§ MR. WALTER PALMER (Salisbury)I beg to ask the President of the Board of Agriculture if he will consent to include poultry in the Agricultural Returns of the year.
§ THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE (Mr. HANBURY, Preston)The schedules for the Agricultural Returns for the present year are already printed, and it would now be too late to include poultry in them. A trial was, however, given to this proposal from 1884 to 1886 but was found to be statistically unsatisfactory, owing to the indifference of the larger occupiers and the impossibility of reaching the numerous class of poultry keepers occupying less than a quarter of an acre. Since 1892 only occupiers of upwards of one ace have been called upon to make Agricultural Returns, and were an attempt now made to obtain satisfactory Returns of all poultry within the United Kingdom, not only would an enormous amount of extra work devolve upon the Inland Revenue collectors, but the publication of the other Agricultural Returns would be seriously delayed. The difficulty is further increased by the large amount of poultry kept by the labouring classes in urban districts.