengthens the case which I am putting forward. In the history of South Africa we have had revolts of a more political character than that of 1922. Every revolt or rebellion which has taken place in South Africa or elsewhere has naturally resulted in the loss of life and destruction of property. I want to refer to two instances which will go in favour of something being done in this case. I refer to the Jameson raid. Under normal conditions the men connected with that raid would have been executed, but there was a certain class prejudice in their favour because they did not belong to the working classes. The leader of that revolt afterwards occupied the position of Prime Minister of one of the provinces now in the Union and others occupied seats in this House subsequent to Union, and that shows that the Government and the public forgave what had taken place. I also quote the case of a name everyone in this House respected, that of Sir Aubrey Woolls-Sampson who took part in the Jameson raid and this House decided to grant a pension to Lady Aubrey Woolls-Sampson. Then we had the rebellion of 1914 and one of the gentlemen connected with it now occupies a position of Minister of the Crown in this House. The widow of the late Gen. Beyers received a pension, with which I agree, and I say the widow of Hull, if this had been a revolt organized by the middle class or upper class would have received better consideration instead of getting nothing as the widow of a working man. I want to point out that if the hon. member for Standerton (Gen. Smuts) had exercised leniency at an earlier date, Lewis and Hull would not have been executed, and might now have held appointments in the Government service, like Garnsworthy—and I entirely approve of it—but because he was in no hurry to exercise that clemency these widowshave been left and they now come to the committee and ask for relief. If this committee is not influenced by class distinctions and honestly wants to show that it has no class prejudice let it take this petition into consideration and I submit the committee should refer the matter to the Minister and the Government for further favourable consideration and I move accordingly.

There is no doubt whatever that this House does not deal with matters of this sort in a class spirit and I would refute the argument of the hon. member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge). He gave two instances why he considered Mrs. Hull should be awarded a pension. He has compared her to the widow of the late Gen. Beyers and the widow of the late Sir Aubrey Woolls-Sampson. I will tell the hon. member why those pensions were awarded. It was for great public services rendered to South Africa by the husbands of those two ladies. Does the hon. member tell us that Hull rendered great services to this country? The late Sir Aubrey Woolls-Sampson divested himself of his fortune to help this country. There is no parallel between these two ladies and Mrs. Hull and I hope we shall not depart from the practice of not referring any matter back to the Government or the committee of this House. It is within the province of the hon. member to present a petition next year and to move then that it be referred direct to the Government. This position received consideration by an impartial body. I am inclined to think it was a unanimous vote that turned it down. There was no claim whatever on the State because the husband of Mrs. Hull had not given any service to the State. Unfortunately her late husband transgressed the laws of this country and if we grant her a pension where shall we stop? I hope the House will not accept the motion to refer it to the Government.

On this particular petition the Pensions Committee was divided with regard to the matter. It is one of those unfortunate cases which comes along occasionally and will continue until the Government give what we consider proper redress. We are told these unfortunate happenings should be forgotten but it is not a good way to forget them by leaving the widow and children mention in the petition to starve. It is no good at this stage saying who is to blame. We who followed those happenings know those men were executed under abnormal circumstances, under a law which has never before been brought into force in this country. These men were executed for murder but were not actual murderers because they never carried firearms. It was never asserted that they carried firearms.

Oh, no.

The only reason why they could be found guilty was because they were members of a mob where these men were killed.

No.

That is the fact. There was no suggestion that these men carried firearms. The only suggestion was that they incited the mob to violence. If we are going to hang people every time they incite other people to violence, we are going to make a pretty big hole in the population of this country. I would like to appeal to the Minister in this particular case. Even assuming that these men were misguided and that they were guilty, that does not seem to me to be any real reason why these four children, whose ages I believe are eleven, eight, nine and four, should be made responsible for this unfortunate happening of 1922. I would like to add my appeal to that which as been made by the hon. member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge) that the Government should take this case into consideration with the idea of, at any rate, giving something for these children until they reach the age of sixteen.

Amendment put and negatived.

Recommendations to be reported.

House Resumed:

Resolutions reported, considered and adopted and sent to the Senate for concurrence.

I see that the hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell) has an amendment on the paper.

I am not moving it.

Omission of Clause 2 put and agreed to.

On new Clause 2,

I beg to move—

1. (a) thirty per cent. per annum where the tax does not exceed ten pounds; or
2. (b) twenty per cent. per annum where the tax does not exceed twenty-five pounds; or
3. (c) fifteen per cent. per annum where the tax does not exceed fifty pounds; or
4. (d) twelve per cent. per annum where the tax exceeds fifty pounds.

Those are are rates laid down in the Act of 1926.

seconded.

Amendment put and agreed to.

New clause, as amended, put and agreed to.

Amendments in Clauses 3 and 4 put and agreed to and the Bill, as amended, adopted.

I move, as an unopposed motion—

seconded.

The Minister of Finance was agreeable to meet us in regard to the proposals for limiting the penalty that we suggested in regard to this matter. The Minister having been so gracious in that regard I did not want to worry him, at the report stage, with another very important point in connection with this, but I want to raise it now on the third reading so that he may consider it, and, if he agrees with me, then he can remedy the matter in another place. I have seen a report as to the proposals of the Transvaal Provincial Council for the forthcoming year with reference to the poll tax and income tax. They propose, in regard to the poll tax, to exempt from the payment of that tax any person making a sworn declaration to the effect that during the year for which the tax is payable he has not been in receipt of an income of £50. Now let me deal, first of all, with the case of Europeans. Surely, that is putting a premium on perjury. Any person who makes an affidavit that he has not had a certain income is, by the mere making of that affidavit, exempt from the payment of this tax, and then if this applies equally to natives, it means that practically no natives will pay the poll tax. Then they propose to exempt from payment of the additional 50 per cent. of the tax all unmarried persons making a sworn declaration to the effect that during the year for which the tax is payable they have not been in receipt of an income of £100. Again I say, that is putting a premium on perjury. Then they reduce the basic tax from £1 10s. to £1 in the case of any person not liable to the payment of Union income tax. So instead of a flat rate of poll tax, which was certainly contemplated by this House, they are going to have a sliding scale poll tax. This is the cream of the jest, that they go on to provide that in the case of persons in receipt of an income of £1,500 and over, the percentage of income tax payable shall be increased from 15 per cent. to 20 per cent. In other words, when you reach the £1,500 limit you are going to make a jump, and the man who gets £1,501 is going to pay 20 per cent. and the person receiving only £1,499 will pay only 15 per cent. None of us in this House when we passed the Financial Relations Act in 1925 ever contemplated that you would get a graduated tax and a sliding scale such as this. The Minister will agree that our income tax is already on a graduated basis. The higher your income the higher the rate at which you pay. But not satisfied with that, they are now proposing to make an arbitrary jump at the income of £1,500. The Minister was unaware of this until I drew his attention to it. He had not had an opportunity of considering it, and I did not want to hold up progress in the committee or report stages, but I do suggest it is a matter that should receive the earnest consideration of the Minister. We certainly contemplated when we allowed the provinces to charge income tax that that tax should be based on the Union tax. We said: “What you must do is to take the Union income tax, and on that you may affix a surcharge going up to 20 per cent. in the case of married persons and 30 per cent. in the case of unmarried persons.” But these gentlemen in the Transvaal are going back on what was definitely understood at that time. We said we would not have two concurrent and differently levied income taxes. We said: “What we will allow you to do is to take the Union income tax and impose on that a surcharge exactly in proportion to the Union tax, and with the same incidence on the taxpayer.” Here they are proposing first to impose a poll tax on a sliding scale, and, secondly, to impose an income tax which is really the same as the old Free State income tax which we abolished two years ago. All I ask the Minister to do is to give the House an assurance that he will consider this matter, and see if any remedy can be suggested in another place.

I do not want to express any opinion on the merits of the proposed taxation of the Transvaal Provincial Council. That legislation, if passed, will either be within the scope of the Financial Relations Act or not, and if it is not within the scope, then, of course, it will be ultra vires If it is within the scope of the Act, I do not think we, as a House, should interfere with the constitutional right of the council to levy their taxation as they think fit. That policy may have to be altered later on, but I want to repeat that up to now I think members of both parties with few exceptions, agree that we should not interfere with the constitutional rights of the provincial councils, unless they consent. As far as the Transvaal council is concerned, the action they are taking here may be wise, or it may not, but I do not think we should be asked to introduce any further amendment where they do not consent to any further curtailment of their rights, so I cannot promise the hon. member that I will in another place move any amendment to the effect suggested by him.

Motion put and agreed to.

Bill read a third time.

I move—

Why cannot we get in some of the Ministers? We can raise several questions here on items in the estimates which went through in rather a hurried manner. I wanted to ask some questions, but I had no opportunity, and I reserved it till now. I want to refer to the superior courts, and the Master of the Supreme Court here. There is a tremendous lot of grumbling about the delays in that office. You cannot get an estate wound up, and you cannot pay out dividends and so on. Personally, I am inclined to think they have not sufficient officials in that office, although I regret having to say so. I want to call the attention of the Minister of Justice to this, and I would like him to see if some remedy cannot be found. There is a lot of complaint about it in Cape Town.

I should like to draw the attention of the Government and the House to the condition of wheat farming. The production of foodstuffs is of importance, not only for the farming population, but for everybody. It, therefore, deserves the encouragement and sympathy of all of us. A drought is now prevailing in the grain districts, and if it keeps on long enough it will be calamitous for the producers, especially as fertilizer is so dear. The Government was so good last year as to increase the customs duty on wheat and flour, and this had a good result because, immediately after, the price of wheat rose by 1s. a bag, and in some cases 1s. 16d., but in spite of that increased duty, the price has dropped again this year. Though it was impossible for the importers to import wheat at less than 26s. 9d. landed here, the farmers were only offered 24s. In December last over 800,000 lbs. were imported, and there were also large importations during the following month. This happened while there was sufficient wheat available locally to last for eight months. I suspect that the millers import to such an extent because they know that they will not be stuck with the wheat, and that in that way they can push down the prices of the local product. The millers tell the farmers that they do not need anymore wheat, and compel many farmers in that way to dispose of their crop at an unpayable price. The millers do not reduce the price of their flour when they buy up wheat at 2s. 9d. less than the overseas market price. They, therefore, make a clear extra profit of 2s. 9d. a bag. Steps ought to be taken to put a stop to it. One way would be to prohibit all importations of wheat and flour during the months the farmers get in the harvest. I want to suggest that the Minister of Trade and Industries should institute a thorough enquiry into the causes why the prices of local grain are so low and make some suggestion to assist the farmers. There is a screw loose, and if we know where the hitch is we shall be able to rectify it. Something must be done, and the sooner the better. The farmers are advised to work together in a co-operative society. I do not doubt that such co-operation would be an excellent thing, but it is a difficult matter in connection with grain farming, and the word cooperation stinks in the nostrils of many wheat growers because they have so often in the past been had by certain individuals under that pretext. I hope the Government will comply with my wish in this matter. Then I also want to ask the Minister to act on the report which was made by the commission which enquired into our fisheries. The Government went to great expense in connection with that enquiry. But what is the good? If you ask the Minister to carry out the recommendations then he replies that it is a matter for the provincial council, and if you approach the provincial council then the reply is: “Where is the money?” In this way nothing is done. Representatives of the Government should meet representatives of the provincial council in the matter, otherwise one of the most important industries will remain undeveloped. We spend a lot of money every year in emergency loans and on unemployed. Thousands and tens of thousands of people who are searching for a living to-day would be able to find it, if our fishing industry along the coasts is assisted.

I would like to bring to the notice of the Minister of Finance the case of the Wanderers View township lessees, which township is in my constituency of Hospital. On the 14th of December last I accompanied a deputation of leaseholders to Pretoria to see the Minister of Lands, the object of which was to ask that the leases should be converted into freehold. When the case was put to the Lands Department it agreed, as far as I can gather, to fix a sum that should be paid by the lessees in respect of the Government’s interest in the land. After this the papers were sent to the treasury, which evidently was not satisfied and referred the matter back to the Lands Department, and I now understand that the papers have again been sent back to the treasury. This is really not business. This is an urgent matter, and it could have been fixed up in a few hours.

Why didn’t you come and see me about it if it were such an urgent matter?

I saw your representative. The matter is urgent because at present the lessees do not know what the Government is going to do. Will the Minister go into the matter soon—there is no great enquiry involved. Let him, however, keep in view the policy of the late Government in regard to the conversion of leasehold to freehold title and deal with the matter in a liberal way. I can speak with feeling on the subject of delay, because under the late Government I was a victim of this interminable inter-departmental procrastination. There were unhappily some four departments concerned, and when you have to deal with State departments you realize how time is lost with fin nicking remarks and, very often, unfounded objections. I ask the Minister to go into the matter at the earliest possible moment.

I would like to refer to two matters, but I don’t want to repeat arguments I have already used. I raised the question of an industrial bank on March 16th, 1926, and the Minister then stated that the Government was prepared to instruct the Board of Trade to examine the question. Since then 15 months have elapsed, and apparently nothing has been done. The Board of Trade is overwhelmed with work in regard to the tariff and the protectionist policy, and I do not know whether it is fair to saddle it with this additional burden, nor do I think that unless it had outside assistance it will be able to deal adequately with the matter. An Irish banking commission, which was appointed in 1926, consisted of men of outstanding merit and experience with banking. That commission recommended State loans to industry, the industries assisted to obtain the Minister of Finance’s assent to any loan which they might require. The money was to be lent only for capital undertakings, and the Government was to appoint two trustees on the board of every assisted concern, and was to be represented by two directors on the board of the trust company. This policy of guaranteeing grants to industrial organizations has been approved of by some of the most eminent men in the banking world. I ask the Minister to go into the matter during the recess. South Africa needs an industrial bank, to do for industry what the Land Bank has so successfully accomplished for agriculture. The other matter I wish to raise is in connection with the Government’s decision not to take over the Hospitals Inquiry Report, but to leave it to the provinces. Can the Minister tell us what the provincial councils have done in the way of attempting to carry out the recommendations conveyed in the commission’s report?

I wish to draw the Minister’s attention to the hardship the public is suffering under the Death Duties Act, more particularly in regard to Section 10. Can legislation be introduced next session to amend this Act, which was designed to prevent wealthy persons forming trusts in order to evade paying the duties? The Act has been framed with such a disregard for legal principles on the subject of succession that many cases of extreme hardship have resulted. The difficulty arises over the words “deemed to have accrued,” there being no exemption from duty on inheritances which had accrued prior to the Act coming into force. We have a clear case here. I deal with the case of a father who left certain sums of money to his children with the usufruct vested in the stepmother. The father died in 1875, leaving a sum of £3,489 19s. 8d. to his daughter. The daughter died in 1921 and the stepmother in 1925, so that the daughter had no benefit of this money. Take the case of one nephew entitled to £225 16s. 6d. He had to pay 9 per cent. succession duty and 10 per cent. succession duty on nomination of usufruct, or in all £51 3s., equalling a duty of over 22 per cent. on his inheritance. Owing to the great expense the assessments were not contested, and, if under the Act, in fixing the rate payable by children at 2 per cent. If it had been contemplated they would have to pay the extra 10 per cent., it would have been very clear on the point. This case was brought to my notice a few weeks ago, and direct descendants should not be mulcted up to 22 per cent. on a direct inheritance. I hope the Minister will go into this and bring in an amending Bill next session.

I want to raise a matter affecting the Labour Department, the papers in which were only brought to my notice yesterday. The matter has reference to a determination of the Wage Board and in particular to a proposed determination by the Minister of rates of pay and hours of labour in the baking and confectionery industry on the Witwatersrand and Pretoria areas. I have only had an opportunity of reading the papers hurriedly, but matters raised in my correspondents’ letter are of sufficient importance for me to ask the Minister to give serious attention to the matter. Briefly, he has published in the Government “Gazette” of May 20th, 1927, a notice of his intention to make a wage determination in the baking trade for the Rand and Pretoria. Two salient features emerge from that determination. According to this determination, baking may only be done by a baker, a table hand, an apprentice or a learner. The minimum rate laid down for the baker is £6 13s 6d. a week, and for the table hand £4 10s. a week, and there are small increasing wages for learners and apprentices. The Minister lays down in the proposed determination that there shall not be more than one apprentice or learner to each baker. What is the state of affairs in the baking industry on the Rand? There are a large number of natives employed in that industry, and it is the express intention of the chairman of the Wage Board in his recommendation to the Minister to make this determination, to eliminate all native employees from the baking industry on the Rand. Either the intention is to eliminate all natives from employment as bakers and table hands, or, if natives are employed, they are to receive a minimum wage ranging from £6 13s. 6d. down to £3 a week. But no native employed in the baking trade shall get less than £3 a week. That is the effect of the determination. The bakers say that many hundreds of natives are employed in the making of bread, and there are 100,000 natives on the Rand who eat bread, yet in the making of the poorer qualities of bread a native must not be employed unless at these prohibitive rates. The bakers say you want to force them to employ white labour, and ask “Where are we to get that labour from?” There are few, if any, unemployed bakers on the Rand in the baking industry to-day, and at the same time only one apprentice is allowed per baker. You put these bakers between the upper and nether millstone. Such rates have never been paid to natives in this country before. You say that if you want to employ white labour you cannot do it because we artificially limit the number of apprentices to one per baker. Now the baker is the highest rank in the baking hierarchy, who gets £6 13s. 6d. per week, and you say there must only be one apprentice per baker. I am putting this as it has been put to me, and it seems to me it is a mistake artificially to restrict the number of white apprentices if you are trying to introduce a white labour policy into the baking industry. Then it does seem to me to be a mistake artificially to try and throw out the hundreds of natives who are employed in the baking industry by means of a wage determination. I am told that inevitably it will have the effect of putting up the price of bread and especially that class of bread which is supplied to the natives and the poorer section of the population. An objection has been forwarded on behalf of a large section of the baking trade to the Minister against the proposed determination. The objection is dated 9th June. That is the last that has been heard of it. There has not been much time since then, I admit. The first ground of objection set out is—

Though the rates were fixed with an eye to the European employees only when they met in this Industrial Conciliation Board, the Minister is now going to take those rates and put them into his Wage Act determination and make them applicable to natives, who were expressly ruled out from the agreement arrived at under the Industrial Conciliation Act. The second ground of objection is—

I would ask the Minister, does he want to lay down a minimum wage of £3 a week for natives employed in the Johannesburg bakeries?

Some are getting more than that.

That is no answer to my question.

I will deal with it.

These people make the point that if you are going to lay down a minimum wage of £3 a week for natives employed in Johannesburg bakeries, where are you going to stop? These two Labour Ministers, the Minister of Public Works and the Minister of Labour, seem to be an ill-starred pair of political twins. The third ground of objection which has been set out is—

The fourth objection reads—

They state that the result is that it will be impossible for any employer to replace natives by employing Europeans, and they add that the effect of the promulgation will be to increase the price of bread to the poorer classes. I have also received a letter from the attorney who represents these people, in which, inter alia, he points out that there are very few white bakers out of employment on the Rand, and that it will be impossible for the master bakers of Johannesburg to replace their natives with white workers. He also states that at one time it was thought that perhaps apprentices might be employed so as gradually to replace the native, but, owing to the ratio which has been laid down, the master bakers are debarred from employing a sufficient number of apprentices. He also adds that this matter may lead to trouble, the end of which cannot be foreseen, and mentions that the price of bread on the Rand varies from 8d. down to 5d. per 2-lb. loaf. The fact of the matter is, in other words, that if this goes through those persons who are producing the 5d. loaf will no longer be able to produce that at 5d., and your poorer customers, your native customers, are those who are going to be hit. In other words, what the Minister is really trying to do is to say that these natives shall not have native baked bread unless they are prepared to pay European wages to these natives. Is that fair? Is that a reasonable thing to do? He goes on—

There are tens of thousands of people, possibly including the Minister himself, who employ natives in their kitchens throughout the Transvaal and Natal, and elsewhere, and who handle that bread—

Yes but that rate is the highest European rate. They found out there are bakers who cater for native trade only, yet every one of those natives has to pay more for his bread in order it may be baked for them by European bakers. My correspondent makes this point, that the master bakers are represented by a minority of the master bakers and only that class which caters for the highest form of European trade and which will not really suffer—

The wage of a baker is £6 13s. 6d., and that of the table hand is £4 10s., and except apprentices, you must be either a baker or a table hand in order to take any part whatever in this process of baking.

Who laid that down? The bakers themselves.

The Minister announces in the “Gazette” he is going to make a law that on the Rand and in Pretoria these wages and conditions must obtain. I am taking him up in this House and I want him to justify it. The point these people make is that as these definitions are drawn, everybody who assists in this process of baking is either a baker or a table hand and must get the wage of £6 13s. 6d. or £4 10s. 0d. as a minimum. It does one of two things. It either excludes natives altogether, in which case bread, even for natives, must be baked by Europeans and the price must go up, or it pays fancy wages to natives. In any case the five-penny loaf will disappear from Johannesburg. It will not hit the man who gets the best class of bread, but it is going to hit the natives and the poorer classes of Europeans. I want the Minister to enlighten us as to his reasons for this step.

I want to support the hon. member for Piquetberg (Mr. deWaal) in his plea for the advancement of wheat growing in South Africa, because there is no doubt a reduction in wheat production is noticeable. The reason for this is that it is becoming more and more difficult for the wheat farmers to make a living. When the price of corn was 40s. a bag hundreds of thousands of bags were produced every year, but on account of the drop in the price the production has considerably lessened. I have already quoted the figures for my district but I now want to give the figures as they appear in the report of the Board of Trade and Industries with regard to wheat culture in the Cape Province. I think that they do not differ very much from the Transvaal figures. The estimated costs of production are as follows: Malmesbury 9s. 2d. a bag, Piquetberg, 19s. 9d. a bag, Swellendam, 15s. 8d. a bag, near to Cape Town 18s. 2d. a bag, and Caledon 18s. 4d. a bag. In the Transvaal according to our calculations the costs are 21s. a bag. It can therefore be reckoned that the costs of production are on the whole 20s. a bag. When the selling price is 30s. a bag it means a profit of 10s. a bag to the wheat farmers, but the price is not 30s. At the moment the price of wheat is not more than 24s. or 25s. What, therefore is the position of the small wheat farmers, especially in the Transvaal? A wheat farmer who reaps 200 bags of wheat a year and in whose case wheat growing is the principal means of existence therefore earns £50 a year on which he and his family have to live. It is no wonder that wheat culture is going backward, and that more and more wheat farms are being sold. One of the causes is the great difference between the retail selling price and the calculated price for a bag. A bag of wheat of 200 lbs produces 150 lbs, of flour, and 50 lbs of bran, and out of the flour 100 loaves of bread of 2 lbs. weight are baked. The consumer has therefore to pay £3 6s. 8d. for the production of a bag of wheat. What is the portion of it that the farmer gets? It is only 30 per cent. The miller gets 19¼ per cent. and the baker 49½ per cent. thus practically half. Well, it must be admitted that delivery alone costs the baker 12½ per cent. but he gets a further 37 per cent. and the share of a bag of wheat to the farmer himself who has worked 6 months for it is only one-third portion. There has further to be considered, as mentioned by the hon. member for Piquetberg (Mr. de Waal), that there is a certain time of the year in which large quantities of wheat are imported from abroad, and this undoubtedly has its speculative side whereby the farmer is compelled to sell his wheat at a price which is offered at that time, because there is always the chance that the price may drop later on. Further it is suggested that the Board of Trade and Industries shall be given instructions to prepare a report, but I must say that in this respect the Government cannot be accused of neglect, because instructions have repeatedly been given to frame reports, and so we have the reports of 1923 from the former Board of Trade and Industries, in 1926 an important, and in my opinion, good report, and in 1927, only a little while ago, another report was made with regard to bakeries, etc. There are sufficient data in these reports in connection with wheat farming, baking, and the sale and marketing of wheat, but it must be admitted that it is necessary to devise means to somewhat increase the profit of the wheat farmer. In the first place it will be said that the costs of production must be reduced. I have already given the complete figures in this connection, but if the various items in connection with production are gone into, everyone will have to admit that no possibility of reducing the cost of production is possible. There, therefore, remains the increase in price. The increase is prevented by the importation of wheat from abroad. It is true that the Minister last year increased the customs duty on wheat, but I think it is not sufficient, and that it can be further increased. I also believe that the consumers are willing to pay a little more if the farmer himself can also make a living, and if the Government see their way to still further increase the duty to 30s. a bag of 200 lbs. the farmer will also be able to exist. Then a small farmer who reaps 200 bags of wheat will be able to make £100 a year out of it. I should like the Minister of Finance, or whoever has charge of the matter, to go into the question during the recess as to what can be done to assist the wheat farmers who are doing everything in their power to get some reward for their labour and toil.

I would like to raise a question as to the way in which the registration of voters is being effected under the new law, and to tell the Minister of the line what happened to me in my own case. I live in Johannesburg; the House I live in is my own; and I am registered as a voter in Parktown. Naturally, I have to come down here for the session of Parliament. To my astonishment I got a notice on the 19th of April telling me I had been struck of the roll, because I had been away for three months. If a member of Parliament is, without a word of warning, taken off the roll every time he comes down here, what is the position going to be with other voters in the country, if this specific case I am mentioning is a typical example of what is going on, I would like to know what the result is going to be on the voters’ roll throughout the country. I would like to know whether it would be fair to have a referendum on a roll like that. Naturally, I was very annoyed at my name having been struck off, and I admit I wrote the registering officer a pretty stiff letter; I wrote to him that my being struck off was a sign of the general ineptitude of the way registration was going on. I said to him—“You kindly put me back on the roll or I’ll know the reason why.” Had the canvassers knocked at my door and asked my tenant—I let my house while I am away— “Where is Mr. Reitz,” he would have heard at once that I was down attending to my duties in Parliament, but the canvasser, apparently asked “Is Mr. Reitz here and hearing that I was not, it was a case of “Take him off the list; he will never be missed.” Members may laugh, but it is a serious matter. The possession of the vote is the very foundation of democracy, and is one of the greatest rights a free man can have. The right to obtain the franchise is carefully hedged round by law. Having taken the trouble to get on the roll, you would think it would be equally difficult to get taken off the roll. But it is not so. Here we have a mere temporary hand for, and I say it without any disparagement, these canvassers, as a rule, are men who are temporarily out of employment and are given the job of canvassing out of kindness of heart by the electoral officer. Having made my protest to the electoral officer, he replied that if I wished my name reinserted, I had to state every place of residence I had occupied during the last two years and to fill in the application forms again, the final sentence of the letter reading—

Is that the way to deal with a voter? Unless I am prepared to eat dirt and go crawling to this officer—

I suppose somebody must be satisfied.

I hold they had no right to take me off the roll, and you cannot expect me to crawl to the electoral officer to have my name reinstated. Unless I eat dirt to that official I cannot be put back on the roll. An appeal made in Cape Town on this very point has succeeded, the registration court holding that the officials have no right to take a man off the roll under these conditions. Let the Minister give instructions that men like myself whose names have been struck off the roll under these extraordinary conditions, be reinstated without having to crawl to some official. What safeguard have we against repetition of this sort of thing? Will the referendum that it is proposed to take, be a fair one if these are the conditions under which the voters’ roll is being compiled? Why have I been taken off the roll—I am here on the country’s business.

Don’t they put you on the roll where you are living?

So I shall have to register six months here and six months in Johannesburg, and thousands of people will be faced with the danger of having their names removed from the roll once a year. We warned the Minister of the Inferior last year about this matter, but I am sure he did not contemplate a state of affairs like this. I have brought up the matter, which is of very farreaching importance in no contentious spirit, but there is something wrong with the law which allows this to happen.

The Minister will remember a complaint which I ventilated in this House at the instance of a newly arrived settler on Lot B, Roodepoort, Klip River Division, regarding the existence of burr-weed on that Lot, which is in a Government settlement and which had been unoccupied for some years, the previous allotted having surrendered it. During the time it remained unoccupied not only did burr-weed flourish there but tick fever also broke out and was still rampant when the holding was re-allotted a few months ago. The adjoining settlers, as a measure of protection against infection of their own cattle, created neutral fences, hoping by so doing to ensure the raising of the quarantine which applied to their holdings as well as to the inflicted holding, and which endures for 14 months after the last outbreak. The adjoining holders have asked me to ventilate a legitimate grievance against the Land Board or the Veterinary Department, whichever of the two departments was responsible for the issuing to the new settler of a permit to place his cattle on this grossly infected holding, which has resulted in a fresh outbreak of tick fever occurring amongst the newly introduced cattle, thus prolonging the period of quarantine not only for the holder of the infected farm but also for the unfortunate settlers whose holdings adjoin. This policy of granting permits to place cattle on grossly infected veldt is surely a mistaken policy and one which should be reversed at once. In this instance it shows a callous disregard of the interests of the adjoining owners. Will the Minister state whether the Veterinary Department, as the responsible department, were consulted as to the wisdom of granting this permit or was the influence of the Lands Department or the Land Board too strong? In any case, I want a definite statement from the Minister whether he approves of this policy being pursued, and if not will he take steps to prevent the issue of such permits in future? There is another matter brought to my notice to-day in connection with the movement of two flocks of sheep from the Free State to Natal which were grossly infected with scab. I tabled a question about this a few days ago, and I have further information in the form of a letter now regarding it, and I want to ask the Minister one or two questions. This letter reads—

It is also set out that out of one troop of 700, no less than 125 were infected with scab. The Minister admitted, in reply to a question I put to him the other day, that the age of the scab detected in these sheep was from two to three months. Therefore, there must have been scab on the farm on which these sheep were running for two or three months prior to their removal, and with efficient inspectors, how is it possible in a flock of 7,000 sheep for scab to be rampant like this without the inspectors noticing it? They should have been inspected before any movement took place, and there must have been infection visible before the permit was granted to move them. How, then, was the scab overlooked? This association wants information on this point. The letter says—

The seriousness of the position is increased by the fact that they travelled down one of the passes on the berg down which tens of thousands of sheep travel every year to their winter grazing, and they have unquestionably infected that pass, and the whole of the country traversed by the road over which the sheep travelled to Dundee District The farmers’ association have asked me to ascertain what action has been taken to deal with the inspectors, who have manifestly been grossly negligent and also what action has been taken against the owner of the sheep, who must have known they were infected with scab before he moved them. The letter concludes with this remark—

Perhaps the Minister will explain, then, how they came to have scab.

Business suspended at 6 p.m. and resumed at 8.5 p.m.

I was making the point when business was suspended that the owner these sheep must have known when he moved them from the Free State that they were infected and I also said that the inspectors who passed those sheep must also have known. That is a very grave statement to make, but I base it on the fact that before the sheep had reached their destination, that is, when they arrived at Waschbank on their way to Dundee, they were met by an inspector, who had no difficulty in detecting scab. Sheep that had had the infection for three months had escaped the notice of the inspectors in the Free State, whilst the Natal inspector had no difficulty in detecting the disease immediately he saw the sheep and while they were actually in transit between the Free State and Dundee. I want to stress this point with the Minister. This is a case of a deliberate and wanton movement of scab infected sheep done with full knowledge of the existence of the disease and of the consequences to the sheep farmers over whose farms the sheep were moved. We know that Natal farmers whose sheep are depastured in the Free State in the summer months regard it as most essential that they should get them back to their winter quarters in Natal, and to some the infliction of a fine is no deterrent, the owner much preferring to pay a heavy fine to wintering in the Free State. It seems to me that in this case, notwithstanding the fact that these sheep were infected with scab, some influence was brought to bear on the Free State inspectors to pass them into Natal, regardless of the interests of the farming community generally, and inspectors who can be thus influenced are not fit to occupy such a responsible position. I may mention the name of Mr. Lucas Meyer as the gentleman who mentioned this matter at the meeting of sheep farmers held at Elandslaagte. That portion of the country, from Jackal’s Spruit to Waschbank, is the portion of my district owned by some of the most progressive sheep farmers in Klip River, men who own high-class sheep. One can imagine what the result is going to be if those owners are going to be compelled to dip at this time of the year. The secretary of the association says that the sheep went to Waschbank and slept there on the farm of Mr. E. A. White, who has since been placed under licence. So that we already have one of the farms which this flock traversed under licence. The secretary further states that while at Waschbank the sheep were inspected by a local stock inspector, who found out of a troop of 700 that 170 were very badly infected. I think that is a very important point in this case in support of my contention that there must have been guilty knowledge on the part of the owner and Free State inspectors. The sheep were actually travelling when the Natal inspector looked at them and detected scab amongst them. I do not want to make any political capital out of this unfortunate incident. I want to pay the Minister this tribute, that so far as my own district is concerned the scab position has very much improved in the last year and the farmers at this meeting at Elandslaagte deplored this serious setback very much. They say in this letter that they consider that the inspectors concerned in the free State should be immediately dismissed and, as tar as Mr. Gregory is concerned, he should be prosecuted. No doubt he will be prosecuted; that goes without saying. I do hope, if it is found that there was knowledge on his part that the sheep were infected when he moved them, that he will receive a very heavy penalty. I ask the Minister to take a very serious view of this matter and to take such steps as will prevent further abuses of this character as far as is possible.

I would like to deal with the point raised by the hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell). The hon. member has given me the correspondence. I will take the matter up and go into it fully with the parties concerned. May I just say at the outset that the conditions which have been referred to by the hon. member and contained in this letter, and which are in the Wage Board’s recommendation, are precisely the same conditions which the master bakers themselves laid down in the wage agreement six months previously, they are taken over word for word. The baking industry took advantage of the Conciliation Act and an industrial council was formed twelve months ago, and this industrial council made a wage agreement. That wage agreement expired towards the end of the year, but they renewed it again and carried it on. It expires in August next. The difficulty was this that the master bakers, through the industrial council representatives, complained, many of them, that owing to some bakers taking advantage of the definition of “employee” in the Industrial Conciliation Act they were not playing the game because they were dismissing Europeans and taking on pass law natives. They approached the department and also approached me. The industrial council—which I had to recognize as the official body representing the industry—said that—

As the Industrial Conciliation Act does not provide for that, I had to ask the Wage Board to make an investigation. What the Wage Board did really was to make a recommendation in precisely the same terms on this point as the wage agreement which existed, this in collaboration with and after discussing it with the Industrial Council. After hearing the objections and getting agreement between the council and itself the Wage Board made the recommendation to which I have referred. That recommendation has been in force, but owing to a recent court judgment we have had to republish it as a peculiar position has arisen. It is only on account of this republication that these objections are now being raised by a section of the industry which disassociates itself from the council. That is an unfortunate position. We are not responsible for that. The recent court case has compelled the Government to republish these recommendations, for this reason, that if the board makes a recommendation in terms of the Act it is published for a month for objections to be raised in any particular. If the board makes any amendments in consequence of those objections we thought that all that was necessary was that the amended recommendation should be published and made law but now the court has decided that every time any amendment is made to a recommendation which has been published it has to be republished for another month, and so every time objections are received and the board amends the regulation in consequence it means you cannot put them at once into force but you must publish them again for further objections for another month. That is something that I do not think this House contemplated at the time the Act was passed, and it is something which the law advisers certainly did not think was the case. There was complete agreement as far as the Witwatersrand is concerned, but as far as Pretoria is concerned there was a certain amount of disagreement, which still exists, and the department is going into that. But on the Witwatersrand there was agreement between the Industrial Council and the Wage Board, and as stated the ratios and the technical terms were taken over from the agreement which the industry itself laid down and which had been law for nearly twelve months.

Are you not going to deal with my specific point as to native labour?

There are reports to the effect that some bakers have no difficulty. Some bakers before the agreement were employing all white labour. It was only when some bakers started dismissing Europeans and employing natives that the good employers came along and said, “it is hopeless unless you give us proper protection.” We have reports from bakers that they have been able to comply and agree with it and also able to get any additional help they require. The industry itself laid the conditions down; the board simply took them over.

I rise to appeal to the Government to alter its present procedure in dealing with unemployment. I realize the Government is doing what it thinks to be in the best interests of the unemployed by gradually taking on twenty or twenty-five or thirty unemployed but it is a wrong policy altogether. We find there are roughly 25 to 30 per cent. who are unemployable either from age or infirmity and the very fact of the Government employing these men is the cause of the poor returns from work done. By employing only 20 or 25 at a time the Government is not diminishing the ranks of the unemployed. It attracts into the ranks a large number of unemployable persons who ought to be receiving a pension, also persons who would not work if they were offered work, because if the Government were to employ from 200 to 250 men in Cape Town and the same in the large towns it would kill the unemployment problem altogether. The result being that the unemployable would not join the ranks of the unemployed, neither would those who did not want work. It would be money well spent because you would not be assisting financially undesirable cases, also you would not be dealing with anyone except the genuine unemployed. It would be cheapest in the long run; it would be more beneficial to the people concerned and it would also separate those who do not want work from those who do, but the present dole system is detrimental to all concerned. I do appeal to the Government to offer employment to people who are willing to work and so eradicate the cancer which is in our midst at the present time.

I just want to reply to a few points which have been raised here. The hon. member for Lydenburg (Mr. Nieuwenhuize) spoke about the parlous state of the wheat farmers. Let me say at once that this Government had a report prepared by the Board of Trade and Industries with reference to the position of the wheat farmers. There certain recommendations to the Government were made, and the Government gave the necessary protection as recommended by the Board of Trade and Industries. The hon. member says that the farmers only get one-third of the price that they ought to get for their wheat. The hon. member surely does not expect the Government also to act as a trader, purchaser and seller of wheat. We expect the farmers to work out their own salvation by means of co-operation as the tobacco farmers have done. Then they will get a better price for their wheat.

Co-operation is very difficult.

The tobacco farmers had the same difficulty, and had to fight against large combines, but they occupy a strong position to-day. The millers to-day can do what they like, but if the wheat farmers in all parts of the country co-operate they will not allow themselves to be dictated to by the millers. The facilities for co-operation exist and they can themselves do much to improve their position. The Government goes still further. It feels that the wheat production which in our country is the lowest in the world must be increased and it bought a farm at Malmesbury last year to make experiments and to ascertain how the production could be increased. Our ground in many cases is exhausted and the poor ground must in many cases be improved by proper fertilizers to raise the production. The Government is taking steps to get the necessary information and will then place it at the disposal of the farmers.

Why does it not prohibit the importation of wheat?

We have increased the customs duties, but we have also to remember the consumer. We have to look on both sides, but we would do everything in our power to help the farmers. The hon. member for Klip River (Mr. Anderson) made certain remarks with reference to the issue of permits by which east coast fever has been spread in Natal from De Jagersdrift to Rooikop. Let me say that the Department of Lands cannot remove animals just as it wishes, but only if accompanied by permits from the Veterinary Department and those permits are not given unless it is quite safe to issue them. I have not all the documents in connection with the matter here, but will make further enquiry. But then he made a further statement in connection with certain sheep which trekked through the Free State. He said that 7,000 scabby sheep had trekked through the Free State to Natal. The poor Free State which was freed from scab is now made out to be the lurking place of scab. I can tell the hon. member that I am myself sorry that scabby sheep trekked, but the position is not so bad as he represents. The sheep belong to Mr. Gregory. He is a young man who grew up at Dundee in Natal. The father has a farm in the Free State, and his son treks in the summer with his sheep in that direction. The facts in connection with these cases are that two flocks of sheep of Mr. Gregory had scab last year in the district of Dundee in Natal. Those sheep were properly dipped by one of the Natal dipping inspectors, and the sheep then trekked to the Free State without the inspectors notifying the chief inspector of the Free State to keep his eye on them. But Mr. Gregory dips his sheep every year in December after they have been shorn. Because the sheep were dipped the Free State inspector examined them and found no scab. Whether it was camouflage—we know this can be easily down—we do not know, but when the sheep reached their destination in Natal scab was reported. I am going to institute action against Mr. Gregory, but as regards the inspector, I am also going to make a thorough enquiry whether the sheep were all properly inspected, and I shall further have the question gone into how it happened that the Natal inspector, who knew that the sheep had scab, did not communicate it to the Free State inspectors. The chief inspector in the Free State reports as follows—

That is the report which I received, and I am now busy making enquiries. If it appears that there was any neglect on the part of the inspectors I shall not hesitate a moment in immediately dismissing whoever has been negligent. I am just as anxious as any hon. member to eradicate scab in the country, and it can be done. But I cannot be blamed for an inspector’s negligence.

Recently the Minister of Finance was indulging in a funeral oration with regard to the future of the country, and I carefully studied, as far as I could, every indication which might lend support to that doleful view. I think sometimes it was the professional attitude—“Do not come to me for money,” and “I want to provide a surprise surplus next year.” But it may not be that; it may be that the hon. gentleman is absolutely convinced that we have to look for a cloudy sky. I should like him, if he has time, to go into some of the reports dealing with the economic position of the country, and he might take his courage, if not in both hands, in one hand, as they would show him that the prognostications he offered are not warranted. I refer to reports from chambers of commerce—these mercantile men are without any sentiment or sentimental spirit, except that of profit, and they are always more practical than sentimental. They cherish no illusions if they can help it. I would like the Minister to rely on them, as they are far more optimistic than he is, based on the business returns they see coming in, and they are in closer touch with the people. The Durban Chamber of Commerce, at its annual meeting in May, said—

I ask the Minister to make a note of these words. They go on to say, after referring to the satisfactory prosperity of last year— “Better times are ahead of us.” Take now the annual report of the Chamber of Commerce of Cape Town, a very substantial body of men, who look after inland business of various kinds, and are not likely to be misled. Their opinion is one that must surely commend itself to the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger). This appears in the latest issue of the “Journal of Commerce” published in June, this month—

What does it say about the Flag Bill?

The hon. member naturally has that flag question on the brain. He is admittedly a Sinn Feiner, and, in passing, I may say that Ireland is a great example to be followed. That country adopted a compromise flag with a green stripe for Home Rulers and an orange stripe to satisfy Orangemen. I recommend the example to the hon. member. I have referred to commerce, trade and industries reports. As regards mining, nothing need be said. The gold mines are prosperous beyond all previous experience. Costs are lower and profits greater, so that there can be no doubt whatever as to the public revenue accruing from gold mines. With regard to coal mines, it is simply a question of adequate rolling stock, and if it will not be a record year, it will be a very prosperous year indeed. Now we come to what, no doubt, is frightening the hon. gentleman—diamonds. No doubt he will be told that they will become unsaleable and we will be able to sweep them up with brooms. That is all in the profession— these combine gentry are very anxious that the Government should be frightened, as far as possible, with regard to the Government revenue from diamonds. I have no doubt they whispered to the Minister—“Do not shake that house of cards by a breath of wind; if you do anything of a disturbing kind this precarious business will disappear in a night, and the million revenue you are dependent on this year will vanish.” But if the Minister will look at that invaluable index, the stock exchange, he will see that De Beers fifty-shilling shares are still standing at over £16; and as long as the Minister sees that figure he may sleep peacefully as regards diamonds. If there is anything really wrong with the diamond market, a slump would be engineered in the shares so that they might first be sold and then bought back cheaply. It may suit the combine just now to be “bears” as to the future of diamonds whilst the Precious Stones Bill is going through Parliament. I come now to another thing which we on these benches hold in rather low estimation—the Reserve Bank. The Minister has stated very definitely that he will have no State bank. I ask hon. members to realize what Mr. Clegg, the head of the Reserve Bank, has been saying recently. He is an authority straight from the Bank of England. I have no doubt that the Minister will sit at his feet in perfect humility. That gentleman has made the annual address at the meeting of shareholders. Of course, he would bitterly oppose establishing anything like a State bank on the lines of the Commonwealth Bank of Australia. No, but he lays it down that if the Reserve Bank were given “wider powers” there would be “a clear field for it to do enough business in connection with the credit market to enable it to fulfil its functions of controlling credit and thereby the currency of the country.” A nice concession truly! The last Government was weak—all obstinate and tyrannical Governments are weak—and unfortunately it gave an exceedingly valuable concession to the Reserve Bank, instead of establishing a State bank. What real right has the Reserve Bank —a shareholder’s institution—to control currency? For that certainly should be absolutely in the hands of government. What do we find? The Government allows this privately owned bank to issue £9,000,000 worth of notes, but the bank, before it issues them to commercial banks, insists on their depositing against the notes issued to them 40 per cent. in gold and 60 per cent. in approved shortdated bills.

Cut it short, cut it short!

Yes, I would cut that concession very short indeed. The consequence is that the Reserve Bank has a present made to it of £9,000,000 capital which costs it nothing but the expense of printing. Mr. Clegg can teach us politicians a lesson in diplomatic speech. In his annual address near the outset he said he would refer to the question of profits at a later stage, but when the later stage came, he declared, “I have already referred to the profits, so I need not refer to them again.” I can quite understand his reticence in regard to profits, for the bank has made out of this concession profits for its shareholders to the amount of £415,000, but the Government gets only £84,414. These figures are given to me officially. The Minister thinks this good business, and quietly sits by and allows all this major profit to be taken away from the country. Where does the hon. gentleman go to obtain advances when he is short of money? He draws Treasury bills and discounts them, but if he had this £9,000,000 worth of notes, he would not have to borrow on Treasury bills, but could even lend the Reserve Bank his idle money. The public determine what currency is required, notes, gold, silver and copper, and it is the duty of government to supply it. That is the A.B.C. of public finance, but it appears that the hon. gentleman has not sufficiently studied State banking, so it is necessary to put the matter on this simple basis: he pays the bank discount and interest for “accommodation” in the shape of Treasury bills, and all the time he is calmly giving away £9,000,000 of currency, for which he receives the insignificant sum of £84,000 over several years, for that is the total received to date. Does he think this great finance? After all, “high finance” is interpreted in simple terms of domestic economy, but the hon. gentleman is highly praised in strictly financial circles as being a fit successor to Mr. Burton. Personally I think it may be so. However, I can assure him that so long as he is praised by the Cleggs and financiers of that kind, who come to this country to extract all they can from it, he is not acting in the best interests of South Africa. If he could take a lesson from Mr. Clegg, and the others, how to make money he might make it for the people instead of for big financiers. The happy position of the owners of the Preserve Bank is shown by the fact that shareholders for every £100 invested in it have now fully secured stock valued on the stock exchange at £185, so that if the people decided to take back into the hands of government this concession we would probably have to give these shareholders cent. per cent. as compensation for their holding. This is the result of surrendering the State right to create paper currency, the least costly to make, and the greatest of modern credit and currency requirements. Yet the hon. gentleman says he does not believe in State banking!

The hon. member for Cape Town (Hanover Street) (Mr. Alexander) asks what steps have been taken to insure that provincial councils are going to carry out, as far as possible, the recommendations of the Hospitals Inquiry Commission. As I stated previously, the control of the hospitals remains under the provincial administration, and for that reason it is advisable for the Minister to interfere as little as possible in hospital matters. However, I gave the assurance to the House that I would do whatever I could to urge on the provincial administrations to carry out the recommendations of the Hospital Commission’s report, as far as possible. Just before Parliament assembled last year, I had a conference with the four administrators on this question of hospital administration, and certain conclusions were reached. As far as I can judge to-day, the provincial administrations are abiding by the resolutions which were then reached and are doing their duty. A big advance has been made since the appearance of the report in the way of new hospital accommodation and construction. Loans have been approved of by Parliament for new hospitals at East London, Bloemfontein and Cape Town, and on the Loan Estimates Parliament has approved of the erection of an infectious diseases hospital at Durban.

And a hospital at Pretoria.

So the chief centres where the needs are the greatest are being provided for. Further it was agreed upon as a guide to provincial administrations in hospital policy that there should be a hospital survey of the whole Union and I agree it should be undertaken as soon as possible and that it would be carried out by the Department of Public Health of the Union Government. During the course of last year I appointed such a commission and they have completed their labours and the report is being printed now so that the provincial administration will have guidance in future with regard to hospital policy in this report. That will prevent the building of hospitals at centres where afterwards, it would appear, are unsuitable. It will prevent a good deal of waste of money. Further it was agreed by me in the conference with the Administrators that the inspection of hospitals in future will be on the shoulders of the Public Health Department and for that reason I promised them after consultation with my colleagues and the Minister of Finance we would create a new post—that of inspector of hospitals. The post has been created and we have asked for applications, but there a difficulty has arisen. I did my best, but it was difficult to secure a suitable man. I want a really first-class man, because he would be the guide in the every day administration of hospitals for the provincial administration who are without experts in that direction. So far I have not succeeded in getting a suitable man, but I am trying to secure one and as soon as we get one we shall make the appointment and the inspection will then take place under the direction of the Department of Public Health. The other question which has been put to me by the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) (Col. D. Reitz) in connection with registration. Largely it was a complaint referring to his own particular case. He has a complaint in the first instance against the canvasser. The registering officer is dependent upon the work of the canvasser. I have the correspondence before me in regard to this particular case and the excuse of the canvasser was that he called at the house of the hon. member and was informed that the hon. member was not living there and he asked for the address.

My tenant sends my rent deposit slips every month and I have never been in a boarding house in my life. That is his excuse. He tells me that also.

I am right in that then. He was told the hon. gentleman was not known.

That is hard lines.

Such ignorance one could not expect in Johannesburg or elsewhere.

He was probably a Nationalist.

There is a further complaint against the registering officer. I have seen the correspondence and I think the hon. gentleman admits that his letter to the registering officer was not couched in very complimentary terms and that caused some bad feeling.

I am prepared to admit that.

His complaint was that the registering officer wrote in an egotistical strain to him.

I admit that.

Then I hope it will be a lesson to the hon. member and every other person that in future much can be gained by referring to other persons in complimentary terms.

In the meantime I am left off the roll.

I refer the hon. member to Clause 15 of the Electoral Act of last year “where the prescribed form of claim has not been used by any claimant or where the claim has not been properly filled in and properly completed and the applicant is disqualified where he should not be disqualified his name shall be added to the list.”

I am on the list.

I take it your claim is to get on again?

No, they had no right to take me off.

But it is really a question of getting the hon. member on the roll again and as I understand the section it means that without really completing the form of claim the hon. member can be put on the roll again by the revising officer.

But he refused.

I think you are referring to the registering officer and not the revising officer. You cannot reach the revising officer otherwise than through the registering officer and without completing the form of claim against the filling up of which the hon. gentleman objects. By filling it up he can reach the revising officer, and if he is satisfied the hon. member can be on the register he can add the name to the voters’ roll.

But he had no right to take me off.

The hon. gentleman shares that complaint with a large number of other people, but as far as that is concerned, we have the machinery under the Act and for that reason you have the revision court and even members of Parliament, including the hon. member, must follow the ordinary course that other people follow.

But they don’t notify a man when he has been taken off. I am down here and I do not know when the revision court is sitting.

The hon. member is quite right. If the name was on the roll and was removed he must get notice. It is definitely laid down in the Act and if it was not done then possibly it was unintentional or the letter must have gone wrong.

The new principle is working better than you expected.

The hon. member asks further whether I would give instructions to all registering officers that a certain judgment has gone a certain way in Cape Town and they must act accordingly. I do not think I have the power to do that. It would be inadvisable for any Minister to interfere with the machinery created under the Act in connection with registration. Very often a cause is brought before the courts in connection with registration, if it is a matter of a point of law, and it is often referred to the Supreme Court. The appeal to the Supreme Court can be made without any expense to the persons appealing. When the decision has been made, as a matter of course, all lower courts and revising officers have to keep to the judgment. It is not the business of the Minister to interfere with the working of the machinery created under the Act.

I cannot help thinking a large number of people who have been disenfranchised will find the Minister’s explanation unsatisfactory. Take the case of Cape Town alone. A great deal of the trouble in Cape Town is due to the instructions given to the canvassers who had to report by a particular date. They had not time to complete the areas and find out the names and addresses of all the people entitled to be registered. The time was too short and there was not sufficient check on the canvassers to see if the work was properly done. Another complaint is that when the canvassers went round they were instructed to compile the jury list in the Cape Province. In the Cape Province we have had trial by jury abolished. Rightly so as it led to results that were very undesirable and unfair. But a very important argument was that trial by civil jury was a tremendous burden on business people in the town. So a large number of people who, much as they appreciated and valued the vote—when they were called upon to fill up their qualifications for the vote and found that they were at the same time called on to fill up their qualification for the preparation of the jury roll, well a large number of people would not fill up the application for the voters’ roll because they were being handicapped by filling up their qualification for the jury roll. It was a serious handicap and the Government had no right to couple the preparation of the voters’ roll with the preparation of the jury roll at the same time. We have had a very large number of people struck off the roll here who were absent either on a holiday or through their houses being let, etc. When the Bill was before the House the Minister would not listen to the remonstrances which were made. The result is that we have got a voters roll which is in an extraordinary state of chaos. One organisation alone has managed to collect the names of 11,000 people who have claimed to be on the roll. The Minister smiles. Does he not admit that 3,000 or more have actually been accepted as legitimate claims to be on the roll? How can those 3,000 alone come to be left off the roll under any proper system of canvassing and under any proper system of registration? The matter becomes of extreme importance when it is remembered that upon this registration the next general election will be fought, the next delimination will be determined and the referendum will be taken. I do say that it is the duty of the Government to pass some sort of reparation bill which will put right in the next few days the extreme anomalies and injustices which have been brought about by the operation of this Bill, about which the utmost warning was given to the Minister at the time.

In every biennial registration you get the same complaints.

No, not by any means. This is one of the worst registrations we have ever had. We had the regrettable fact that one of the members of the Ministerial bench was actually left off the roll. To get back to the perfectly rotten registration which we have had this year, I ask what action the Minister is going to take in view of the fact that upon this registration will depend those three important issues which I have mentioned. In the true interests of electoral justice and of the registration of the people of this country, what is the Minister going to do to remedy that? What about those members of this House from other parts of the country and what about those public servants who are brought down here several months of the year? What is going to be done for the protection of their interests? Now we have the judgment of the courts saying that the decisions of certain registering officers are wrong. The Minister knows that, as far as these particular decisions are concerned, they affect only the particular people in whose particular cases the decisions were given. Surely there is some method of arriving at a system by which a general ruling given by the registering officer, especially in regard to people already on the rolls, may be corrected in such a way that the decision, when corrected, shall apply not merely to the individual persons concerned, but to the blocks of persons whose cases are identical. There should be some way of securing uniformity in the decisions, either by the Minister or the Government taking a special case to the judges of the court, or by the Minister letting the registering offices know what decisions have already been given. Then there is the same complaint about the registration of coloured voters, who have been made to fill up forms in quite a different way from whites. Why was that distinction drawn by a Government which is professedly in other spheres treating as a matter of civilization the rights of the coloured and whites on exactly the same basis? Why is this distinction made and made in such a way that it is much more difficult for the coloured voters to get on the roll than it is for the whites?

No.

It is no use the Minister shaking his head. I do say that every one of these points which I have raised are of the utmost importance in the interests of true and fair and proper representation of the people of this country. The Minister knows perfectly well the difficulty there always is in getting registration. Why are these additional and unnecessary difficulties placed in the way of people who should be put on the roll? The Minister has to come back to this one elementary thing, that the canvassing arrangements in this case were hopelessly bad and for that the Minister and his department are responsible.

In the appointment of the canvassers the South African party had a say.

It is not a question of the appointment of canvassers. It is a question of the conditions under which the canvassers had to do their work. The time allowed to them was wholly inadequate for the proper performance of their duties. We have rarely listened to a more paltry defence of injustice than we have heard from the Minister. The spirit we complain of is the light-hearted way in which the Minister either ignores or neglects the rights of people to be put on the roll. The result is that those of us who write indignant letters may apparently look forward with certainty to our being kept off the roll, though in every other respect we are entitled to be kept on. It is a remarkable defence, and it comes with very ill-grace from one who, in his responsible position, is supposed to look impartially upon the rights of every person in the country.

That is bunkum; it is not his business to see you are registered.

The hon. member for Ceres (Mr. Roux) must have been asleep. I did not say that at all. I want, at some time or other, to get an explanation from the Minister as to how it is that a state of affairs was possible under which a private organization was able to secure the names of 11,000 people who claimed to be on the roll, and in regard to whom the Minister will admit that at least 3,000 were entitled to be on the roll. The question is, how they came to be left out.

Hon. members opposite want to make a little party capital out of the registration, and they are attacking the Minister because the registration has not gone as they wished. The attack will, however, not assist the S.A. party at all. After every biennial registration since 1907 there has been great complaint. In 1907 the old Cape Legislative Assembly went so far as to appoint a Select Committee to make enquiry. There are always complaints and the people whose names are not on the roll are always dissatisfied. During the time that the S.A. party were in office the Cape members did not complain so much, because they would then have had to complain against their own Minister. Moreover, there would have been no ground for complaint against the Minister just as there is now no ground for complaint against the Minister of the Interior. It is impossible for the Minister and the officials entrusted with the registration to see that the name of every person entitled to registration appears on the roll. Hon. members who are now complaining that the time for registration was too short know just as well as I do that the Act which controls the registration was in force before this Government came into office. The day on which the registration must begin, the length of time within which application can be made, before the provisional roll of voters is posted up, and the time that the provisional roll must so remain posted up are old provisions. The Act lays down further that if anyone is dissatisfied because his name is excluded he can take certain steps. Hon. members opposite have one complaint, and it is against their own friends who were so negligent that they did not even take the trouble of seeing that their names were on the roll. The hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) (Col. D. Reitz) admits that he was away from home. The Act says that a person must be registered where he lives and that he must have lived there for three months before the registration.

I lived there a year.

It does not matter whether you lived there 20 years, but if you no longer have the right to be registered there then your name can no longer appear on the roll. The hon. member admits that he was absent. He is still talking about the injustice done him, but I think he attaches too much importance to his own personality.

I had to come to Parliament.

Does the hon. member admit that he was absent for three months?

In Parliament.

But the hon. member was away from home. If he will not admit it then I must leave it to the House to say whether it is so or not. He left three months before the registration and let his house to someone else and he therefore did not live there. If the hon. member denies that fact then he will deny anything. The hon. member was away and someone else was living in his house and therefore he did not have the right of being registered there. Moreover, the Electoral Officer notified him—and I think he now has the form with him—that his name had been omitted. If he was a sensible man then he would have filled in the form and his name would have been on the Voters’ Roll. I do not think that so many people have been omitted from the roll as hon. members opposite want to make out. I speak from experience because I was myself, in 1909, instructed to prepare the Voters’ Roll in Cape Town. At that time there were many people who were registered in more than one constituency. Hon. members opposite are dissatisfied now because under the new law it is practically made impossible for a person to be registered in two, three or four constituencies. In the old days the position was that Cape Town for that reason had an advantage over the countryside. George Smith who earned his salary in St. George’s Street was registered in Cape Town (Central), but the name of George Smith also appeared on the Voters’ Roll of Newlands, Rondebosch or Salt River. He might in the second case have been the same person as the George Smith working in St. George’s Street, but the registration officer does not know that.

He cannot vote in all the constituencies.

I am now speaking of registration. Hon. members opposite are now trying to make party capital out of the matter but it will not assist them a bit. If a person’s name has been left off the roll it is his own fault. Those of us who represent country constituencies know what trouble our electors have to take to get their names on the roll. People in Cape Town who live a few miles from the registration office cannot complain if their names do not appear on the roll, because they have had full opportunity to see to it. According to law the provisional voters’ roll must be play-carded six full weeks and persons have an opportunity to see if their names are on it. I know that some persons have taken the trouble to find out whether their names were on. When such was not the case they have filled in a form, and if they were entitled then their name was put on the roll. Because hon. members opposite want to make party capital out of it they blamed the Minister because the registration does not suit them. The registration in the Cape Province was not worse than at any previous biennial registration, but formerly the Voters’ Roll was prepared under their own Minister and Government.

With regard to the matter of the industrial bank raised by the hon. member for Cape Town (Hanover Street) (Mr. Alexander) I cannot add anything to what I told the House not so long ago. In accordance with the undertaking I gave the House, I referred the matter to the Board of Trade and Industries, members of which are perhaps better acquainted with the requirements and needs of industries than anybody else, and are eminently fitted to conduct such an investigation. They have given the matter attention, but have been busy with many other difficult matters, and I have not yet received the report. I will receive it shortly, and it will receive consideration. The hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus) raised the question of the Wanderers’ lots, a matter which seems to have become urgent, but I am informed by the Treasury it has been going on for the last 40 years, and no settlement was reached in that period. The Secretary of Lands and Secretary for Finance are going into the question what is a reasonable amount payable to the Government for the redemption of its interest, and when some agreement has been arrived at between that department and the Treasury, I will go into the question.

Motion put and agreed to.

Bill read a second time; House to go into committee now.

House in Committee:

Clauses put and agreed to.

On First Schedule,

If I am in order, I should like to draw attention to the serious state of affairs that has arisen in the country owing to the neglect of the Government in connection with the question of the spread of native trade union propaganda—an uncontrolled movement which is doing a great deal of harm.

The hon. member cannot discuss policy now; he can discuss only the item. He can do so on the third reading.

If the hon. member wishes to discuss this point, do we not take the Prime Minister’s Vote on this Schedule?

Not as a rule on the schedule.

If the hon. member desires to maintain it as a right, is it not competent for him to challenge any Minister’s Vote?

No, I am sorry; it has not been the practice. It can be done only at the second and third readings.

Schedules and title put and agreed to.

House Resumed:

Bill reported without amendment; third reading on 20th June.

I move—

This Bill provides for the construction of certain three short lines of railway and for the ratification of a certain agreement entered into by the Administration and the Government of Southern Rhodesia in regard to the operation of a line of railway and the construction of a certain bridge over the Limpopo River; including the lines constructed as war measures, this Bill is the ninth providing for the construction of new railways within the Union since 1910. Excluding the present Bill, the total mileage of new railways constructed or authorized since Union is 4,265 involving an expenditure of over £17,000,000. This excludes several deviations of the Natal main lines ranking as new routes. Of the lines authorized since 1922, under the 1922 programme, 42 miles still remain to be constructed; of the 1924-’26 programme, 12 miles still remain to be constructed, and of the 1925 programme, 801 miles have still to be completed and opened. This makes a total of 856 miles remaining to be completed, and there is active construction work in progress on 359 miles, leaving 497 miles still to be started. In these figures is not included the New Cape Central Railway, purchased by the Administration a few years ago. In regard to the present programme, the report of the Railway Board gives, in the case of the ordinary new lines, the engineers’ reports and estimates of cost of construction, with maps, their approximate routes, etc., and hon. members will find in the board’s report full details of construction, the approximate length, the ruling gradients, the type of rails, the position in regard to loop lines, and other matters referred to in the Bill. The Bill itself, with the addition of a few specific provisions, follows the lines of previous Acts dealing with railway construction. Section 1 authorizes the construction and equipment of the line mentioned therein. Section 6 provides for the ratification of the agreement entered into between the Government of Southern Rhodesia and the Administration. The Bill also provides for the ratification of the alteration of portions of the route of the St. Mark’s-lmvani line which was sanctioned in 1925. It was found necessary to deviate the line, and although no extra financial assistance is required, it is necessary to have Parliament’s approval of the changed route. The Cape Town-Woltemade relief line is to ease the traffic position in Cape Town itself. I understand that as many as 365 trains have been handled on this section of the line in a day and relief is urgently necessary. The proposal before the House has nothing to do with the electrification of the suburban line. I understand the deviation will be primarily a goods line to serve the Cape Town goods station and docks, but it will be used for passenger traffic when convenient. As to the Louis Trichardt deviation it forms part of the original Messina line scheme. When it was built the serving of Louis Trichardt and its hinterland was specially considered, but the Administration found it impossible to provide the extra amount required for that purpose. Since then Louis Trichardt and its hinterland have shown considerable development, and the distance of the town from the station has become a considerable commercial handicap, with the result that the Louis Trichardt Village Council, the Zoutpansberg Chamber of Commerce and the Spelonken Cotton Syndicate have agreed to the levying of a special surcharge on the rates. These bodies can speak for the people concerned.

We were told they were going to guarantee the interest on the additional outlay.

I think the guarantee takes the form of an agreement to pay a special surcharge on the ordinary rates.

How long is that to continue?

The hon. member the other night expressed doubt about the success of this arrangement in the past, and bearing in mind the case of Ceres and Messina, I am inclined to agree with him. The agreement is there, however, and as long as Parliament can resist the pressure which is generally brought to bear in these matters, it is a perfectly sound proposition. The existing lines will be retained intact for convenience in working through trains. Out of the 1,200 trains per annum on that route about 784 will be run direct and the remainder will run over the loop line. The Limpopo line will be 9½ miles in extent from Messina and the estimated cost is £51,000. Half the share of the cost of the bridge over the Limpopo River, the estimated cost of which is £24,000, would have been payable by the South African Administration, but this will not be necessary as the trustees of the late Alfred Beit have offered to pay a share of the cost of construction of the combined road and railway bridge. We have had much pleasure in accepting this very generous and public-spirited offer. The structure and design of the bridge are now engaging the attention of the trustees. Under the agreement which we ask the House to ratify the Administration undertakes to maintain and work the line and provide the necessary personnel and rolling stock for the whole of the line up to the north bank of the Limpopo River.

The Rhodesian Government will make good any loss on the north side?

Yes. The terminus will be about one mile from the north bank.

Does Rhodesia contemplate linking up?

I am not able to say. The estimated capital cost of the one mile of line on the north bank payable by the Rhodesian Government is £18,410. The Imvani-St. Mark’s line is due to an alteration of the original plan, and the result of further information obtained after the Bill was introduced and the line sanctioned and which entails an extension of the line by a few miles. It was necessary to have the alteration validated by Parliament.

I support lines 1, 2 and 3 in any case. As regards No. 4 line—the Louis Trichardt deviation— I think that it is unnecessary and I am surprised the administration brought it forward. With regard to the Cape Town-Woltemade No. 1 line it is four miles in length and is costing £110,000. An examination of the number of trains scheduled during the week day at the present time through Maitland compared with 1920, is 307 as against 109 and the board make out a very strong case for the line. Traffic to Cape Town is increasing rapidly especially at the docks but I must call attention to the excessive cost of the line, which works out at £27,543 a mile. After deducting charges for signals, crossings, etc., it is going to work out at £10,443 for permanent way alone, and it does not appear to justify such an enormous cost for the permanent way as this. This avoiding line is going to interfere with four roads. First of all there is the road running off Albert Road, Woodstock to the foreshore, and then there is the road to Milnerton, that is going to be stopped altogether. There may be a legal point about that. Another is an important road running out of town because this line crosses the main road at Maitland on this side of the cemetery near Kensington. All the traffic going to the north-east and south-west goes over that road. The other road is the Koeberg Road on which there is always a good bit of traffic. What we want to impress upon the Government is that it has always been the policy of the department up to now to compel local authorities concerned, when it comes to building a bridge to pay half the cost. It is only fair and just the department should meet the whole of the cost of the bridge over the main road running towards Bellville and also over the Koeberg Road. They are both old roads which have been there for some two hundred years. It is the railway that is the newcomer and they are going to interfere with the traffic and let me say the municipality of Cape Town will not get an extra 6d. from this traffic. The department will get it all. Why then compel the municipality to contribute to build these two bridges simply because of the deviation of a line by the railway department? I know the importance of it but I raise a strong protest. There is no doubt if this was a private railway they would have to build the bridges. I have the agreement here of the first railway in South Africa which lays it down that the company shall be bound and obliged to make and keep in repair so many convenient gates, bridges, culverts and passenger ways, on and over any road to or from the railway as shall be necessary to make good any interruptions caused by the said railway. This dates back to 1861 for the Wynberg line. If a project like this were brought before the British Parliament they would take good care that all bridges made would have to be made, not at the expense of the local authority, but at the expense of the railway company. But just because this happens to be a state line they must take, as they do, certain rights and so forth from the public or from the local authorities.

They take rights from private landowners.

Yes, but why should you want to make the ratepayers of Cape Town bear a portion of this burden? You do not pay anything to the rates of Cape Town, except on property that you hire out to other individuals. The general public and private individuals do not get as well treated from the State railways as they would insist upon getting from a private railway. The only people who benefit from the State railways are the employees, who elect their own masters. This State railway which we have here claims rights and privileges that no private railway would have for a moment. Take the way the people are treated on the Wynberg line. They have to pay double fare in some cases, even if they leave behind their monthly or weekly ticket, I think the municipality of Cape Town have here a very strong case indeed. In regard to the Messina-Limpopo line, I think most South Africans will welcome that. I want to draw attention to the Louis Trichardt extension or loop, 8¼ miles to cost £31,000. I do not see that this line is called for particularly. The Railway Board do not, in my opinion, make out a very good case. [Railway Board’s report on the proposal read.] It seems to me that there is nothing very strong about this report. I could mention another place also where there is a lot of agitation, and yet they have never succeeded in getting a railway. That is Dordrecht in the Wodehouse district, four miles from the nearest railway. Deputations have come here repeatedly to press for this line being made. Take a place like Kuruman, hundreds of miles from the railway, or take Namaqualand, Port St. Johns or Peddie, these places are all miles away from the nearest railway. Why the Administration should have gone out of their way to make this special loop, a distance of eight miles, I fail to understand. The only thing I can get from the report is that there has been sufficient agitation to move the railway department. There is no other explanation. Judging by the traffic on the existing line it appears to me that most of the traffic is native passengers. Over 10,000 were carried in one year. This line, up to now, has never paid. There has always been a loss upon it. That you should now go and spend on this line £31,000 I do not think is justified at all. I hope the Minister will reconsider. You have 400 miles sanctioned by this House, and that has not yet been implemented.

I am at one with the Government in its view that when bridges have to be built, when a line has been constructed, the local authority should bear part of the expense. I notice in the plan of this Woltemade and Cape Town scheme, a bridge is marked on the main road, but there is nothing at all in the Estimates as to the cost of the bridge. The whole of the cost of this is £16,000, whereas one bridge alone over the main road at Woltemade could not be constructed for that sum. The municipality must be drawn to the conclusion that although it is marked on the plan, there is no intention to build the bridge. Then there is the line to Malmesbury. Apparently that is going to be a level crossing. The traffic there is increasing enormously. We know that all our grain traffic goes along that road. We are going to have a position at that point which will be quite intolerable. I see that the Paarden Island road is to be closed. I do not know why, because it is a road that has been in existence for many years. The Church Street bridge is already so narrow that it is very difficult for two vehicles to pass. It means we are going to have an enormous congestion of traffic there. How £16,000 is going to cover all that I do not know. Take the construction of new lines during the last year or two. Let me take four lines only. There is the Mtubatubar—Pongola railway. There has been a deviation of seven miles there without parliamentary sanction. The original estimated cost was £419,760, and the revised estimate was £651,358, an increase of £211,598 Take the Upington—Kakamas, the original estimate was £113,000, and the revised estimate £154,070, an increase of £41,070. The Ceres to Prince Albert line original estimate, £31,570, revised estimate £54,540, an increase of £17,370. Then we come to the George and Knysna line, which makes one despair of ever getting a decent estimate. The original estimate was £296,820, and the revised estimate £435,440. These are very large increases, and are we in regard to these particular lines also going to have these enormous increases? Taking the first line alone, ill which I am interested, because it is a very necessary line, one feels that the estimate is totally inadequate. The map shows an overhead bridge, but the estimates show nothing at all. The Minister will find that at least two other bridges will have to be built in addition to the one on the main road then there is nothing in the reports to show definitely what the income is going to be, and we know from experience that the income is always over-estimated. I showed recently that on nine lines the income was over-estimated by over £100,000, which is a very serious position. When there is no provision made for the bridge on the estimates we fear that the bridge is not going to be built do not know whether the Minister knows what traffic passes over that road. They speak of over 300 trains a day, but I think that over 300 vehicles an hour pass over that part. All the heavy traffic goes over that part of the road I would like to draw attention to the time during which the level crossing gates are closed. On the Sea Point line I found that the gates were closed 7 minutes before a train arrived and for 2 minutes after the train had passed the station. If there is to be a level crossing at this spot on the main road, it will make it impossible for the public to carry on their business properly. Here we are not asking the Minister to build bridges where the railway is already in existence, but where a line is to be built across roads which are in constant use.

I would like to support what has just been said. Nobody objects to the construction of this avoiding line. Un the contrary, one is glad that railway traffic has increased to such an extent that provision has to be made for relieving congestion, but I am very much afraid that, although you are going to relieve congestion on the railways, you are going to cause congestion as far as the general public is concerned which is going to be unprecedented. I visited the vicinity in company with the hon. member for Salt. River (Mr. Snow) this morning and from what. I saw I think you are going to have a very serious state of affairs, for altogether there will be nine new level crossings created. If one realizes what takes place at Belmont Road, Rondebosch, where the gates at the level crossings are open only eleven minutes during the hour from 5.30 to 6.30 p.m. and are closed during heavy, busy parts of the day one can imagine the extent of the congestion of traffic these level crossings cause. Unless the Government do as suggested by the municipality at Koeberg Road, Main Road, Maitland, and Church Street, Woodstock, there will be very considerable public danger, the roads being very narrow. The estimates do not give any idea of what the ultimate cost will be. We have an illustration of this in the reconstruction of the bridge over the railway at Salt River. It was originally estimated that the portion to which the City Council contributed two-thirds would cost £10,000 and the portion which the Government constructed entirely at their own expense would be £12,000, but the City Council is now asked to pay its portion of £25,000 instead of £10,000 and in the same way the other portion must have cost £30,000 instead of £12,000, so that the original estimate of the total cost of the bridge will be exceeded by £30,000, the whole costing £55,000 instead of £22,000. It is impossible to say that this Woltemade deviation is required except for the benefit of the country as a whole. It is not suggested that it has anything to do with the development of Cape Town, and in this respect the municipality has made a just and reasonable request that the bridges at Koeberg Road, Main Road and Church Street should be constructed entirely at the cost of the Government. The bridge should certainly be reconstructed at Church Street, Woodstock, which is going to be a very important industrial Centre and unless something is done to make provision for the traffic the conditions will become quite intolerable. The existing bridge is absolutely inadequate and should be widened unless we are going to create a very serious danger for traffic. I hope the Minister will agree to receive a deputation from the City Council on this matter.

I would like to call the attention of the Minister to a matter in connection with the extension of the line from Messina to the Limpopo. No doubt the House is aware that the line from Bandolier Kop to Messina was to enable the Messina copper mine to make a start. That company has worked for a long time and has done a great deal for the development for Messina, and the district round it. The railway was built in agreement with the company, and in 1921 the agreement which now subsists was entered into and that provides for the payment of 7½ per cent. of its profits annually to the railway administration When the line was serving the company mainly no doubt a policy of that kind was justified, but the position is altogether different now. The district has developed largely and the land has been settled to a very considerable extent and the population has very largely increased, and the value of Government land has also very largely increased, and now the line has become part of one of the main lines of the administration, one of the main lines to the north, I think the time has come when the Government can give some consideration to the question of relieving the company of part of the payment now incumbent upon it under the agreement. Altogether the company has paid, since the railway was built, £85,000 to the administration, and its present payments amount to £4,000 a year. The company has done a great deal to develop and extend the district under difficult circumstances, and its intention is at present to raise further capital and extend its operations. Of course, this obligation to pay 7½ per cent. of its profits over and above the ordinary taxation it is subject to, is a very serious handicap in raising additional capital, and even to carrying on its ordinary operations. The fact that this line is now coming to form a base, so to speak, for an extension of the system over the Limpopo, and no doubt in due course further north up to Rhodesia, offers a reasonable opportunity to take into consideration the question of relieving the company either wholly or in part, of its obligations under this agreement.

It appears to me there has been a lack of co-operation between the railway authorities and the City Council authorities to a serious extent, on this question. It has been complained that information has not been given which one would have expected in connection with such an important alteration of this kind in the Cape Peninsula. The Minister of Finance, one recognizes, is not as well as Finance, one recognizes, is not as well acquainted with the details as the Minister of Railways would be.

What is the question of not receiving courtesy?

Here you have a City Council which is very much concerned with the construction of this new line, and when Mr. Benning went in his official capacity to ascertain from the Administration some time ago, what the administration were doing in taking transfer of small portions of land in various places, he was told by the authorities that there was no special point in it, but perhaps at some time they might have to consider about building a line. At that time the officials must have known that they had this scheme in view. In dealing with an alteration of this sort, it has to be remembered that it is entirely owing to the lack of foresight and vision of railway officials in the past that the present delay and glut of traffic on the line have occurred. If the officials of 30 years ago had any vision or any foresight, they certainly would have arranged for a wider track to be taken on the surburban and main line and would not have built railway workshops close to the line. It would not have been necessary to interfere with the foreshore in the way the department are doing if there had been more foresight, therefore the Railway Department should be prepared to do far more for the City Council than they have hitherto expressed a desire to do. Here is a line which breaks into the foreshore, goes across public roads that have been in existence for many years, goes through the Kensington Estate and crosses the Koeberg Road, where, unless you construct a bridge, there is going to be serious delay to road traffic. A bridge should be constructed there immediately this work is taken in hand so that delay to the heavy grain traffic, etc., will be avoided. In my opinion, this scheme, in order to be successful, will cost a great deal more than appears on the Estimates. Take the road known as the Paarden Island Road. Under this scheme it is proposed to close that road. It appears to me that in these days, when so much is being done to develop the peninsula, that road should be maintained at all costs, as there are far too few direct approaches to the foreshore, and the rights of the public must be properly protected. Mr. Benning informed me yesterday that an average of a thousand loads of sand are taken daily from the foreshore, and vet it is calmly proposed to close the Paarden Island Road, which is one of the oldest roads to the foreshore, and in that case I certainly consider that one of the peoples’ rights will be taken away. These are the objections of a practical man who has been a big contractor and I think the Minister should see that something further is done to protect the rights of the public. In regard to this Avoiding Line I understand the city council went to the railway hoard recently and discussed this matter. That discussion should have taken place long ago and before the final plan was drawn. I say the city council were entitled to a proper plan giving all details of this avoiding line, and they have a very just grievance. I suggest the least the acting Minister can do even now is to supply the city hall authorities with a plan giving details of all the roads to be traversed by this new line and all the bridges proposed in connection with it. There is a glorious mess-up at the bridge widening at Salt River. It occurred to the Railway Department that they would widen the bridge. They consulted the City Hall authorities, but they could not come to terms on a complete scheme of widening. The work, which was supposed to cost £11,000 or £12,000, has cost twice that amount already. There was an opportunity there for the city engineer and the railway engineers to have designed a bridge which would be a credit to the Cape Peninsula, whereas now one of two bridges is being widened and the other is being left, “as you were,” with the result that there is a combination of bottle-neck and switchback, which is bound to result in numerous delays to traffic and possibly numerous accidents.

The hon. member cannot discuss that bridge now.

It seems to me the widening of the bridge would not have been undertaken if these alterations had not been undertaken by the Railway Administration

I should like to support the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) in the claim he has made with regard to these bridges on the road where the new doubling line to Woltemade will cross existing traffic. The Minister knows the enormous amount of traffic there is there; it is one of the chief arteries. The question of level crossings has been a vexed one for a considerable time and it has been my duty year after year to point to some of the worst examples in the suburbs, especially the one at Belmont, where an enormous amount of traffic is held up and an enormous waste of time takes place to the detriment of business men. I do not want to go into that, because a commission has been appointed to consider the whole question of level crossings. I hope when that commission does come with its recommendations a distinction will be drawn between those roads crossing the suburban line which are big arteries of traffic and the other roads which are comparatively minor. While there may be a good deal to be said for the Government claiming part of the cost of bridges or subways built in connection with the existing lines, there is nothing to be said for the Government putting off its liabilities upon anyone else as it is doing in this case—where the railway is now made to cross existing roads, on which you have an enormous amount of traffic, such as on the Main Road towards Salt River. This traffic is going to develop. I do claim that the hon. member for Capetown (Central) (Mr. Jagger) and the others who have supported him are on entirely sound lines when they say that when the Government brings an obstruction to the road, where the road is already existing, and it is done for the benefit of the whole community, and not for local benefit only, the Administration should pay the whole of the cost to make the road safe for the traffic which is already in existence there, and is bound in the ordinary course to develop.

While I realize that to a great extent the Government must adhere to this principle of making a municipality contribute towards the cost of a bridge over the railway in the municipal area, the area we are now discussing is outside the municipality. At the present time there are an enormous number of motor accidents on the Main Road in the vicinity of the proposed bridge. The traffic that passes over the Main Road is not merely local traffic, but also all road traffic between Capetown and the rest of the Union, all traffic to and from the north must pass over the Main Road, or over the Koeberg Road besides traffic which passes to and from the Malmesbury and Piquetberg districts; often you see wagon load following wagon load passing over that road. It was found necessary when they built a railway to carry ballast to the docks to erect a bridge there. That being so, how much more necessary is it that a bridge should be built for this railway, which will be not only a means of developing this particular area, but will carry the goods traffic from the docks to Johannesburg. With such a large volume of traffic, the bridge should be built with an eye not only to present, but to future requirements. In fact, whenever the Government construct bridges which are necessary for the development of the country in general, the needs of the future should not be overlooked. I am confident that the Government will erect a bridge at Koeberg Road, and I hope they will make it 40 feet wide. Church Street is in the municipality of Capetown, but the other two bridges are outside the municipal area, and the burden of their construction should be borne by the State.

I quite agree with the hon. member for Piquetberg (Mr. de Waal) that our fisheries have been neglected.

The hon. member is wrong. We are now discussing the construction of railways.

I should like to endorse what has been said with regard to the construction of bridges by the Railway Department in connection with the laying down of the Wolteniade—Fort Knokke line. This is not case where in consequence of the development of a town or large centre like Capetown, it has become necessary to extend the facilities required by the town alone. In Capetown there are only two main arteries for traffic leading into the country and the proposed action of the Railway Administration will really mean that access to the city will very seriously be interfered with. The officials of the department have failed to realize the volume of traffic that is concerned. The administration has conceded the point that a bridge must be built on the main road to Paarl—and Johannesburg. There is clearly an obligation to construct a bridge that will mean the ordinary traffic will not be interfered with. The administration hardly realizes the volume of traffic which passes over the Koeberg Road. It has been very carefully ascertained by actual observation. I would like the Minister to give an assurance that when the matter conies to be considered, he will not lightly brush aside this request that if a bridge has to be constructed, one half should not be borne by the municipality. I think the whole of it should be borne by the Railway Administration, and I join with other members who, irrespective of party, have pressed upon the Minister this question, and I hope, as far as Koeberg Road is concerned, he will see his way clear to concede it.

In dealing with this matter the hon. member for Salt River (Mr. Snow) complained that the representatives of the Town Council were denied certain information which they sought in regard to certain rumours which they heard as to the intention of the Government in regard to this line, and that they were treated in a discourteous manner. Railway construction proposals are always confidential until laid before Parliament. That has always been the practice in the past. The hon. member will appreciate the necessity for that. If construction programmes leaked out, you would have land speculation to the detriment of the administration.

This is hot an ordinary case of construction, it is extraordinary.

It is part of the ordinary construction Bill, and the officials had no right to tell in advance that it was proposed to construct a line like this. The hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) has referred to an underestimate for this line. Well, the estimate has been carefully prepared by the officers of the administration. Sometimes, I know, estimates are not very reliable, but I hope we shall not be unfortunate in this respect. With regard to constructing bridges, I understand the matter was represented to the Railway Board yesterday by a deputation from the Capetown municipality. I was not present at the interview, but I have been informed of what transpired by other members of the board. The intention is to build a bridge over the main road. As far as the Koeberg Road is concerned, the intention was to provide a level crossing there with a gatekeeper, but representations have been made that the traffic there is very heavy and that is a matter which the administration will further inquire into before coming to a definite decision. The same applies to the question of giving access to the foreshore by means of Church Street. That is also a matter which is being carefully investigated and no finally has been reached about it. The administration want to have the closest co-operation with the council and they do not intend to pursue a policy which will be in any way unreasonable. As far as the other question of contribution is concerned, we do not ask for a contribution in regard to the main road. If any bridges have to be built over any of the other places, I think we can leave that an open matter.

In connection with the municipality, you ought to put it in the Bill. I know the Railway Department. It may raise difficulties later on.

I do not know whether we will be able to come to a decision before the Bill is actually passed as to the question of supplying bridges over the other two places. That, naturally, will have to be very carefully investigated, and it will have to be ascertained what the actual amount of traffic is which passes over these two places. The hon. member for Capetown (Central) dealing with the proposals in regard to Messina, is rather doubtful about the wisdom of making this deviation. There again the matter was carefully considered by the board and no extra burden is cast upon the finances of the railway through this proposal. I understand that the proposed surcharges of rates on the existing amount of traffic passing over the line will be £2,645, while the interest and depreciation is estimated at about £2,400. If we stick to our agreement and maintain these surcharges on the rates the administration will come out all right. We must, of course, consider the development which has been taking place in the northern Transvaal. The hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. Duncan) has raised the question of the desirability of reviewing the agreement with the Messina Copper Company in regard to the contribution which they have to make in connection with the construction of the line. I do not know the particulars about the matter now. I remember that some years ago the matter was dealt with by the Railways and Harbours Committee and I think a certain amount of relief was given. That is a matter which the administration will have to consider, whether a case can be made out now for further reviewing the agreement. If that is to be done, we will have an illustration of what the hon. member for Capetown (Central) fears, that these people were very anxious to have a railway constructed and they came forward with an agreement and now they want it to be revised.