§ The council of any borough, urban district or parish may hire compulsorily any unused land and let it for allotments, on the terms that two thirds of the rent paid by the tenants of such allotments shall be paid to the owner of the land as rent and one-third shall be accumulated as a fund, out of which compensation shall be paid to the tenants in the event pf the owner claiming to resume possession of the land for necessary building operations. The Board of Agriculture and Fisheries may make regulations for carrying out the provisions of this Section and for determining under what circumstances the owner may so claim to resume possession.—[Mr. A. Williams.]
§ Brought up, and read the first time.
§ Mr. A. WILLIAMSI beg to move.
That the Clause be read a second time.The object of this new Clause is to render available land, in the neighbourhood of towns chiefly, which is intended for building and which cannot very well be used for allotments on that account. Of course, it cannot very well be bought, because having a building value it is very dear, and the hiring of it is difficult, because it may so soon be required for building purposes All who have been on allotment committees of county councils and so on have come up against that difficulty. This par- 1204 ticular case has been brought to my notice by the report of an organisation of allotment-holders in the North of England re presenting over 25,000 allotment-holders. They say that the landlords of such building lands are not willing to let it because of the reasons that I have given, but the difficulty would be removed by some such Clause as this. Under the Clause, the local authority would have power to hire such land compulsorily if necessary, and to let it to allotment-holders. Then, to meet the difficulty that the landlord might require to have it back for building purposes at, any time, it is provided that one third of the rent should be accumulated as a kind of insurance fund, and that when the landlord shows that it is necessary for him to have the land back for building purposes, compensation to the tenant should be paid out of the insurance fund.It will no doubt be necessary to have Regulations for carrying it out in its details, for providing the terms on which the land may be entered upon as unused. The word "unused" might possibly require some definition. And again, providing as to the circumstances in which the landlord might come and say that it was necessary for him to have this land for building purposes and providing for the scale of compensation to the tenant. In such cases I propose in this Clause that the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries may make Regulations for carrying out the provisions in the matter I have mentioned, particularly for determining in what circumstances the owner may claim to resume possession. I think that this Clause would be quite fair to everybody concerned. The land at present is unused, and therefore is not bringing in anything or is bringing in nothing appreciable to the owner. Under this Clause he would be getting a certain amount for it. At the same time this land, which in all probability is very conveniently situated in some densely packed neighbourhood, would be made available, in some cases for one, two, three, or even many years, for allotment purposes. I hope sincerely that the Government will accept the Clause. It may be that there is something in my amateur drafting that does not commend itself to the Government. If so, I shall be perfectly willing to accept any modification that would make it more artistic and skilful in wording, as long as the principle were accepted for dealing with what is a very serious difficulty.
§ Captain O'GRADYI beg to second the Motion.
§ 5.0 P.M.
§ Sir F. BANBURYI do not quite under-stand how this new Clause would operate. In the first place, the hon. Member says it applies to unused land, but. that the owner may get some thing for it even if he gets something which is only very small. That presumes that someone must be paying him something for the use of that land. ''Unused" is a term which is not clear, and might lead to a great deal of litigation. It appears that the land may be acquired compulsorily, and that a certain rent may be paid. For the sake of argument, say that the rent is £30 a year. As I read the Clause, only £20 is to be paid to the landlord, although the people using the land are paying £30. The land lord is not only to have his land taken compulsorily, but he is to receive only two-thirds of the rent, and the remaining one-third is to provide a fund for the tenants. We are, I think, progressing very far in the direction of a gentleman called Trotsky, when Clauses of this sort are proposed seriously. The next thing will be not only that the landlords are to have the land taken from them, but that the tenants will in future pay only one-third of the rent, and that the other two-thirds are to be set aside to provide a fund against losses which might occur because of bad weather, bad cultivation, or some other cause I do think that that is going a little too far. The only thing I can see in the Clause is that it will afford considerable litigation as to what is used and what is unused land. Supposing the hon. Member had land of this sort, and he was afraid that the county council was coming along. He has only to turn a horse or donkey or goat on to it and it immediately becomes used. Then there would be a discussion as to whether that was in any kind of way an evasion of the Act, and the lawyers would benefit. I hope the hon. and learned Solicitor-General will see the futility of this Clause, and that the Government will not accept it.
§ Sir E. POLLOCKI am sorry that I am unable to accept this Clause. I do not take any exception to the form of drafting, because I quite realise that my hon. Friend would be ready to accept amended language that would meet his purpose. I think the Clause is really quite unnecessary. At the present moment there 1206 is abundant power of acquiring land compulsorily under Section 39 of the original Act of 1908. It is quite true that that power might not have been exercised to the full, but we are very much hoping that under Clause 1 of this present Bill the powers in the Act of 1908 will be put into force. If there is some land which might wisely be adapted for the purpose of allotments there are powers under which it can be taken. I am not going into a strict or meticulous examination of the Clause, because its terms could be improved no doubt, but I think there is a difficulty in defining what is meant by unused land. The Clause does not specify that the land is to be within a particular urban area or any other area, and I think a great many views might be expressed as to what is unused land. Sometimes people have land which may be put to a "better purpose from the point of view of a particular critic, who may hold that the land is unused. On the other hand the owner may have quite good reasons for letting it lie idle for the time being. The latter part of the Clause, which provides for the payment of rent, only two-thirds of which is paid to the owner and one-third is to provide a sort of insurance fund, rather points to the case of derelict land, the owner of which no body knows, but in regard to which some owner might ultimately turn up, with the result that there would be danger of the tenants being put out of possession. Against that accident it is proposed to provide a sort of insurance. The real answer to the Clause is Section 39 of the Act of 1908, and when my hon. Friend has looked at that I think he will feel that the point he desires to raise is adequately met.
§ Mr. ACLANDIn view of the explanation I think my hon. Friend would be well advised to withdraw his Amendment. It is much more to the point to get local authorities to make adequate use of the powers they possess. A good many societies already make arrangements, which could be improved without statutory pro vision, for accumulating a compensation fund to be used in regard to unexhausted improvements and so on at the end of a tenancy. With regard to the persona whom the hon. Member represents in moving this Amendment, he would be giving them good advice if he advised them to appeal to the National Union or the Agricultural Organisation Society with a view to getting such help as can be provided by 1207 either of those societies in conjunction with local authorities for acquiring the land they want under existing powers.
§ Mr. A. WILLIAMSThere are one or two points to which I would like to refer. I am particularly hurt at its being suggested that I am a "coming Trotsky." I should like to point out to the right hon. Baronet that if Trotsky never did anything worse than to give landlords, two-thirds of the rent for land which had been producing absolutely nothing, I think he would be a benefactor to the landlords. With regard to the remarks of my hon. Friend (Mr. Acland), it is true that any allotment or smallholders' association can accumulate a kind of insurance fund, but the object of this Clause is to enable a local authority to accumulate such a fund. If you had land in or about a great town, a number of pieces of building land now doing absolutely nothing, my Clause would give the local authority power to take this land, to pay the landlords a rent for what now produces no income, and to accumulate the balance as an insurance fund, so that if one particular piece of land out of twenty or fifty were taken for building purposes there would be a fund to pay the tenants of that particular piece compensation for what they were losing. I am quite aware that there are powers for the compulsory hiring of land, but I am not aware that there is any power to the local authority to accumulate a fund such as I have spoken of. With regard to unused land, I let slip a word which led the right hon. Baronet (Sir F. Ban-bury) to think that I was not really meaning unused land. I am really meaning unused land, and I do not think there will be any difficulty about clearly defining what one means by unused land. I am very sorry that the Government cannot accept this Amendment. It would be only a waste of time to go to a Division upon it, but at the same time I hope that the Government will take into consideration this very urgent question of unused building land which might be made useful for the inhabitants of densely populated neighbourhods.
§ Major LANE-FOXI want the hon. Member to realise that when we on this side heard him described as a Trotsky, that description was not accepted by us as in any way true of an hon. Member whom we know for his pacific and benevolent tendencies. I would be the very last 1208 to associate myself with any such description. I most cordially agree with the principle of the Amendment, and I disagree with the remarks made from this side on it. Of course, if the Government say the Clause is not necessary, and that that is a reason for refilling it, I have nothing more to say. I think the hon. Member will agree that the Clause is not a very workable one. I could not support it in its present wording, but I do agree with him thoroughly that there arc great tracts of land on the outskirts of towns which are lying idle, year after year, and are badly wanted. It may be true, as the Solicitor-General has said, that there are full powers now, but the fact remains that through years such land was not made use of. I hope the Government will see that the use of the land under that Act continues, without in any sense taking away from the advantage which the land lord has the right to have. Until such land can be used for building purposes it should be used for the purposes of cultivation. I want the hon. Member to realise that the principle of his proposal has considerable support in all quarters of the House.
Major WOODI wish to ask the Solicitor-General whether the Act which is referred to, and which, he says, covers the point, is one under which fairly rapid action may be taken. It is quite obvious that land that is idle to-day may be wanted for building in six months, nine months, or a year. If you have to waste a great deal of time in getting possession of it for allotment-holders, obviously it is no good. What is needed is power to get land on terms that will enable people who work it to get out of it without loss. Are the existing powers such as to make that speedy evacuation impossible. If they are so, then I think it would be necessary to introduce some form of words.
Sir A. BOSCAWENThe present law is that a council may acquire land compulsorily irrespective of the capital value which may belong to the land. It is quite true that that has not been availed of very much, and the principal reason for that is that it has taken some time to put into operation. But when you read that-existing provision together with the very drastic and expeditious powers conferred by Clauses 1 and 2 of this Bill, those will enable the council or local authority to acquire land in the most rapid way. There- 1209 fore I think the answer to the question is, Yes, that under this Bill the powers are speeded up, and I think in that way the point made by my hon. Friend opposite will be met.
§ Mr. WILLIAMSIn the event of the landlord obtaining this land is there any provision in the existing law for compensation to be paid to the occupiers?
§ Mr. WILLIAMSMy impression was that in the case of building land there was no compensation paid to the allotment holder.
§ Major PRESCOTTWhat notice has to be given to the allotment holder for evacuation in the event of land being required for building purposes. I rather think it is twelve months.
Sir A. BOSCAWENI am afraid I could not answer that off-hand. There is I know sufficient, but I am not quite sure what it is.
§ Mr. CAUTLEYI do not think that the point in the Amendment is fully met, and I do not quite agree with the Solicitor-General that there are powers to take this land expeditiously and attain the object. I remember perfectly well last year that in cases of the kind the Defence of the Realm Act had to be resorted to, and a special regulation passed to enable this vacant building land to be taken and let to allotment holders. The Parliamentary Secretary refers us to Clauses 1 and 2 of the Bill, and that does hasten the procedure, but I do not think it quite meets the difficulty. The difficulty is that it does not provide for giving up this land at a moment's notice and securing compensation to the tenants. The existing owners of the land have no objection to neighbouring occupiers occupying the, land if it were not for the difficulty of the retaking possession of the land and the payment of compensation. I do not see how the local authority is to have this power unless in addition to the power of taking the land they have the power to determine the allotment holders holding at the end of the season on short notice, and also providing compensation for those holders. If that were done and some fund provided for compensation to the allotment holder it would be of service.
§ Sir E. POLLOCKI rise to call attention to the other Sections, which must be remembered and borne in mind in sequence to Section 39 to which I referred previously. The hon. Member for East Grinstead (Mr. Cautley) has, I think, overlooked what those existing powers are, and those existing powers are in favour of the tenant and rather against the landlord. Under Section 46, where land is to be acquired by a, council compulsorily for small holdings or allotments, they are to continue, unless it is "shown to the satisfaction of the Board"—and note those words—that the land is required for building or industrial purposes, and only in that ca-so can the landlord resume possession. The tenants have, side by side with that, their right of compensation.
§ Mr. CAUTLEYBut it is not expeditious.
§ Sir E. POLLOCKIt is suggested that the tenants of the land would be in some jeopardy, but so far from being in jeopardy they are secured, because the owner of the land cannot rapidly resume possession, and has actually got to give twelve months' notice, unless ho satisfies the authority that the land is bonâ fide required for building or industrial purposes. Therefore, during the whole of that period you have got the tenants safely and securely upon the land, and it cannot be taken from them at the mere whim or caprice of the landowner. When that notice expires, and the other preliminaries have been carried out by the landlord to satisfy the council, then will compensation be payable. The Compensation Clauses of other Acts would apply, and if there is compensation to be paid it will be paid. It may be that these powers have not hitherto been put in force, but the power is in the hands of the local authorities to take the land, and they have power to hold it in favour of the tenants, unless and until it is bonâ fide required ''to their satisfaction" for other purposes. Notice has to be given to the tenants, so as to afford them occupation which will make it worth their while to continue. I think the scheme is complete, and that, therefore, it is unnecessary to accept this Amendment.
§ Major LLOYD-GREAMEI do not think the Solicitor-General has really appreciated the object, which is not to get land which can be held on a long tenure, but to get quickly into this land and quickly out again. We do not want this 1211 twelve months' system for this particular kind of land. If you take the whole complete scheme of the Act, the parish council or borough council would very likely say, "It is not worth while taking possession of this land, and it would be hard on the landlord if it were not given quickly." There is a large amount of derelict land, and you do not know when it may be required for building or development. It may be a year or two years, or it may be within six months. What you want is, in a case like that, to be able to move quickly and at once enter into possession and say to the tenant, "You are going to have an allotment on this land, but if it is required for building you have got to go out much quicker than you do under the complete scheme of the Act." The proposal of the hon. Member to set aside one-third of the rent for compensation exactly meets the case. It is fair to the landlord, who gets nothing at the present time. I notice that the right hon. Baronet, with unduly tender care for the landlord, is not in favour, and I remember him on one occasion pleading hard for the right of the landlord to, retain empty houses and not have them converted into dwellings for the working classes.
§ Sir F. BANBURYI never said anything about that.
§ Major LLOYD-GREAMEI have a distinct recollection of the right hon. Gentleman boasting that the houses on each side of him were completely derelict and that no one was living in them. He objected to certain proposals which we put forward with the object of making such houses available for the working classes. I hope that the Minister will take the houses on both sides of the right hon. Gentleman and fill them. There is nothing in the least unfair to the landlord in this proposal, and I should certainly hope that they are not going to indulge in subterfuges of the kind referred to by the right hon. Baronet. The landlord is not getting a penny now for the land, and this is going to give him two-thirds of the rent, and that is something in his pocket, while he can develop the land at a suitable time, and in that event compensation is to be paid to the occupier. Some Amendments later on are designed for the purpose of trying to secure alternative allotments when, people are turned out. The right hon. Baronet is, perhaps, not so well acquainted with cer- 1212 tain industrial areas as some of us. In many instances there are acres of this derelict land in the neighbourhood of large towns, and that land in the last four years has proved very valuable in providing additions to our food supply. By these proposals you get the advantage that if you turn out the allotee if there is any available land in the neighbourhood you can place him on another allotment. I do not want to press this unduly at the present time, but I have tried to explain this was really the point which was at the back of my mind, and as I have said, I am not quite sure that the Solicitor-General fully appreciates it. I hope he will see his way to consider the Amendment before the Bill comes up in another place. I do not think the drafting it satisfactory, but the Solicitor-General knows what is in our minds, and I think the House will agree that there is a good deal more in the. Amendment than was at first thought. I am sure the House would be pleased if the Government would give an undertaking to consider the matter and in another place put in a proper Amendment to meet the-point.
§ Lieut-Commander WILLIAMSI trust that the Government will endeavour if they possibly can to meet this particular new Clause, which has a great many advantages. The right hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London referred to the landlords' position, but I think in this instance they have got a pretty good thing. First of all, it does open up additional possibilities of rapid acquirement of land) for allotments. But still more important, to my understanding, at the present time is the ease with which, if you had some system of compensation such as is laid down in this Clause, you might go back within twenty-hours to building purposes. It might be acquired at a day's notice, and it is absolutely essential now, as those of us who have any connection with the out-skirts of great towns know, that when building plans are complete you must get forward with them as quickly as possible, and for that reason alone I should like to ask the Government to go into the question more fully before they entirely throw out this new Clause.
Sir A. BOSCAWENPerhaps I may be allowed to say another word or two by leave of the House. The point which is put is, I think, rather the opposite one from what generally comes from supporters of allotments. As a rule they ask. 1213 for security of tenure, but now they are asking for the opposite; they are asking that land which is nearly ripe for building may be occupied, but temporarily. As regards entering on that land, the powers which already exist, read in conjunction with the very drastic powers in Clauses and 2 of this Bill, would give prompt entry for the purposes of allotments, but what is now wanted is that that land may be taken and passed back to the landowner quickly if wanted for building. That is an important point. We cannot accept this Amendment as it stands, but I will give an undertaking that that matter shall be reconsidered when the Bill is considered in another House.
§ Mr. A. WILLIAMSI beg leave to withdraw the Clause.
§ Motion and Clause, by leave, withdrawn.