ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses some of the relevant clauses of the original Group Areas Act No. 41 of 1950. It reviews the presentation of the Act by the Minister in charge of it on its first introduction into the South African Senate. The underlying principle of this Bill is to make provision for the establishment of Group Areas, that is, separate areas for the different racial groups, by compulsion if necessary. Legislative sanction must be given, in other words, to the idea of establishing these groups. The European, Coloured and the Native groups follow the pattern of the Population Registration Act. The chapter illustrates the speech on the main Group Areas Act in the Senate by Senator Edgar H. Brookes and the speech some years later in the House of Assembly on one of the many amending Group Areas Acts, by Mrs. Helen Suzman, the one representative of the Progressive Party in the South African Parliament.
