*THE EARL OF ONSLOWrose "To ask the President of the Board of Agriculture whether he is now in a position to make any statement to the House as to the action taken by county councils to put in force the Small Holdings Acts, and with what results; and, whether he will call for and lay on the Table of the House, after Michaelmas next, a Return showing the position of affairs in respect to the provision of small holdings in each county to which the Acts apply; and to inquire what is the amount now standing to the credit of the Small Holdings Account, and what further amount becomes due during the current financial year, and to what purpose it has been or will be applied."
§ The noble Earl said: My Lords, in asking the Questions of which I have given notice, I wish at once to say that I am not anxious to press the noble Earl to give us any information as to the operation of the Act of last session if he thinks that the time is premature for so doing. The Act has only been in operation six months, and I have specially put in the Notice standing in my name on the Paper a request that what information may be given shall be given after Michaelmas next, because, as your Lordships are aware, it is not easy to 314 obtain land except at the normal periods of the year when land changes hands—namely, at Lady-day and Michaelmas. I am afraid that considerable expectations have been raised in the minds of a great many people that they would be put in possession of small holdings at a much earlier date than is at all possible; and I cannot altogether exonerate the noble Earl the President of the Board of Agriculture himself from having given rise to some of those expectations, for he has told us repeatedly, sometimes in picturesque language, that the applications have been enormous. I think he said that applications had been received for land which would stretch a mile wide from Berwick to Lands End. I am not sure whether these are the geographical points; but, at any rate, he said that a very large number of applications had been received. He did not tell us, however, how many of those applications were made by persons who would be suitable as tenants for small holdings; and I venture to think, from the small experience I have had in the matter, that there will be a very different number when the exact proportion of those who are suitable is found to those who have applied.
§ A number of the noble Earl's friends in the other House of Parliament have been going about the country saying to would-be small holders: "If your county council do not give you a small holding, let me know, and I will very soon see that the Government make them do so." Now, I have looked through the Act from begining to end. There is a great deal about the county council and about the Board of Agriculture and the Commissioners under the Board of Agriculture, but there is not a single word in it that Members of Parliament are to obtain small holdings for their constituents, and I think it is a dangerous thing that Members of Parliament should act as amateur Commissioners for the Board of Agriculture. It has been said that in Cambridgeshire 10,000 acres had been applied for and 1,000 acres obtained, and the question has been asked "What is to be done to provide the remaining 9,000?" I venture to think that when the matter comes to be looked into it will be found that in Cambridgeshire and 315 in other counties very much less than 9,000 acres will be required to supply the demands of those who are capable and in a position to cultivate small holdings.
§ The process of sifting applications must necessarily take a considerable time. Some of the applicants will be obviously unfit; others may turn out incapable; others there will be who, having failed in every other walk of life, think they can make a success on the land. I hold, from the experience we had on the Committee of which I was a member, that it is precisely in the districts where small holdings are best known at the present moment that they are most likely to be a success. Then the county council must ask for references to satisfy themselves as to the suitability and the qualifications of the applicants. I think that in this question of providing snail holdings the goodwill and the consideration of all those interested are essential. If the Board of Agriculture attempt to put into force the powers which they possess to compel county councils to do that which they are unwilling to do, they will put up the backs of the county councils against them; they will also put up the backs of the owners of land and the tenant farmers against them. But if they will leave the matter alone and let the county councils, who I am satisfied are most anxious to carry out the duties which Parliament has placed upon them, attend to it in their own way and in their own time—although to some people it may seem a long time—I believe there will be very few of those who are really capable of farming small holdings who will not find that they will be put in possession of land to cultivate.
§ The Board of Agriculture in their circular have stated that preference is to be given to residents and to those who do not already hold land. While I quite agree that it is very desirable to give preference to those who want to enter upon small holdings for the first time, I venture to think that a large proportion of those who are applying are applying for more land than that which they at present hold, and I hope the Board of 316 Agriculture will encourage county councils in adding acre to acre to the land of those who have shown that they have the will and capacity to cultivate small holdings. There will be many applications, not for small holdings in general, but for a particular piece of land which it may be impossible to obtain, or to obtain at anything like the price which would make it possible for the small holder to cultivate it with success. Therefore, I think those who are under the impression that every application ought to be granted within twelve months are doomed to disappointment.
§ Next I ask what is the position of the Small Holdings Account. We were told, when the measure was passing through Parliament, that a large sum of money was to be devoted to the purposes of the Act from the Imperial Exchequer, and I believe I am correct in saying that within three months—by 25th March—£100,000 was placed to the credit of the Small Holdings Account. I want to know what has been done with that money, or what it is proposed to do with it; and I want to know what further sums it is anticipated will be paid into the Small Holdings Account. I think there is ample room for a wise, judicious, and useful expenditure of the money, but I notice that in the Estimates of the present year there does not appear to be any provision for any money to be paid into the account at all. I should have thought, from the importance which the noble Earl the President of the Board of Agriculture attaches to this question, that if we got £100,000 in the first three months we should have obtained a similar amount in each succeeding quarter, and that at the end of the financial year we should have had a sum of £400,000.
§ This fund is to be devoted to grants to co -operative societies, and to demonstrating by experiments how small holdings may be created f we are told that, in the event of failure, one-half will be repaid to the county councils of the loss they incur; the preliminary inquiries are to be paid, and so are the costs of valuation and arbitration. I hope the noble Earl will be able to tell us how much he expects to spend on these several objects during the course of the present year. 317 There is another point upon which I should like to receive information, and of my intention to ask this Question I have given my noble friend private notice. Certain doubt exists in the minds of those whose business it is to acquire land for small holdings whether the county council will have to compensate the sitting tenant, who may be displaced for the purpose of creating small holdings, in the same way as if he were holding land under a private landlord under the Agricultural Holdings Act. There is a great deal in the Act which says that compensation is to be given in the way of readjustment of rent where a part of a holding is taken and the rest remains in the hands of the owner, and subsection 3 says that any claim which, under the Agricultural Holdings Act, might be referred to arbitration, shall be so referred and be determined under that Act and not under the Small Holdings Act. I wish to know whether any compensation is payable for disturbance such as an ordinary landowner would have to pay to a tenant under the Act brought in and passed by my noble friend opposite.
§ There is another point on which the House would like to be enlightened. We have heard a great deal of what has been done by rural councils, but these powers are entrusted equally to county boroughs. I should like to know whether any boroughs have held inquiries and taken steps to provide land for small holdings for those who live in their areas, because one of the principal commendations which this Act received from the noble Earl was that it would restore to the land some of those who had flocked into the towns. I should like to ask the noble Earl whether there is any probability that land will be acquired by county borough authorities for the purpose of settling upon that land those who at present live in the boroughs within which they hold jurisdiction. As I said at the opening of my remarks, I have no desire to press the noble Earl to give us any information which he way think premature; but I am quite sure that if he will, after Michaelmas next, ask of all the county councils what steps they have taken under the Act and with what results, he will be able to make an interesting Return to Parlia- 318 ment; and the Return for the twelve months after Michaelmas next will be of an even more interesting character. I beg to ask the Questions standing in my name.
*THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES (Earl CARRINGTON)My Lards, I have to thank the noble Earl opposite for the friendly way in which he has put his Questions. I can, assure him that we have nothing to keep back, and I will give him all the information I can as fully and succinctly as possible. The noble Earl has asked four Questions—first, as to the action taken by county councils; secondly, as to the results of that action; thirdly, as to the laying of a Return on the Table showing the position of affairs after Michaelmas; and, fourthly, as to the Small Holdings Account. Perhaps I may be allowed to take the action of the county councils first.
All the county councils have appointed small holdings and allotments committees, and have in most cases delegated to them all the powers under the Act, saving that of borrowing or raising a rate, which cannot be transferred. Steps have been taken by advertisements, posters, circulars, and the issue of forms to ascertain the demand for land. The committees have worked hard visiting the different districts. I am informed that in one county the vice-chairman of the small holdings allotments committee has travelled over 2,000 miles in connection with local inquiries, and there is an enthusiastic Member of your Lordships' House who told me on the Tuesday in Ascot week that he was on his way to a three days' pilgrimage in a motor car for the benefit of small holders in his county, to see what use he could be to them in getting land. Valuers have been, or will be, appointed in twenty-eight counties in England to assist the county councils in the acquisition of land for small holdings, and, as the noble Earl has said, their fees and allowances will be repayable by the Board of Agriculture under Section 17 of the Act of last year.
I am bound to say that the collective agency and the local knowledge of the 319 county councils have been of the greatest possible value to the country. If they had not tackled the work, what would have been the alternative? We should have had to have appointed at least one commissioner in each county, or fifty-two commissioners in all, at £1,200 a year each; and, even if we had done that, I very much doubt whether the work could have been as thoroughly and satisfactorily performed as it has been by the voluntary action of the county councils. On the other hand, our Commissioners and inspectors have, I hope and believe, been of great assistance to the county councils; and, if I may be permitted to say so, I think they have been a little unfairly treated in some quarters. An hon. relative of my own, Mr. Abel Smith, asked, in another place, on 11th June this year, what these men had done in return for their large salaries, and what was the daily routine of their work. Perhaps your Lordships will excuse me for a moment while I answer that Question. The two Commissioners, who, I am bound to say, are exceptionally good men, were appointed at the end of last year, and entered the office at half-past ten on 1st January this year, the day on which the Act came into force. They are well up in their work, and have the interests of both tenants and landlords at heart, and they are determined to make the Act a success. They have both informed me that they do not propose to take any holidays this year. They have arranged conferences, prepared circulars, and have advised on difficult points of law. They have had an enormous correspondence, and many interviews with county councils and individuals, to whom they have explained the Act. They have great knowledge of co-operation, which is so necessary for the success of the Act, and the Commissioners themselves or their inspectors have visited every single county in England except the Scilly Islands, and in most cases more than once. I think, therefore, the Commissioners deserve credit for the work they have done during the last six months. So much for their action.
Now, as to the result. One result of this work, and a very important one, is that it has shown how very wrong many 320 persons were who considered themselves agricultural experts when they said two years ago that there was no demand whatever for land. Sir Edward Strachey told the House of Commons the other day that there had been 19,419 applications for 309,000 acres for small holdings. Even that did not seem to be going fast enough to please everybody, and a Metropolitan Member of Parliament asked—
Does that mean that the land has been provided?On reflection that evidently struck him as unreasonable, for he qualified his question by saying—I never supposed for one moment that they had all been provided with land.That is the question with which, with your Lordships' permission, I now propose to deal. The Act came into force on 1st January last, and your Lordships, knowing all about land, will realise that the earliest possible time at which notice to a six months' tenant could be given was Lady Day, 25th March. To-day is 13th July, so Michælmas Day, 29th September, is the earliest opportunity you have of getting the laud, unless it is obtainable by private agreement between the landlord and tenant-farmer and the county council. That is unless you choose to adopt the methods of the Barra islanders or those unemployed gentlemen who wanted to seize Windsor Park—proceedings which, I think, would hardly commend themselves even to any Metropolitan Member.Some of those who are opposed to small holdings on principle say that no doubt there is a great demand for land, but it is mostly made by unsuitable persons, and that in one county only eighty applicants had been approved out of 174. That, to my mind, requires some inquiry, for I think the comity council in that instance must have been rather too inquisitive. The suitability seems to vary in different parts of England. In Cambridgeshire 673 applicants were approved out of 865; in the Isle of Wight every one with two exceptions has been accepted as suitable; and the general opinion in all parts of the country is that the applicants are just the sort of men we want, while their capital is far greater than advocates of 321 small holdings had any reason to anticipate. I will take four counties. In Dorset 206 applicants have £14,000 in cash, besides stock and implements; in Herts 140 have £11,000; in Herefordshire 130 have £9,000; in Cheshire 180 have £26,000; while in the Holland division of Lincolnshire 490 applicants have between them money that would enable them to put £6 an acre into the land. When the unsuitable applicants have been weeded out it is estimated that in these four counties the people can put down at least £5 an acre on the 14,000 acres for which they have applied.
So far so good. Now comes the great difficulty. The heaviest part of the work is now before the county councils. In the past they have shown tact, patience, and great public spirit in making their inquiries. I hope and believe that they will in the future show courage and enterprise, and I can promise them that they can count most certainly on wholehearted Government support. Now, what is the situation to-day? Applications for about 1,000 acres, more or less—it is very difficult to be absolutely accurate, but I think I am understating it—in Rutlandshire, Montgomeryshire, the West Riding, Worcestershire, Lancashire, and Devon, have been satisfied by private arrangement between landlords and the applicants. Your Lordships will say that that is a mere flea-bite. But it proves two things—that after six months working of the Act 200 more acres have been obtained by private arrangement than were obtained in sixteen years under the well-known Act of 1892; and that all this magic of property and wish to purchase is more or less a myth, for there have been no requests to purchase to any extent. The people merely want to hire the land and to have security of tenure.
Now I come to the schemes that have been approved. Radnorshire leads the van, having obtained 280 acres of land, and the men are on the land at the present moment. Gloucestershire has obtained 188 acres, the Isle of Wight, 142; Wiltshire is negotiating for 250, and in the Holland division, where 1,200 acres have been offered, they have arranged to purchase 286 acres, and to buy farms as well. The Kesteven division 322 of Lincolnshre are offered 600 acres; in Cheshire they have obtained 250 acres of Crown land; Cambridgeshire hopes to have 1,000 acres at least ready by Michaelmas; and Somerset has purchased 26 acres for £2,400. This seems a large sum, but the land is all let, and readily let, at £4 an acre. In Buckinghamshire the council have an offer of 500 acres of land in two parishes at a price of £13 per acre to buy, or 13s. per acre to rent. The land is ready for the county council at Michaelmas, not only that, but all the men are ready to go on the land if the county council choose to accept it. The whole of these schemes comprise 2,000 acres of land; and, in addition, there are schemes provisionally approved relating to 261 acres and 147 acres respectively in Cambridgeshire, and 156 acres and 82 acres respectively in Norfolk, making a supplementary total of 646 acres. In many other counties negotiations are proceeding, but are not sufficiently advanced at the present moment to be brought into view.
The noble Earl has asked me to present a Return showing the position of affairs in respect to the provision of small holdings at Michaelmas in each county to which the Acts apply. I have, I think, somewhat anticipated his request, for I have prepared a Return up to 30th June, and that is practically ready and will soon be published. It is an interim Report showing the state of affairs up to the end of the first six months. Up to the present the Board have received seventeen schemes for the provision of small holdings, thirteen of which have been already provisionally approved. I should like to be allowed to thank those landowners, not only Members of your Lordship's House, but landowners generally throughout the country, who have provided land for small holdings or have offered it to county councils for that purpose.
The noble Earl, Lord Onslow, who has taken a warm interest in the subject, and whose services we all so gladly recognise, offered on 23rd June, in a letter to the Press, to let his present small holdings to the county councils at reduced rents. I should like to be allowed to say that we do not want any charity rents at all. We do not want landlords to let their lands for small holdings at reduced 323 rents. If people cannot make small holdings pay without charity rents, they are not worth putting on the land. What we wish is that land should be obtainable for small holdings, not at the outrageous prices which have been formerly charged—I have known the price to go up to £20 an acre in Scarborough—but at approximately the same price as a farmer would give in the open market. Then the noble Earl went on to say that he was not prepared to let any land at present to the Surrey County Council unless they could assure him that they had the consent of the sitting tenant. He added—
Nor am I prepared to exercise any pressure or influence on existing tenants to give up land.I think the most noble Earl must be in an unique position, and that there are no single fields on his estate that could be taken without virtually affecting the remainder of the farms. I suppose that there is no tenant who is not farming his lard satisfactorily, and I suppose, also, that in no case is there a tenant farming two, three, or, perhaps, four farms, residing on one and placing labourers or caretakers in the occupation of the other farm houses. That, of course, is an evil influence. A Mr. Baylis, in North Berkshire, wrote a letter to the papers informing the public that he farmed 7,000 acres of land, and he boasted that not one of the labourers on that enormous I tract of country was in a position to take I one of the smallest of small holdings.May I give a couple of examples? There is an estate called the Swine Estate in Yorkshire, comprising 4,500 acres, in the possession of the Crown. I went down to see that estate. When we entered the village in a motor car we scattered a good many cows that were grazing on the road side, and they galloped off in all directions with their tails in the air. I asked the boy who was with them who owned the cows, and he replied that they belonged "to the gentlemen in the village." I inquired if it was necessary to keep them on the road side, and he replied that it was, as there was nowhere else for them to go, these men not possessing a single acre of land on which they could turn out their cattle. I afterwards discovered that the blacksmith of the village kept 324 his cow in the coal shed. There was no other place for it. I found it possible to take a piece of land from 3 to 14 acres for each of five tenants. It met the demand at once, and satisfied the hardworking people in the village without inflicting any hardship upon the tenant farmers.
The second instance is also in Yorkshire. The Crown owns an estate there of 7,000 acres of magnificent land. It is cut up into twenty-seven farms, and on one farm of 576 acres there was formerly a small holding of 22 acres which had been absorbed by the tenant. I have taken that out of the farm and added a little more to it, giving the small holder 37 acres of land. I ask your Lordships whether anybody can say that that can possibly be construed into a hardship upon that tenant farmer, who is still left 539 acres of splendid land. I most respectfully submit that a pleasant word from a landlord to his tenant would often bring about a far more satisfactory solution than would be reached by the exercise of the compulsory powers granted by the Act. There is very little evidence that landlords would refuse to let or sell land; but the lion in the way seems to be the large farmers, who are not very sympathetic to the movement. I hope it will not be necessary to resort to compulsory powers on a large scale; but if land cannot be obtained in any other way, compulsion is contemplated by the Act, and must, and no doubt will be exercised. The Board of Agriculture have been informed by several county councils that they will not hesitate in the matter. An application for a compulsory hiring order has been received from Carmarthenshire, and the Northumberland Council are considering whether they will apply for an order to take an unoccupied farm of 500 acres which the landlord declines to sell or let on any terms whatever. If it were clearly understood that the county councils all over England would not hesitate to apply for such orders where attempts to obtain land by agreement failed, I think negotiations would be successful without compulsion being resorted to. In regard to that portion of the question 325 relating to compensation, I understand that the noble Earl means compensation for disturbance.
§ *EARL CARRINGTONI think everybody will agree that during the progress of the Small Holdings Bill through Parliament it was distinctly understood that no tenant could apply for compensation for disturbance against a landlord who took a portion of a farm in order to turn it into small holdings, though, of course, the farmer would be entitled to a reduction of rent for severance. If that is so, what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander; and if a private individual does not give compensation to his tenants for land taken from a farm for small holdings, it would be wrong and absurd to expect the State to do so. As to the county boroughs. I have not got the statistics with me; but they have been holding inquiries. I will look into that point and let the noble Earl know exactly what the position is in regard to county boroughs at the earliest possible opportunity.
As to the last of the noble Earl's questions, the amount is £100,000. No further amount is due, during the present year; and not one penny of that sum has been spent up to the present time. The salaries of the Commissioners and inspectors are not paid out of that fund, but out of the Agricultural Vote. Payments in due time will be made, out of this £100,000 for the four following purposes:—(1) Fees for the valuation of land and other preliminary expenses; (2) costs of obtaining orders for compulsory purchase of hiring, which I hope will be very small; (3) grants towards organising co-operative societies; and (4) losses incurred by county councils in carrying out the schemes.
I have been very generally blamed in another place and outside for not having started experimental farms as proposed in the Report of the Departmental Committee, presided over by Lord Onslow, but, as I had an experimental farm ready, I thought it was hardly necessary to go to the expense of buying land for that purpose. When I undertook the management of the 62,000 acres of 326 Crown lands, situated in fourteen counties, there were 993 acres in small holdings and allotments. That number has now increased to 4,187 acres, and, as showing the financial result of twelve months of the new management, I have paid into the bank this year, after deducting all expenses. £44,000, an increase of £13,481 as compared with the average of the three preceding years. Yet we were always told there would be a dead loss on such a transaction. I have tried to make a plain and straightforward statement, which I hope will be satisfactory to the House to which I have the honour to belong, as well as to the country that I have the privilege to serve.
THE EARL of ONSLOWI should like to ask whether the Board of Agriculture have in contemplation the starting of any experimental small holdings under Part 16 of the Act or is that part of the Act to remain a dead letter?
§ *EARL CARRINGTONIt is very easy to be generous with other people's money. But, having got this experimental farm, I think I should be very sharply questioned if I spent any more money on experimental farms at the present time.
§ *THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEMy Lords, I listened with great interest to the statement which the noble Earl the President of the Board of Agriculture has just made, and I certainly do not rise for the purpose of criticising it. On the contrary, I think we feel generally that his Department is to be congratulated on having been successful in giving effect to the provisions of the Small Holdings Act to the extent which he has described. I merely wish to note, in passing, one, or perhaps two, of the observations that fell from him.
The noble Earl paid a well-deserved compliment to the county councils for the manner in which they have seconded his efforts. That compliment was, as I say, a well-deserved compliment, for I am sure the noble Earl is right in believing that the degree of success which has attended him could not have been achieved if it had not been for the co-operation of the county councils. I 327 am inclined to accentuate that point, if I may, because we on this side of the House have always believed that, if anything could be done in the way of popularising small holdings, the proper machinery to resort to is the machinery of the county councils; and your Lordships will remember that we took great exception to another Small Holdings Bill on the ground that the go-by was given to the Scottish county councils and the whole administration of the Act placed in the hands of a kind of improvised bureaucracy.
I also heard with satisfaction the noble Earl's admission that the great difficulty in all these cases is, not to find applicants for small holdings, but to find suitable applicants for them. He has evidently experienced the difficulty which we anticipated when this matter was discussed last year or the year before, and when we pointed out how comparatively rare it was to find applicants for small holdings who really possessed all the attributes calculated to make them successful in their vocation. The noble Earl gave a very glowing account of the amount of capital possessed by the persons who had applied to his department, but it is not the possession of capital alone that is necessary in order to make a good small holder, I venture to say, after hearing the statement of the noble Earl, that it goes far to show that we were perfectly right when, at the time of the introduction of this measure, we maintained our opinion that there was no real reluctance either on the part of the local authorities, or of the landowners of England to give facilities for the creation of small holdings. The speech of the noble Earl, I think, demonstrated that, and I am, therefore, very glad to have heard him make it.
THE EARL OF KIMBERLEYMy Lords, I am a humble Member of the county council of my county, and have taken a prominent part in the holding of inquiries in Norfolk on the subject of small holdings. All I can say is that I do not think the Board of Agriculture are moving fast enough in this matter. There is an enormous demand in my county for small holdings, but of course none of the applicants, except under exceptional 328 circumstances, can possibly come into possession of land until Michaelmas owing to existing tenancies. We have already purchased two plots of land and have got those schemes through. We have also several schemes in hand, but there is delay owing to the necessity of a Commissioner under the Board of Agriculture coming down. I would ask the noble Earl the President of the Board of Agriculture how we are to proceed if we want to buy land by auction. That question has arisen very acutely during the last fortnight. If it is necessary to obtain leave from the Board of Agriculture before the purchase can be made, you may lose the opportunity of a very advantageous purchase. On one occasion we did purchase without sanction, and the sanction has since been obtained. The particular land was valued by the Board of Agriculture at £50 an acre, but we bought it for £47 an acre. I think it would have been of very great advantage if the Act had contained a provision for a revision of rents every seven years. In my county landlords are very willing to let land to the county council; at the same time there is this difficulty, that the tithe, at present a very heavy one, may so up still further. Therefore in letting land to the county council the landlord has to allow himself a certain margin. This creates a difficulty, whereas if there had been revision of rents every seven years the matter would have been much easier. Naturally we have had to inquire confidentially into the means of the people who are applying, and I have been very much struck by two remarkable things—the number of sons of labourers, about twenty-six years of age, who produce Post Office Savings Bank books containing deposits of from £70 to £100, and the fact that all, or nearly all, of them are teetotallers and non-smokers. Another curious thing is that in my county everybody wants his land alongside his dwelling. That, of course, is an impossibility. Then, again, there is one farm which applicants are desirous of having, but which is in a very bad state and is full of weeds. The men wish to take it at a certain price, but the Commissioner said it could only be taken provided it was perfectly certain that the men were fully alive to what they were taking, because he was very 329 much afraid it would not be suitable for small holdings. These men know exactly what it is, and they wish to have it. The only question is whether the county council is justified in allowing the men to take it. I mention that as showing that the Board of Agriculture are very sharp upon us. There is an enormous number of applications, and we could go faster if we could get the Board of Agriculture to move equally quickly.