§ 94. Mr. LOUGHasked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Agriculture whether he is aware that penalties, often amounting to £50 per acre, or a sum equal to the full capital value of the land, exist in most agreements or leases, with the object of preventing grass land from being broken up for cultivation; and whether, in view of the existing national crisis, he can see his way to introduce, as an emergency measure, a short Bill providing for the abolition of all such clauses in any lease or agreement, and the substitution of a simple undertaking that the land shall be properly laid down after the cropping?
§ The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of AGRICULTURE (Mr. Acland)The Board have heard of no case in which a landlord has declined to relax a covenant of the nature referred to by my right hon. Friend when it was in the national interest that he should do so. I doubt, therefore, whether there is a case, for the legislation suggested.