§ VISCOUNT TURNOUR (Sussex, Horsham)To ask the hon. Member for South Somerset, as representing the President of the Board of Agriculture, what were the opportunities afforded to the thirty-nine agricultural labourers lately employed by the Crown on the Burwell Estate, in Cambridgeshire (and since dismissed), to acquire small holdings from the present tenants; on what terms they were offered small holdings; and on what terms the same holdings have since been let.
§ (Answered by Sir Edward Strachey.) The Crown farm at Burwell has been let by the Commissioners of Woods and Forests to my hon. friend the Member for Newmarket, and they are not officially concerned with the arrangements he has made to divide it into small holdings. But I am authorised by him to say that every one of the labourers formerly employed on the farm was personally offered a portion of the land at a rent sufficient to cover the rent my hon. friend is paying, together with interest and sinking fund on all outlay, and a sufficient margin for expenses of management. It is on these terms that the land has now been sublet by him to fifty-nine small holders.