HL Deb 26 July 1911 vol 9 cc689-98

*THE EARL OF NORTHBROOK rose to ask the President of the Board of Agriculture whether his attention has been called to the serious loss sustained by certain tenants of small holdings provided by the Hampshire County Council under the Small Holdings Act, 1908; whether he is aware that the loss to the tenants owing to a storm which occurred in May last amounts practically to an entire year's rent of the holdings; whether under these circumstances there is any power on the part of the county council to make any remission or reduction of rent to the tenants who have so suffered, or whether, in the event of any such tenant being unable to pay the full rent of his small holding, the county council will be compelled by law to take proceedings for the recovery of the rent in order to protect the county ratepayers as far as possible against a loss in respect of any such small holdings; and whether the Board of Agriculture has any power under the Small Holdings Act, 1908, to make any contribution towards compensating tenants who have sustained the losses referred to.

The noble Earl said: My Lords, before asking the noble Earl the Question which stands in my name I wish to explain to your Lordships the circumstances which have led to difficulties with regard to certain tenants under the Hampshire County Council. My object in putting this Question is to obtain from the President of the Board of Agriculture an authoritative statement as to the powers which county councils legally possess of granting assistance in this and similar cases, and how far county councils would be justified in making use of those powers with respect to the obligation that is put upon them of seeing that in the creation of small holdings no loss shall fall upon the ratepayers. The story I have to tell is not a very long one, and I venture to think it is not altogether an uninstructive one. In the year 1909 the Small Holdings Committee to whom the county council of Hampshire delegated their powers considered that it was desirable, in order to provide land for certain applicants in the south-eastern part of the county to purchase a farm which had been offered to them. This farm consisted of 120 acres. It was favourably situated and the soil was suitable for market gardening, and being within eight miles of Portsmouth and of Gosport it had accessible markets for the produce of the small holders.

A scheme was accordingly submitted to the Board of Agriculture and approved by them, and the farm was eventually purchased by the county council at the price of £5,600. We have also spent £73 on redeeming the Land Tax and £75 on repairs and adaptation, and we are spending a further £420 in erecting two cottages on the farm which are now in course of construction. Subsequently a scheme for the adaptation and division of the land was submitted to the Board and approved by them, and the rent to be paid for the farm amounted to £311 17s., or an average of £2 12s. per acre over the whole of the farm. A certain number of tenants were found who were willing to accept the land on those terms, and they entered into occupation of the farm at Michaelmas, 1909. I think your Lordships will see that from the suitability of the land this farm seemed admirably adapted for the purpose for which it was acquired. The rent, I admit, was a full one, but that, I think, must inevitably be the case when local authorities acquire land which they subsequently let to small holders. I can only say that the rent that was put upon the land was the lowest possible rent that would recoup the county council for the expenses which they had incurred.

These tenants entered on the holdings with, I think, every prospect of success. I regret to say, however, that that has not been realised, and the purchase of this farm has been found to be satisfactory neither to the county council nor to the tenants. In the first year, unfortunately, swine fever broke out on the farm and forty pigs, the property of our tenants, were slaughtered, and although the tenants received compensation for those pigs they lost what is most valuable to those who grow market garden stuff, the manure which is necessary for maintaining the fertility of the soil. And then, although they did not have a bad season, the price of market garden produce was so low that in many cases it did not pay the small holders to send the stuff into the market. One tenant after a short experience gave up the land. Another of our tenants, who held rather a large holding, at the end of last year became bankrupt and thereby involved the County Council in a loss of £120, half of which, I trust, we shall succeed in obtaining from the Board of Agriculture through the good offices of my noble friend the President. The other tenants carried on through the year and paid their rent, and in May of last year it appeared that they had got through their difficulties of the preceding year and had every prospect of a good season.

But I am sorry to say that this was not to be. For on May 23 last a storm of exceptional violence visited that district and it so happened that the full brunt of this storm, which I believe was in the nature of a cloud break or waterspout, was unfortunately poured on the land in the occupation of our tenants. I received a report from the small holdings officer as to the great amount of damage that had been done. I took the earliest opportunity of myself inspecting the farm, and. if I had not seen it with my own eyes I really could hardly have believed that forty minutes' rain could have wrought such havoc. The crops were washed out of the ground, and the cabbages at the bottom of the hill were smothered and entirely covered over with potatoes and other crops which had been washed down from above. On the top of the hill the soil had been entirely washed away; all the poultry on the farm had been drowned; the gravel of the roads had been washed over the fields and a great part of the manurial value had been washed out of the ground. So violent was the downpour that it washed a plough a distance of 120 yards down the hill, and on the line of railway that runs at the bottom of the farm the train was stopped for a considerable time. I immediately instructed the small holdings officer to go into the question of the amount of loss which these small holders had sustained, and he has estimated the damage at £366, which, as your Lordships will observe, is considerably more than twelve months' rent of the farm.

I should like to say one word about the tenants on this land. They are—and I include the man who unfortunately went bankrupt—hardworking, industrious men with considerable experience and knowledge of market gardening, but like, I fear, a large number of small tenants under county councils, they have a very limited amount of capital. County councils are frequently accused of having little sympathy with applicants for small holdings and of exaggerating the amount of capital necessary to enable a man to take a small holding. I think those criticisms come from those who have not had much practical experience in regard to land. I can only speak from my own experience in my own county, but can honestly say that I do not think we are liable to that charge. On the contrary, I should say that if Small Holdings Committees are to be blamed at all it is rather for stretching a point in favour of the applicants and in many cases putting men on the land who have not sufficient capital to stand two or three bad seasons.

These unfortunate tenants of ours, owing to this storm, have lost a considerable part of the small capital which they put on the land, and it would appear to be almost impossible for them to pay, certainly to pay in full, the rent that becomes due at Michaelmas next. The question then arises, What are the Small Holdings Committee to do? I understand that the Board of Agriculture have no power to grant any assistance to these men from the Small Holdings Fund, and I take it that the county council would have no right to make any grant or loan to them. Therefore the question remains, What powers have the county council through their Small Holdings Committee of remitting the rent, or at any rate some portion of the rent, that will become due in a short time? I may say that the Small Holdings Committee, and I as chairman, feel a responsibility in this case in having put the men on the land, and therefore we desire to treat them with every possible consideration. At the same time we have to bear in mind the obligation that we have to the ratepayers in the matter. We have to remember that Mr. Harcourt, when he introduced this Bill in the House of Commons, stated that no part of the payment of rent was to fall on the rates. Lord Robson, who was then a Law Officer of the Crown, stated in the House of Commons that in his opinion the rates were most carefully guarded in this respect by the Act; and I observe that in the last Report of the Small Holdings Commissioners it is stated that county councils are bound to see that the creation of holdings does not result in a loss which will fall on the rates. Therefore our position with regard to these tenants appears to me to present considerable difficulties.

I have seen it stated—I do not know whether the President of the Board of Agriculture agrees—that county councils should act towards their tenants in the same way that a just and liberal landlord would treat his tenants in similar circumstances. It is hardly necessary for me to point out to your Lordships that there is a vast difference between the position of an individual landowner and the position of a local authority which holds land as trustee of the ratepayers. The individual landlord, of course, if he so wishes, can deal most liberally with his tenants. He can make them an advance of money by loan, he can remit part of their rent, or reduce their rent permanently at his own expense. But county councils are in a perfectly different position and possess no similar powers; and I do not think it will be contended, however much the county council may sympathise with men in this position, that they have any right whatever to exercise their benevolence by putting their hands into the pockets of the ratepayers.

Then I know we may be told that this is an exceptional case and therefore may be treated in an exceptional manner. I do trust it is an exceptional case. But there are many other circumstances which are not exceptional and of which we have all had experience, such as the failure of crops through bad weather, or the loss of animals in consequence of disease, which may easily put county council tenants in precisely as difficult a financial position as our tenants find themselves in at the present moment. I should like to know what county councils are to do when they find that their tenants are unable to pay their rent through no fault of their own. Landlords have in the past behaved very generously to tenants in those circumstances, but I should like to know what the view of the Board of Agriculture is as to what county councils should do in similar circumstances. Are county councils to insist on the payment of the rent, and, if the tenants are unable to pay, to put them out of the land? And are they to put on the land other applicants who they have on their books and who possess a little capital? Or, on the other hand, are they to act the benevolent landlord at the expense of the ratepayers? I can only say that if the Board of Agriculture favour the latter view the ratepayers of the country should recognise that sooner or later—I think it may be rather sooner than later—they will have out of the rates to produce money m order to keep these small tenants on the land.

These are questions of considerable importance to county councils, to the ratepayers whom they represent, and to the tenants who occupy the land. I hope that my noble friend will be able to tell me what the Small Holdings Committee of the Hampshire County Council ought to do in the circumstances which I have endeavoured to describe with regard to these tenants; and I should be grateful to him if he would go rather further than that, and indicate what he considers the general principles should be on which county councils should deal with those cases of tenants who, through no fault of their own, find themselves unable to pay the rents when they become due. I beg to ask the noble Earl the Question that stands in my name.

THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES (EARL CARRINGTON)

My Lords, I was somewhat comforted by the conclusion of the noble Earl's speech. He began by asking me what would be the powers of county councils in certain circumstances, and then he went onto describe a most lamentable catastrophe that had happened to a farm which he described as admirably suited for the purpose of small holdings. The tenants on this farm seem to be persecuted by misfortune. They lost their pigs the first year. In the second year one of their number went bankrupt, though I do not think that is a solitary incident either in the case of a small farmer or a large farmer. The noble Earl stated that the rest were doing fairly well, and he paid them no doubt a just compliment in saying that they were a hard-working and industrious body of men, the unfortunate man who went bankrupt included. Then he went on to tell us that small holders would not be able to stand three or four bad seasons. I should think very likely not. I do not know many farmers who could. If a man has three or four bad seasons running, it must necessarily cripple him to some extent. The noble Earl went on to say that the storm to which he referred destroyed this farm, and he also mentioned his own personal responsibility in having put these persons on the land. I think every fair-minded man would acquit him of any responsibility on that score, as no one could possibly have foreseen such a calamity as a deluge of such violence as to wash a plough 120 yards and to wash away the soil of the farm. I think the case is a very exceptional and a very sad one, and I believe that such a thing will not easily happen again in England whatever may happen in Australia and other countries where they are exposed to devastation by floods.

The noble Earl asked me whether there was any power on the part of county councils to make a remission or reduction of rent to tenants who suffer in this way. The noble Earl knows as well as I do that under the Act there are no funds out of which the Board can help these tenants. As regards the remission or reduction of rent the position I am informed on the best authority is that the county council can use their discretion as to the time which should be allowed for payment by those from whom payment may reasonably be expected in course of time, but they are not entitled out of the rates to assist their tenants by contributing in any way towards making up their loss. I think everybody will agree with that. If I had tried to insert any such provision in the Small Holdings Bill, there would have been no earthly chance of my ever seeing a Bill of that sort on the Statute Book. Then the noble Earl asked me what the general principles are. In some cases—I hope not in many—the county council may find that the finances of their tenants are exhausted, and that recovery of the rent is impracticable. In such cases, they might accept a surrender of the tenancy, and if the tenant, by the assistance of his friends or of any enactment that we may hereafter pass, can obtain the necessary capital to start a fresh tenancy, the council might then help the industrious and hard-working man by reletting the holding to him at a fair rent, having regard to any injury that might have been done to the land in such an exceptional case as the noble Earl has laid before the House. As the Board of Agriculture approved of the scheme tinder which these holdings were provided, it is possible that the Board will have to share with the county council their loss under the scheme, and if the council act on the lines suggested the Board will, of course, most readily and liberally accept any liability that might arise by such action. As I have already privately informed the noble Earl, everybody must consider this an exceptional case, one of real hardship and one in which I firmly believe not only the public but the House of Lords will be glad to assist.

THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE

Why the House of Lords?

EARL CARRINGTON

As owning one-third of the land of England. I am sure the House of Lords would respond to any appeal of this sort. I am obliged to the noble Earl for having brought the matter forward, and I hope that this discussion may pave the way for an appeal for subscriptions, and I am sure no more worthy object could be found for public benevolence.

THE EARL OF NORTHBROOK

Do I understand the noble Earl to say that the county council would have no power of remitting the rent in these circumstances—that is, of wiping it off—but that their only power would be to postpone the payment of the rent if they thought the tenant would eventually be able to pay it?

EARL CARRINGTON

Yes, that is the case. They will have to cut their losses. But if there was any chance of a man going on in his holding, they have every right to postpone the payment of rent in that case.

LORD LAMINGTON

I hope the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack will take to heart this illustration of the working of his favourite panacea of putting people back on the land.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD LOREBURN)

I do not know to what the noble Lord refers.

LORD LAMINGTON

The noble and learned Lord has often made speeches on the value of getting people back on the land as a means of arresting destitution in the country.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR

I have never made a speech of that kind. All I did was, when a Bill for Scotland was before the House on Second Reading, to state that it ought to be discussed for the reason, among others, that the best people were leaving the land and coming into the towns. I cannot understand why I have been brought into this discussion.

THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE

My Lords, I think the House is indebted to my noble friend for the extremely interesting account which he has given us of this episode in the history of what may prove to be a typical case of small holdings. It is, of course, perfectly true, as the noble Earl the President of the Board of Agriculture has told us, that this catastrophe was an exceptional one. I suppose there are many chances to one against a similar cloud-burst taking place in the centre of a patch of allotments; but, as my noble friend truly said, it is not only these exceptional risks which small holders have to run. There are the everyday risks of country life with which we are all familiar—epidemics of disease such as swine fever, which the noble Earl particularly mentioned, and which sometimes play havoc amongst allotment holders. Then you may have two or three bad seasons following. I think the noble Earl said it was inconceivable that there should be such a succession of bad seasons. At any rate we can carry our minds hack to a succession of bad seasons in the seventies, when half the farmers in the country would have gone bankrupt if they and their landlords had not stood shoulder to shoulder and made arrangements for tiding over the crisis.

What is important is that we have elicited distinctly from the noble Earl that in cases of this kind the only thing which the county council can do is to give time to the tenants who have sustained these losses, although I think he indicated that to some extent the Board of Agriculture was prepared to share the loss with the county councils. I think that is a new development. I do not remember having been told of it before. But the moral, I think, of the whole affair is to enforce what so many of us have ventured to urge from this side of the House. We are in no way hostile to the policy of small holdings, but what we do desire is that that policy should be pursued with the greatest caution possible, and, above all, that men should be chosen who are known to have at any rate a moderate amount of capital with which to work their holdings. But if the kind of policy which I understand the noble Earl advocates of creating small holdings indiscriminately all over the country and in defiance of the better judgment of the county councils who really know what the local circumstances are is pursued I am afraid you will find that the county councils will be saddled with a large number of tenants with perhaps not too much knowledge and with not nearly enough capital, who on the first touch of misfortune will go bankrupt, involving a serious loss to the ratepayers, and possibly, as we now understand, to the taxpayers as well. I am therefore glad that my noble friend has laid this matter fully before the House.

THE EARL OF CAMPERDOWN

The noble Earl made one remark which I did not quite understand, and which no doubt he will be able to explain. He said that county councils had no power to abate any portion of the rent in any circumstances, but at a later stage in his speech he said, "Of course, they have to cut their losses," and he also said that the Board of Agriculture would be prepared to share their losses with them. I should like to know under what provision of the law the Board of Agriculture will be able to share losses with the county councils, and out of what fund the money will come.

EARL CARRINGTON

Out of the Small Holdings Fund. I have got £100,000.

THE EARL OF CAMPERDOWN

Has the Board of Agriculture power to apply that Fund to any purpose that it likes?

EARL CARRINGTON

To any purpose under the Act. It is all in the Act if the noble Earl will refer to it.