HC Deb 04 February 1943 vol 386 cc1110-24

Question again proposed, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

Major York

I was saying that the artificial insemination provisions would provide a rapid increase in upgrading of cattle, and I was going on to say that I saw in it the chance to make rapid progress in the elimination of disease. There are, I believe, sufficient, or nearly sufficient, safeguards against abuses, but I would ask my right hon. Friend to consider whether the keeping of records by the sellers would not be an additional safeguard which should be considered. I hope that he will look at that matter in that way. The hon. Member for West Perth was worried about the effect upon the men who sell bulls, but I am certain—and this was said by one hon. Member—that we cannot pay too much attention to one section of our industry if the schemes which are in mind are for the benefit of the whole of the industry and the country.

I would add one word on the drainage provisions. If it were not for the fact that we know that the Minister has done a great job of work, I would feel inclined to accuse him of some complacency in regard to the drainage provisions, and, in particular, in regard to the provision of labour for these schemes. I have personal knowledge, and so has he, of many schemes in this country which are being held up—of ordinary ditching on the farms—schemes which had been got out last year and, in some cases, the year before by internal drainage boards—the drainage of marshes whereby many hundreds or thousands of acres of highly fertile land could be brought into production, are held up by this lack of labour. Further, we hear on all sides that labour is being brought to this country for drainage work in the form of Italian prisoners, but it is always the case of jam to-morrow but never jam to-day. I would implore the right hon. Gentleman and the Government to reconsider the whole question of labour for the industry, for we cannot go much further without a greatly increased labour supply. We cannot ask the Women's Land Army—I am sorry to say that Cinderella of the uniformed Services—to undertake this heavy work. It is men we want, and I ask the Minister to try, and to go on trying, for more labour and equipment and to let nothing stand in his way to attain the object of draining this land.

My last point deals with Clause 14. This Clause has been discussed fairly extensively, and I will confine myself to some remarks upon the third Sub-section of the Clause. I am not concerned with the rights of landlord or tenant, but I am concerned with the effect that this Clause will have on the soil of Britain, on the maintenance of that soil and on the possible dangers which arise out of this Clause from the provisions in the Bill. As I see it, the Clause leaves wide open the gate for that supremely dangerous of all processes, "tumbling down to grass." We are not all of us so optimistic of the future as my right hon. Friend, and while the agricultural industry gratefully acknowledges the recognition which has been accorded to it by the people and the Government during this war, yet it will not take kindly to a year or two of recognition and praise if it is to be followed by a decade of solitary confinement. I would like to see a token from the Minister that this land which has been reclaimed shall not be allowed to revert again to its almost primeval state. I had hoped that the Minister would have explained this in his speech but he left it untouched. If a tenant quits after having spent large sums of money on the clearing of boulders and tree stumps and other impediments to cultivation, under Sub-section (3) of Clause 14 the valuation will be based for all practical purposes upon the actual money expended by the tenant.

I see that my right hon. Friend indicates dissent, but I think you will find that in the majority of valuations it is the cost of the work that is taken into consideration and not the rise in the annual value of the land. If the landlord raises the rent for the new tenant, then there is a clear case of an increase in the annual value, but if—and this will be generally the case in the majority of holdings—no increase on annual value is taken into account, then I cannot see that any compensation will be payable at all. In the case where one or two fields have been improved on a farm, that does not necessarily increase the annual value, and, therefore, the rental value of the farm. Again there will be no compensation payable if what the Minister says is correct. I think I am right in saying that the Minister stressed the fact that the increase in the annual value was the sole criterion.

Many improvements under this Sub-section will cost a great deal more than the value of the land. It is not wise, therefore, to saddle one partner in the industry with the ultimate cost of this improvement, for the landowner is already bearing an over-heavy burden in repairs and maintenance. If these sums which may have to be found after the war for improvements are to be found by the landowner they must come out of the rental—and it should be observed that the cost cannot be included in the maintenance claim. Then there will be less to spend upon annual repairs and maintenance, and what is how an improvement of an uneconomic part of the estate will become a burden in the future upon the economic part of the estate. I feel that is an unwise move, particularly in reference to the marginal land which is such a problem at the present time. I ask the Minister to consider the Clause in this light, and if it is in the national interest that these improvements and these heavy burdens should be brought into effect—and I welcome them—it is only the national emergency which makes that so. I feel there is a very strong case for the Ministry helping to relieve the future burden on an industry which is already over-burdened. Scientific farming and scientific breeding have come to stay, and I believe that this Bill is an terpretation of that spirit.

Mr. Granville (Eye)

We are having a rather sedate Debate, to-day on agriculture. The Minister, who has had great success, always achieves a successful technique in getting Bills of this sort through the House. I do not intend to disturb that atmosphere to-day; I desire only to ask him one or two questions. The first is with regard to Clause 16, Sub-section (2), which says with regard to artificial animal insemination: Regulations made under this section may apply to all or any of the following animals, that is to say, cattle, sheep, goats, swine, horses, domestic fowls, turkeys, geese and ducks. Having waited so long for this Bill, I did think that we would have received a pronouncement from the Minister of Government policy in regard to this matter. But the Minister confined himself to a very brief statement. I was hoping he would tell us not only what is to happen at Cambridge and Reading with regard to the experiments being conducted there in artificial animal insemination, but I also hoped that he would give some lead to the agricultural industry as to what is the Government's intention and what is the policy of his own Department. As he knows, certain individuals in the country have spent a good deal of money, with great knowledge and interest, not from a commercial point of view, on some of these important experiments. The Minister did not tell us what will happen under the Bill about the experiments which have been undertaken by these private individuals, and I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary, when he comes to reply to the Debate, will give us some idea as to whether these people are to be allowed to continue the experiments for which they have sunk considerable sums of money—subject, of course, to control or licence by the Department—or whether they are to be forced to shut up shop and leave the experiments to the official stations at Cambridge and Reading.

The only other point to which I wish to draw attention is in connection with Clause 5. It concerns the River Blyth, which affects the Southwold area of Suffolk where, I understand, thousands of acres of good grassland and arable land are flooded. I know that the Department have done the best they can in the past to deal with this situation, but I understand that at the first full, or flood, tide this area will again be severely flooded. In the village of Walberswick they are at times completely cut off from the world and have to depend for their existence on supplies obtained by boat. The predicament of the people there is very severe, and I ask the Minister to look into this question to see what can be done in conjunction with the local authority and the catchment board. I hope he will be able to prevent the worst from happening and this agricultural area from being badly flooded again in the future.

Mr. Evelyn Walkden (Doncaster)

In making a brief contribution to this Debate I have been influenced by what the hon. and gallant Member for Ripon (Major York) said about the need for more labour on farms. I do not say that the powers we have given to the Minister are unnecessary but I would like to ask him whether he has the tools, or will have them, with which to finish the job? I ask the question for this reason. I had a conversation with one or two officers of a war agricultural committee a few weeks ago about an area containing 700 acres of marshy land which has been brought into cultivation this year. In that area I noticed one or two modern ploughs—large type disc ploughs, I believe they are called—but I learned that the farmer undertaking this responsible work on behalf of the agricultural committee had only one of these ploughs. I was told that the Minister agreed with the policy of exporting these ploughs and I was disturbed. I inquired later whether this was true or not; I went to one of the "higher-ups" of the Ministry and was told that these ploughs and certain other equipment necessary for agriculture to-day were still being exported. Will the Parliamentary Secretary find out whether that is true or not? I believe that more disc ploughs are being exported to-day than are being used by war agricultural committees. That is a wholly unsatisfactory state of affairs. I suggest that while you are obtaining powers to acquire land, drain marshes and make the land arable you ought to assure the House that you are not doing something in the interests either of engineers or of the export trade, which actually injures the chance of making use of that land when you have it.

The Parliamentary Secretary is well aware of another part of the country where there have been quarrels in recent years between members of the different parties on the catchment and drainage boards. The big authorities have not cared very much about the difficulties of the smaller authorities, urban and rural, whose areas lie towards the estuary of the river concerned. Parliament has given power to the catchment boards to levy a rate on the local authorities who have quarrelled as to the amount of money they should call for, or the amount of work that should be done in any particular area. The result has been that in my own division, which is well known to the Parliamentary Secretary, the district most seriously affected has had to endure from this problem more than would otherwise have been necessary because of the niggardliness and the peculiar attitude of bigger neighbours. A great amount of work that ought to have been done has not been done. It is two years since the worst period of flooding in that district, but at that time many hundreds of acres were involved. I do not know what progress has been made with the work that is now being undertaken, but it seems to me that in the power which the Minister is now seeking he is not claiming the right to alter directly or to improve upon the power that was given to him under previous Acts, particularly with reference to the area to which I have referred. I suggest to the Parliamentary Secretary that there ought to be some sort of safeguard against the position that will arise when local authorities quarrel and so prevent the county war agricultural committees from getting on with the job and protecting against floods, owing to the local authorities not feeling disposed to levy the rate which Parliament authorises them to do.

With regard to the first point that I made, I know that the Minister is very conversant with the types of agricultural machinery that are being manufactured. I hope the Parliamentary Secretary will tell us whether or not this machinery is being exported, and if so, what ratio is available to the county war agricultural committees. If it be the case that certain types of ploughs are unpopular, let us encourage their popularity by using them at home instead of allowing them to be exported. I ask my right hon. Friend to be very cautious in examining the figures, because many members of county war agricultural committees are very much dissatisfied with the actual distribution of equipment at the present time.

Mr. David Grenfell (Gower)

I wish to extend a welcome to this Bill and to thank the right hon. Gentleman the Minister of Agriculture for his precise and efficient introduction and explanation of it. It contains a collection of miscellaneous provisions intended to help agriculture; it contains nothing that is revolutionary or really new, except in regard to one Clause. We have been for a very long time dealing with the subject of Clause 1, which provides for greater facilities for adding lime to the soil in various parts of the country. That is a revival of a very old practice which was widely followed and regarded not only as beneficial but essential to good cultivation in the early days of my connection with farming. I lived in a rural area and I well remember the convoys of lime that went to distant farms from the quarries and lime-kilns scattered over that part of the country. In 1926 or 1927, I made a speech pressing for the utmost facilities for the application of lime to the soil of our country once again. I am very glad that this thing has been done. The assistance that has been given already has meant the use of considerably increased quantities of lime, with beneficial results throughout the country. There is a figure in this connection which shows how trifles are important. The cost of the additional subsidy is estimated to be £412,000. That represents the addition occasioned by raising the assistance from one-half to three-quarters of the cost. The sum of £412,000 is a small one in a country where we produce food to a value of something like £412,000,000 a year. The one-tenth of one per cent. of additional cost, as given in this figure, is expenditure which is fully justified, for it helps to bring the lime within the reach of the farmers, and especially the small farmers, who are called upon to extract the utmost quantity of food and nutrition from their fields.

Reference has been made by some hon. Members to the employment of land girls. I fully agree with what was said on this subject by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Molton (Mr. Lambert). I still think that in many parts of the country there are numbers of elderly men who could do this job far better than the young women and leave the young women to do work more suitable to them. Several of the Clauses in the Bill deal with a subject which runs through the dim antiquity of our national records—the drainage and reclamation of land. I wish to compliment the Minister and the Board of Agriculture on the way in which they have enabled vast areas to be better drained than was the case even a few short years ago. We have seen some good results, but they are not yet quite good enough. Even now one sees too many sheets of water after rain. I sympathise with the Minister of Agriculture; the Secretary for Mines likes to see rain and mild weather this winter, but the right hon. Gentleman the Minister of Agriculture has had a little too much of it. However, even after the very heavy rain of this winter, the floods are less than they normally would have been. Something has been done to deal with flooding and to maintain the land in a better state for cultivation.

The right hon. Member for South Mol-ton referred to another subject in which I have been very much interested for a number of years. In my division, too, the sight of large areas of moorland is a familiar one. The reason they have remained moorland can probably be explained historically, but it is not always because the land is inferior land and it may have been due to questions of ownership, tradition and public claims. I would like to believe that there was more substance in Clause 10 of the Bill. On the Committee stage I would like the Minister to respond to a demand from the House that we really embark on a scheme of reclaiming commonlands and bringing them under cultivation. There are many millions of acres in such areas. Much of this land should be brought into cultivation, and to do this it would be essential to have draining and fencing done. I have an idea that all this land should be reclaimed, providing access for the commoners who have rights, giving the public their rights of access, but ensuring the proper drainage, and improving the cultivation and pasture of those vast areas and adding to the production of our food supplies. There is soil that is overworked and soil that is underworked, and these underworked commons should be brought in to relieve the pressure on over-cultivated areas.

Clauses 11 to 13 deal with questions which will be well looked after without my assistance. The right hon. Gentleman will get the assistance of people who are interested in the ownership of land, and they will probably say something on these matters. I was very pleased to hear what the hon. Member for West Perth (Mr. Snadden) said on a delicate and dangerous subject. I am glad that the machinery of artificial insemination is to be brought under control. I think a great degree of harm might be done otherwise. You cannot introduce a convenience of this kind without running the risk of all kinds of fraud and mischief. Indeed, I could conceive of no more effective way of hurting the country, in anticipation of war, than to interfere with the machinery for the procreation of poultry and the various categories of animal life which are intended to come under Clause 16. We should be very careful. I hope the Board of Agriculture will not be induced to experiment too heavily, but will test this system all the way, and see how far the fears which have been expressed may be avoided and what measures can be taken to ensure that this thing is not carried to the point of risking the maintenance of our animal population. I welcome the presence of my right hon. Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary and I should like to say how much I respect his knowledge and industry in a new field. I feel quite sure that in Committee he will enlarge upon the answer that he is to give to the House to-day.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture (Mr. Tom Williams)

This Debate is characteristic of the House of Commons in war-time. The House is extremely jealous of the rights of individuals and hesitant to concede to a Minister more power than he needs, yet it has proved time and again its readiness to set aside partial and private interests wherever the national interest is concerned. To-day's Debate is a further manifestation of its attitude towards these matters. I should like to express my thanks to hon. Members for the general reception that has been given to the Bill. My right hon. Friend the Minister has said that it involves no fundamental alterations. It deals, however, with a number of minor modifications and improvements born of experience, and its one object is to expedite food production. Fortunately, the House of Commons, as well as the nation as a whole, is not only receptive of new ideas but is, I think, appreciative of what has been achieved during the last three years, since we started so far behind scratch, with regard to labour and the absence of drainage and with the many other difficulties which confronted agriculture in September, 1939.

It ought not to take too long to reply to the points that have been raised. The right hon. and gallant Baronet the Member for Rye (Sir G. Courthope), as one would expect, raised the question of Clause 14. I can only repeat what my right hon. Friend has said, that the Bill makes no material change so far as the landowner is concerned and the position remains as it was when the gentlemen's agreement was made in 1939. I refer to the White Paper, W.A.C. 1510. If the words in it were translated into the Bill they would not make any material improvement there. The agreement seems to be extremely specific, though there was one point with which the right hon. Baronet disagreed. Paragraph 4 states: It is proposed that landowners should be entitled to lodge claims at the end of the war for compensation in respect of grassland ploughed up under the Order and that the compensation which will be claimed by, and payable to, the person who is the owner on the date the claim is made will, at the option of the Minister, —that, apparently is the point of difficulty— be based on either (a) the cost of restoring the land, so far as is practicable to the condition in which it would be but for the ploughing up; or (b) a sum calculated with reference to the amount by which the annual value of the land or the farm is diminished by reason of the ploughing up. The option that can be exercised by the Minister in accordance with this gentlemen's agreement seems to me not an unfair one, if we assume that the valuer who is treating the land for compensation purposes is the type of person we all expect he will be and, just as the gentlemen's agreement was made in 1939, so it remains in 1943 and no change, as far as the landowner is concerned, has been or is being made in any part of the Bill. The right hon. Baronet and his friends outside the House may, perhaps, doubt the interpretation to be placed upon paragraph (b) as to the option to be exercised by the Minister, but it does not seem to me that there is anything about which one could really complain.

Another observation was made with regard to Sub-section (3), which refers to compensation to a tenant who, in pursuance of directions, has carried out certain improvements on his holding. There, again, I imagine that if the valuer is the efficient person we expect he will be his mind will not be on, shall I say, 1943, 1944 or 1945, the year when the landlord submits his claim. His mind will be a comprehensive and understanding mind, and in those circumstances it seems to me that there can be little or no justification for fear, doubt or apprehension as to what the position of the land owner will be.

Major York

How far do the provisions of the Agricultural Holdings Act affect what the right hon. Gentleman has just said?

Mr. Williams

I do not quite see how far the Agricultural Holdings Act can affect this. All the regulations relating to compensation are on record and I do not think it is necessary to go into the highly technical details of the duties of the valuer when he is called in for this purpose. The law of compensation is well known and understood by institutions outside this House. It is only the terms of this White Paper which are in question to-day. The one complaint of my right hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Rye was that the option ought not to remain with the Minister as to whether the land shall be re-seeded and restored to its former pre-ploughing-up condition, or the compensation calculated with reference to the amount by which the annual value of the farm is diminished by reason of the ploughing-up. My point is not to deny the fear, doubt or apprehension of my right hon. and gallant Friend, but to explain that the Bill makes no change in the circumstances that existed before its introduction. I know, as my hon. Friend the Member for Leominster (Sir E. Shepperson) and my right hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Rye observed, that landowners have encountered difficulties during the war that are not always appreciated. It is true that they have had to pay higher wages to estate workers when the wages of agricultural workers have gone up. They have had to meet to a certain extent the cost of drainage schemes, and the cost of repairs to outbuildings and so on have increased. This Bill does not affect those things, but we appreciate that difficulties do exist with the landowners. I can only plead that this Bill is all in the interests of the national cause, and I am sure that we can count on the continued co-operation of landowners despite their doubts and fears about the gentlemen's agreement of 1939.

My right hon. Friend the Member for South Molton (Mr. Lambert) raised several points many of which were touched upon by hon. Members who followed him. He referred specifically to Clause 10 which largely concerns Cumberland. It is a purely permissive Clause and it provides that should a large area of common land be improved for grazing either by draining or re-seeding, then the Minister would be able to reclaim the cost of undertaking that work. My right hon. Friend has explained that this largely refers to a big area in Cumberland. With regard to drainage, field and otherwise, as my right hon. Friend very well knows—and this reply can be given to half a dozen other Members who have spoken—this is more or less conditioned by two or three things such as the amount of available labour and the amount of machinery that we have been able to produce or to import. It will be readily agreed that we have not been unsuccessful when I state that we have £750,000 worth of drainage machinery circulated in this country and no fewer than 400 excavators, and that a large number are on order and are likely to be delivered in the course of time. My hon. Friend the Member for North Cumberland (Mr. W. Roberts) asked whether tile drainage had been mechanised. That is one of those highly technical questions that he ought to put to a technician and not to an amateur like myself. I am afraid that I am unable to give the reply that he would like me to give.

Mr. Roberts

Are these tile drainage machines being tested by the Ministry?

Mr. Williams

We have already machinery committees in every county and a special machinery committee representative of the whole nation, and I imagine that this will be one of the problems under consideration. In referring to artificial insemination my hon. Friend suggested that my right hon. Friend ought not to be hesitant but that, if he is satisfied we are on the right horse, he should proceed fairly rapidly. Other hon. Members called for caution, hesitation and so forth, and thus automatically they cancelled each other out in such a way that, between them, they made a splendid case for Clause 16. It gives my right hon. Friend control over this experiment which has great possibilities for good but is fraught also with great possibilities for disaster if badly used. I can say that before any regulations are made breed societies will certainly be consulted.

It is the object of the Ministry to carry the breed societies with them because of the doubts and fears about mismanagement of an extraordinary thing like this. My hon. Friend the Member for Leominster referred to the farmer, the worker and the landowner and the cause of equity, and said that it was not difficult to get a higher wage for the farm labourer, that it was less easy to get something for the farmer, but that it was utterly impossible to get anything for the landowner. When I went to the Ministry of Agriculture in May, 1940, the average wage for agriculture was 32s. 6d. a week, so that whoever had been trying to get that wage increased had not been as successful as my hon. Friend would think. I agree with him, however, that during the past two or three years landowners have had certain difficulties which are not generally appreciated. He referred to the question of drainage costs falling on the owner of the land. Clearly, that must be so. He will not forget that in the interests of producing the maximum amount of food the Treasury provide 50 per cent. of the total cost of drainage schemes. To that extent the Government have not been unfair.

My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Ripon (Major York) and my hon. Friend the Member for Eye (Mr. Granville) also referred to artificial insemination. Quite clearly this proposal is a delicate one and needs extremely careful handling. The only object of Clause 16 is to see that proper control is exercised in the interests of those who for many generations have won a splendid reputation for this country by the grand livestock which has been produced, I am sure that my right hon. Friend would be the last person in the world even to place that reputation in doubt, and that is why he asks for the power to exercise the control which is set up under Clause 16. My hon. Friend the Member for the Eye Division asked what is to become of the private experiments which are taking place. All I can say is that we have two sets of buildings, one at Cambridge and one at Reading, where very careful experiments are proceeding, and on the results of those experiments my right hon. Friend will be able to take action. Private individuals who in the meantime undertake experiments or investigations will do so on their own, and one can say nothing more than that if, when positive results are available and action can be taken, they have been fortunate in their private experiments they will be able to join in the new activities. Beyond that I am afraid that it is impossible to go. With regard to the unfortunate flooding in my hon. Friend's division, I understand that it has been extremely severe and is a grave misfortune to local people. As regards the Doncaster area, I myself know something of what these floods involve. The Department are fully alive to what has happened in that area and whatever assistance they can give in order to avoid a repetition of it they will be happy to give.

The question raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Doncaster (Mr. E. Walkden) regarding disc ploughs was a perfectly proper one and I am sure he will be interested in the reply. It is true that a very small number of disc ploughs which were produced in this country for export and are of no value at all in this country have been exported to those parts of the Empire for which they are most suitable. I repeat that they were made for export and are being exported, because they are of little or no value in this country. It would be far from the wish of the Ministry of Agriculture to countenance the export of agricultural machinery which we require here. For three years or more we have been fighting a battle, a winning battle, to get the maximum amount of machinery for use on our farms from Land's End to John O'Groats. The export of the few disc ploughs to which the hon. Member referred cannot have caused grave dissatisfaction among members of war agricultural executive committees, since there have been so few of them, and they are of so little use in comparison with the normal ploughs operating in this country.

Mr. E. Walkden

But does the right hon. Gentleman deny that some progressive farmers are pleased to receive these ploughs and are doing a very successful job with them even to-day?

Mr. Williams

Yes, but my hon. Friend must not forget that both American and Dominion farmers have sacrificed ploughs and other agricultural machinery which they themselves required in order that they might be exported to this country to help us to achieve the magnificent results which have been attained. It is not a question of our sending away what we require. On balance, the position is 99 to 1 in favour of this country.

Mr. Walkden

The farmers say differently.

Mr. Williams

A particular farmer may say differently, but not "the farmers" generally. It may be that one out of the 370,000 farmers in England and Wales has made that observation, but the other 369,999 would not say so. With regard to catchment boards and drainage boards, my hon. Friend will appreciate that I had something to do with the setting up of catchment boards and know the difficulty of inspiring local authorities, who have to put up the money, to spend the 2d. rate and get on with the job as fast as one would like them to do so. He said the local authorities were complaining. Local authorities have complained from the very first day. Bradford, Leeds, Sheffield—all the big authorities who shower their blessings, in the shape of thousands of gallons of water, upon the lower areas, have said that they were not affected by drainage and did not like to pay. They never have liked to pay. All I can say is that my right hon. Friend and the department closely identified with drainage have done their very best to inspire these large towns and cities with patriotic effort and energy and that so far they have not responded too badly.

The only other observation I need make is in reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Gower (Mr. Grenfell) who, as I should have expected, welcomed the Bill and expressed appreciation of the progress we have so far made. He referred to the question of reclaiming large areas of common land We may have machinery available to us now which would enable us to reclaim certain areas of land that have not so far been reclaimed, but there are other difficulties—phosphates, fertilisers, and so forth; and there is also the question of man-power. I can assure him that as far as we can extend the area available for cultivation we shall make the maximum use of man-power, machinery power and every power at our disposal, and that it will be our great joy to do so. This may be termed a small Measure, but it will be of very great value in extending the area that will be brought under drainage, will remove many difficulties here and there and will, I hope, in the months to come help us again to speed the plough.

Question, "That the Bill be now read a Second Time," put, and agreed to.

Bill read a Second time.

Bill committed to a Committee of the Whole House, for the next Sitting Day. [Captain McEwen.]