MOKGORO J [12] During the second reading of the Indecent or Obscene Photographic Matter Bill, the Minister of Justice made clear that the mischief at which the Bill was aimed was specifically the apprehended moral subversion of “a Christian, civilised country such as the one in which we are living.”18 The Minister also noted that: [I]t is not at all uncommon to find in the possession of one individual several hundreds of these photographs and up to half a dozen more of these films. There would hardly be any doubt that those people who have such photographs and films in their possession, do not only keep them for their own perverse amusement, but also to defile the morals of others, and that flourishing trade in those articles is probably one of the motives behind it.19 be if action to combat [such illustrations] is not taken without delay. Id. para 3:188. 18 19 Hansard, House of Assembly Debates (1967) 2659. I do not wish to be understood as holding that parliamentary statements are admissible for the purpose of interpreting the 1967 Act. I refer to such material at this point purely for the purpose of sketching the background to the legislation. The law in South Africa has traditionally been that legislative history is not admissible in the interpretation of a statute. E.g., Mathiba v Moschke 1920 AD 354, 362. However, that rule is no longer as firmly entrenched as it once was. In S v Makwanyane 1995 (6) BCLR 665 (CC) 678, the Court noted that the exclusionary rule was being relaxed in other jurisdictions, but held that “whether our courts should follow these examples and extend the scope of what is admissible as background material for the purpose of interpreting statutes does not arise in the present case.” ( Per Chaskalson, P.) In Westinghouse Brake & Equip. Pty Ltd. v Bilger Engineering 1986 (2) SA 555 (A) 562-63, the Court held that, where the words of a statute are not clear and unambiguous, the court may have regard to the report of a Commission of Inquiry in order to ascertain the mischief aimed at and the state of the law as it was then understood to be. See also S v Mpetha 1985 (3) SA 702 (A) 713; Ex Parte Slater, Walker Securities (SA) Ltd. 1974 (4) SA 657 (W); Cockram, Interpretation of Statutes (1987) 55 (“The present trend would appear to permit limited use to be made of the history of legislation as an aid to its interpretation.”). The case for relaxing the exclusionary rule in South Africa is strengthened by the fact that the rule has been considerably relaxed in England, see, e.g., Pepper v Hart, [1993] AC 593 (HL) (where legislation is obscure or ambiguous the parliamentary statements of a minister or promoter of the bill could be taken into account). According to Professor Hogg, “[l]egislative history has usually been held inadmissible in Canada under ordinary rules of statutory interpretation. But the interpretation of a particular provision of a statute is an entirely different process from the classification of the statute for purposes of judicial review. There seems to be no good reason why legislative history should not be resorted to for the latter purpose.” Constitutional Law of Canada (3d ed.) (1992) 1285. 19 19 Hansard, House of Assembly Debates (1967) 2659. Further, the Minister made clear that the government was not prepared to allow concerns of personal privacy to stand in the way of the effective enforcement of the law; it was time, he said, “for the cloak of non-interference in the personal and private affairs of people to be cast off, and for the problem we have to contend with to be tackled without gloves.” Id. 2660. 7