HL Deb 07 July 1919 vol 35 cc198-213

LORD STRACHIE rose to move to resolve—

That a Select Committee be appointed to inquire into and report as soon as possible on the discrimination made by the Ministry of Food between the price of milk fixed for producers in Somerset, Devon, Cornwall, and Dorset, and the rest of England, whereby such producers lose 2d. a gallon on their milk.

The noble Lord said: My Lords, it will be within the recollection of the House that a little while ago I was able to induce the Ministry of Food to lay upon the Table the reasons for which they had penalised tire four Western counties—Devon, Dorset, Somerset, and Cornwall—to the extent of 2d. per gallon for every gallon of milk exported from those counties. Lately another Report has been issued which I gather is the Report of the whole Committee of the Ministry of Food on this question, and they confirm the Report of the Travelling Commission. This Report is headed, "Evidence and Recommendations of the Travelling Commission." There is, of course, no evidence in the proper sense of the term. I do not complain of that, as the noble Earl who represents the Ministry of Food in this House told me when the Return was granted that it would be impossible to give any of the evidence, because no evidence in the ordinary sense of the word had been taken.

I think, at the very beginning, that I might take objection as to the way in which the Commission did their work. When such a very serious penalty was to be put on certain counties one would have thought there would be a full note taken of the evidence and of the reasons on which these recommendations were made. What has taken place strengthens my plea to your Lordships that you should appoint a Select Committee in order that evidence might be taken in a proper way, and that those who are penalised by this should be able to see the grounds and reasons given, together with the evidence; because in this Report it is simply the ipse dixit of the Travelling Commission, confirmed by the full Committee.

Since I last spoke on this question in the House great agricultural bodies, who represent practically the whole of agriculture throughout the length and breadth of the country, have passed resolutions condemning the action of the Ministry of Food in this matter. The Council of the Royal Agricultural Society, to which Society many of your Lordships belong, either as members of the Council or as members of the Society, have unanimously condemned the imposition of this reduction of 2d. per gallon in the Western counties. Then, again, the Central Chamber of Agriculture, with two dissentients, condemned this penalisation, and the Council of the British Dairy Farmers Association also. Those three great Agricultural bodies unite in condemning the action taken by the Ministry of Food; and then last, but not least, the National Farmers Union have unanimously condemned this penalisation of the four counties. There we have a great and important body indeed, and I think the Government will be inclined to take some notice that they unanimously condemn this imposition and say it is most unfair and unjust—that it is based upon insufficient grounds and insufficient evidence.

Then, I think it was last month, in another place, all the members of those four Western counties signed a letter addressed to the Leader of the House of Commons, asking that they might have an independent inquiry into this matter, for they, like these great agricultural bodies, were of opinion that there had not been a fair and impartial inquiry. I regret to say that that application for an independent inquiry was turned down by Mr. Bonar Law, who apparently thinks that the action of the Ministry is based upon quite sufficient grounds. I myself had originally meant to ask for an independent inquiry in the same way, but when I found that in another place it was turned down I thought that the only thing was to appeal to your Lordships directly to appoint a Select Committee, because no doubt the Government would have refused an independent inquiry.

I would now like to turn to the Report which has lately been issued by the Ministry of Food. It is Command Paper No. 205, and is an Interim Report as to the Establishment of Differential Zones and the Estimated Cost of Production of Milk in the Summer of 1919. We find there that this Travelling Commission, which went out to investigate this matter, only had some fourteen meetings between February 17 and March 24, and, as a member of that Commission stated at the Central Chamber of Agriculture, they travelled at night and held inquiries during the day, and therefore so far as knowing what was going on in the districts through which they travelled and the climatic conditions it was impossible for them to know anything. It is rather curious to note that on an important question of this sort, which embraced not only England but Scotland as well, they found it necessary to hold only fourteen meetings between the dates I have mentioned.

There is another rather curious statement in this Report. They said— It was found that a very small proportion of the 7,500 forms sent to the Divisional Food Commissioners for distribution to producers was actually completed and returned. It is a startling thing to think that only that number of forms were circulated. In my own county of Somerset there are 4,500 farms of between fifty and 300 acres, and if we add those under fifty acres, which also produce milk, there are at least 5,000 milk producers in Somerset. Yet the Travelling Commission only issued 7,500 forms to the farmers throughout England and Scotland. Then, again, they also admitted that only a very small proportion of the forms were completed and returned, and thus even out of that small number which were sent out very few were actually filled up. Therefore such evidence as they had was based upon something infinitesimal—not I per cent. of the farmers of the country—and yet upon that evidence they based this important return. It shows what little value and attention should be attached to the recommendation of the Travelling Commission.

I would like to point out also that a very large number of farmers were entirely unaware that there were any sittings to be held by the Commissioners on the question of costing. As far as I understand, the only references were made in the local papers, and not in all of these, that the Commission was sitting at Exeter, and as far as I am aware in Somerset very few farmers indeed were aware that any Commission was sitting to inquire into the cost of the production of milk. Then, again, there is another question in this interim Report, The Report does not show what questions the farmers were required to answer or on what basis they were to furnish their Returns of Cost. That is a very important and very germane matter for consideration, because it would depend a good deal upon whether the farmers quite understood when giving their costs, that they were to include their own labour or that of their wives or daughters and sons. That would make a very large difference in the West of England, where there are small farms and a very small amount of paid labour, as compared with the large farms and the large amount of paid labour in the Eastern counties. I would like to know whether it was clear to the farmers that they had a right to bring those matters into consideration.

It does not seem to me that there is any reason to suppose that the Commission at all went into the question of rents being very much higher, and also agricultural rates, and of course Income Tax, in these four counties, as compared with the East of England, because we are told by the Commission that these four counties were penalised because they had more favourable conditions—better climate and better land for dairying purposes. If that is true, and it may be to a certain extent, on the other hand it is undoubtedly the case that where the land is better rents also are higher. Therefore you have to take that fact into consideration in fixing the cost price in these matters. Then it has been said in this Report, and I think in defence of the Ministry of Food, that in these Western counties before the war the price we received for milk was a great deal lower than in other parts of the country. That is not my experience, for at one time I sold a very large quantity of milk, and the only difference in price was when I had to pay a larger amount for carriage owing to the greater distance which the milk was sent. I did not get, less for milk sent to the City of Bristol than for milk sent out of the county. At the present moment the farmer sending his milk there will be penalised 2d. per gallon.

As regards the question of prices, which the Travelling Commission think was important, I should like to quote words spoken upon this question as to whether the West of England received much lower prices before the war than other parts of England. Mr. Butler, Chairman of the United Dairies Limited, at the annual meeting of that great company, said, according to The Times report, that prior to the war in 1911 they paid Dorset producers one-tenth of a penny per gallon more than they did producers in other parts of the country. In Dorset they actually paid more not less. In Somerset they paid producers only one-fifth of a penny less per gallon, and in Devonshire only two-fifths of a penny less. As regards the county of Cornwall he said that they had no figures. I think that may fairly be said to dispose of the argument of the Travelling Commission that it had been the general custom for the four Western county producers to receive a great deal less for their milk—say 2d. per gallon—than the rest, of the country. I am aware that to a large extent they base their argument for penalisation on their belief that there are climatic conditions which affect these four counties. In paragraph 12 they say— As a result of our investigations in different parts of the country we are convinced of the advisability of varying the prices paid to producers for milk in different districts. We consider that milk can be produced more cheaply in the counties of Cornwall, Devonshire, Somersetshire, lend Dorset than in the remaining parts of Great Britain. This is due chiefly to climatic conditions. In regard to climatic conditions they go on to say that the reason is that in the West of England we have hardly ever suffered from a drought. But, my Lords, this year we have had one of the most severe droughts known in the West of England, and it is not the first one we have had by a long way.

The fact is that we suffer just as much in the West of England from drought as they do in other parts of the country, and the drought we have experienced this year has been very severe indeed. The curious thing is that when there was a break in the drought the break that we had was very little indeed in comparison with that experienced in other parts. In Somerset-shire we had no rain as a matter of fact in Ascot week when there was in London and Essex quite a quantity of rain. This shows that we certainly are not favoured as regards rainfall in comparison with other places, and it shows how impossible it is for these four Commissioners to rush through the country travelling by night and say that in the West of England we never get any droughts at all. On the contrary, in the West of England we suffer just as much from drought as anywhere else. There is no doubt we have more rain, but we get it in the winter when we do not want it, and when it is no good at all.

As regards hay, we have suffered very much indeed, and it would be no exaggeration to say that of the permanent pasture of hay crop we shall not have much more than half a ton per acre. That will mean difficulty of feeding in the winter, and will mean increased cost of feeding. Furthermore, as we are aware, the Government have commandeered the whole of our old hay for this year, to take effect in September. The Commissioners go on to say that it is quite easy for farmers to turn out their cattle on April 1, and never to take them in until November, and that they practically require no feeding stuff at all. A statement of that kind simply condemns the Travelling Commission. I speak without fear of contradiction in the presence of West countrymen when I say that it is perfectly impossible to turn out your cows in April and give them nothing at all and leave them out until November to subsist en grass. If we did that, we should reduce our milk supply considerably. This only shows on what a ridiculous basis the Report of this Commission has been made.

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

May I ask the noble Lord from where he is quoting?

LORD STRACHIE

I am quoting from the last issue of the Report of the Ministry of Food, Command Paper No. 205. I will now quote from paragraph 16, which says— We would suggest that in eases where milk is exported from the lower-price to the higher-price areas, the difference in price should be received by the Ministry of Food and devoted to administrative charges. Why should these four counties have to pay the cost of the administration expenses of the Ministry of Food? It seems to me a rather curious state of things that the Ministry of Food should be allowed to increase their expenses, and to be able to make it good in this way. Of course, their expenses will be increased by the mere fact of their having to issue these licences, and having to cause these deductions to be made. They have had to increase the number of officials. That is a matter that has often been complained of. The present mushroom Ministries are always increasing their officials, and never trying to cut down expenses, but rather are increasing them, though I suppose the Treasury has kicked at last, and not too soon. Now the Ministry of Food have hit upon a happy plan of this sort, that they will penalise these particular milk producers, and by that means make them pay the extra expenditure at the Ministry by making the deductions which I have indicated.

I have also seen it stated in the news-papers that Scotland is going to be treated in exactly the same way. There is a condition to be made throughout. England and Scotland regarding a charge of 4d. per gallon to be made owing to the drought. I see that a similar order for penalisation as that introduced in England is to be made for Scotland, and that the Scottish producers who export milk out of Scotland will be obliged to pay 4d. to the Ministry of Food. The Ministry of Food, therefore, is going to get a large sum of money indeed, if they are going to get 4d. en every gallon exported from Scotland. And this, may-I remind your Lordships, applies to every form of milk exported. It applies to articles manufactured out of milk.

I would now like to draw your Lordships' attention to paragraph 17 of the Commissioners' Report, which perhaps is the most important paragraph of all. They say— We consider that for the successful working of any scheme of differential prices it is necessary that the Government should control the wholesale milk trade. I think that is showing what is really at the bottom of this. We know that though agriculturists throughout the length and breadth of the country have condemned these proposals of control of the wholesale milk trade the Ministry of Food have not abandoned the proposal, and are very anxious to seize the whole of that trade. If they are able to get this large sum of money from the English Western counties and also from Scotland they will be in a position to say, "We can take control of the wholesale milk trade of this country without coming upon the Treasury or costing the country anything." That, to my mind, would be a very unfortunate way of nationalising the milk trade which the Ministry apparently are anxious to bring about.

There is no doubt whatever of the object of the Ministry of Food in the paragraph I have quoted and also in this scheme of penalisation. It is to get hold of the milk trade of this country, and also, incidentally, to keep the Ministry of Food from being abolished, which so many of us desire. It seems to me that that is what really is at the bottom of it all. I should like also to ask the House whether it is not very doubtful on general principles—I am not speaking now for the four Western counties—to allow Government Departments to set up a discrimination between a producer in one part of the country and a producer in another part of the country. If you once set up that vicious system you might just as well say that you will do it with coal as with milk. Heaven knows what is to happen after the Report of this Coal Commission which we all know was not exactly an impartial Commission, and not a Commission most of us, I believe, would like to set up. In our Somerset coalfields coal is most expensive to produce, and what would be said if it were proposed to sell it at a certain price, and that in order that this might be done the coalowners of Durham were to be required to pay into a fund to be used for the benefit of the Somerset coalowners or Somerset miners. When you once begin the question of differentiation you cannot say where it will end. You might have the same thing as regards meat or wheat, because it is much less expensive to produce wheat in East Anglia than to produce it in Wales, or in the extreme West of England. Once you begin this system, where is it going to stop?

All I am asking your Lordships for to-day—and I hope you will be inclined to grant it—is to give the West of England the opportunity of going before an impartial tribunal, in order to put their case and to have a proper investigation as to whether it is right that they should receive 2d. a gallon less for their milk than the other parts of England receive. By doing so I think you will allay a great deal of discontent. Within these four counties the feeling on this matter is intense, and if it had not been that the leaders of agricultural opinion there had been very firm there would have been a strike of the whole of the milk producers of that district. I am not surprised that it was rather difficult to prevent such a strike when we have seen, for instance, in the case of the miners or the railway men, that the Government were willing to give in to the threat of a strike at once. I am glad that the milk producers of these four counties desisted from their intention, and were content to come to your Lordships' House and to ask for this Inquiry.

It is very doubtful really whether this Order is a legal one. The opinion of one of the most eminent counsel in the whole country, who used to sit in another place, and the value of whose opinion would, I am sure, be recognised by the noble Lord on the Woolsack, was that this Order was ultra vires. We do not want to take legal proceedings to upset it and we certainly will not have a strike; but we do ask your Lordships to let us have a fair and impartial tribunal to consider this question more closely, and to pronounce whether we have been treated fairly or not.

Moved, That a Select Committee be appointed to inquire into and report as soon as possible on the discrimination made by the Ministry of Food between the price of milk fixed for producers in Somerset, Devon, Cornwall, and Dorset, and the rest of England, whereby such producers lose 2d. a gallon on their milk.—(Lord Strachie.).

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

My Lords,. I am afraid I am hardly prepared to argue the whole case in reply to Lord Strachie. His Notice merely refers to a Select Committee, and I had no idea that he was going to review the whole subject, which is a complicated one and has already been frequently discussed. But there are one or two points to which I desire to reply at once. Throughout his speech, Lord Strachie has assumed that this was a packed Inquiry. Three or four times he has said, "Let us have a fair and impartial Inquiry and let evidence be taken." I deprecate these attacks upon the good faith of this Commission, and I really think I can show the noble Lord that his criticism is unfounded.

The Commission which settled this differentiation in price was set up by the Ministry of Food. The Chairman was Mr. Fisher, who is Agricultural Adviser to the Ministry of Food, but, as he is an officer of the Ministry of Food, I do not include him among the persons who, as I am going to state, are as impartial from their position as any member of your Lordships' House could be. Out of twelve members of this Travelling Commission no fewer than seven persons had nothing to do with the Ministry of Food and were directly and officially connected in one form or another with agriculture. There was a representative of the English Board of Agriculture, and a representative of the Board of Agriculture for Scotland. There was a member of the Institute of Research into Agricultural Economics—Mr. Orwin, a very well-known man; then there was a representative of the West of Scotland Agricultural College, and there were three gentlemen who were members of the Agricultural Advisory Council. Thus, out of twelve persons who made this recommendation seven were wholly independent, and by their affinities and their position you may say, would prima facie have opposed rather than supported this differentiation. I hope, therefore, that the noble Lord will not repeat the view, which I consider is very unfair, that this was a packed Commission, and that it was neither fair nor impartial, and that it was not independent.

Then again, I think Lord Strachie is under a misunderstanding about the actual procedure of this Commission. He says there ought to have been evidence taken. He said that people in Exeter, for instance, did not know that this Inquiry was taking place. All I can tell him is that the Commission spent three days at Exeter.

LORD STRACHIE

I did not say they did not know the Commission had been set up. There was only a notice put in the paper that the Commission was sitting at Exeter.

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

In point of fact, ample information on the point was available in Exeter. No fewer than fifty-two witnesses gave evidence during these three days at Exeter. So I think it must be considered that, at any rate, the fair representative opinion of that county was laid before the Commission. The Commission in all heard no fewer than 328 witnesses. They travelled pretty well all over the country, and they took very great pains to arrive at a satisfactory decision.

If your Lordships desire to appoint a Select Committee to inquire into this subject I shall not, of course, oppose your wishes. But I would most respectfully point out that, this Inquiry has been conducted by very highly skilled persons, by people who represent all the Boards of Agriculture; they have travelled all over the country, heard hundreds of witnesses, examined hundreds of books. If your. Lordships desire to appoint a Select Committee, the work cannot be done in a Committee Room in the Palace of Westminster. If this Report is to be revised it will have to be revised on the spot; it will have to be revised in the centres all over England and Scotland where these people went, and I am really not sure, when this document is carefully studied—I should say that a further document is going to be presented—whether it will be considered worth while to have a large number of your Lordships devoting your attention to revising this document.

However, it is a matter which your Lordships will settle for yourselves. But, in any case, should your Lordships decide to have a Select Committee, I hope you will not do it on the ground that the Inquiry which has already been held has been anything except fair and impartial.

THE MARQUESS OF CREWE

My Lords, I am sure the House will feel that the noble Earl opposite has endeavoured to meet my noble friend in the most reasonable spirit possible. He himself evidently does not think that any further Inquiry is necessary. He has pointed out that the Inquiry which has already taken place was conducted by men of experience, and men who, by virtue of their several positions, ought not to be considered as biased in favour of the view which was ultimately taken. I am sure there is no desire to impugn either the ability or the fairness of the Commission that inquired; but the fact remains that agricultural opinion generally is disturbed at the result which was arrived at. It is, I think, a singular fact that agricultural bodies representing the whole of England, and, so far as their own interests are concerned rather likely to be influenced in the opposite direction, should with not absolute but with practical unanimity have expressed dissatisfaction at the result which was achieved. I happen to be an official of the Central Chamber, and there were representatives there from all parts of the country who expressed the view that some further inquiry into this particular separation of interests ought to be conducted.

I do not absolutely follow the argument of the noble Earl that if a select Committee of your Lordships were appointed to inquire into this matter it would have to become a roving Committee and examine not only the Western counties concerned, but also, for the purposes of comparison I will assume, all other districts in England. I should have supposed that the course the Select Committee would adopt would be the usual one of inviting a certain number of representative witnesses, who would be prepared to state the facts regarding the different districts, and that the Committee would be able to form a judicial opinion upon the facts thus ascertained. It was no doubt convenient for the purposes of the previous inquiry to have a roving Commission, but it is not absolutely necessary, for a purpose of this kind, either to inspect the particular herds of cattle whose yield of milk is involved, or the particular pastures on which they feed, or the particular arable land upon which forage crops may be grown for their consumption.

The facts, I should have supposed, could be quite well ascertained by a selection of picked evidence which need not be very great in volume, and upon which a carefully selected Committee of your Lordships ought to be able to form an opinion. That, after all, is the plan upon which the Board of Agriculture, for instance, has to form most of its judgments; it is obviously impossible for my noble friend the President of the Board of Agriculture to visit and personally to inspect all the places concerning which he has to make some decision. I think, therefore, that the noble Earl has somewhat exaggerated the need for personal inspection; and opinion on the subject being, as it undoubtedly is, dissatisfied, I myself think that your Lordships would do well to agree to the Motion of my noble friend.

EARL GREY

My Lords, I hope that Lord Strachie will press his Motion asking your Lordships to appoint a Select Committee. I have, no interest whatever in the milk industry, and no interest nearer to the Western counties than Northumberland. It is not on the merits of this particular twopence that I would ask your Lordships to press for the appointment of a committee. It seems to me that it is absolutely wrong in principle that the Government; should be able to levy a tax upon certain individual; at the discretion of a Department and for the benefit of the whole community. I shall certainly vote for this Motion if it is pressed to a Division because, as I understand the matter, it will enable that committee to inquire into the principle which governs the matter as well as into the actual twopence; and I think it is a principle that ought to be inquired into and condemned.

VISCOUNT CHAPLIN

My Lords, may I be permitted to say a word in support of the appeal which has been made to the noble Earl?

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

I have agreed. If Lord Strachie and Lord Crewe desire a Committee, I will support it.

VISCOUNT CHAPLIN

I am sorry to say I had not heard that. Then I will say a word in support of the views which have been expressed by the noble Lords who wish the committee to be appointed. It is practically a new departure on the part of the Ministry of Food to make a distinction between different classes of arable produce in the various parts of the country and apportioning prices accordingly.

I ask myself this question, Where is this to end? What happened when the Ministry of Food first began to fix prices? There never was such a lamentable failure. I remember pointing out in this House—when I moved a vote which was practically a vote of censure on the then Food Controller, the late Lord Rhondda—that on every occasion when he had fixed prices there was an immediate diminution in the production of the article concerned. The first thing was milk, the next thing was cheese, and the next thing was butter. I am sure your Lordships will remember that each of these articles became so scarce that it was hardly possible to obtain it. I gave several instances which had occurred within my own knowledge in different parts of the country where even labouring people were bitterly complaining that in days past—before we underwent the misfortune of having a Ministry of Food controlling prices—even when food, was scarce and dear they could always get cheese; but in village after village in the different counties I visited there was a complaint that it was impossible to find anything of the kind. If this principle is to be adopted now, if I had my way I would throw out the Bill altogether; but that is not what is proposed.

The soils are different in all parts of the country; some require a great deal of water, others require very little. Take the Fen land which will grow magnificent crops of wheat and go through a great drought with benefit rather than otherwise. But take other lands which, for instance, grow barley. I can cite the finest barley-growing county in the world—namely, what is known as the Lincolnshire heath. There barley is grown that has never been equalled when the seasons are favourable. Everyone knows, however, that the climate of England is one of the most capricious in the world. Is it to be the principle in the future that whenever the seasons vary—when there is drought in one place or too much rain in another—the prices of agricultural produce in those particular districts are to be varied and fixed accordingly by the Ministry of Food? That is really what the proposals which are before us this afternoon mean. I frankly own that from the beginning to the end the whole of this principle of fixing prices is utterly wrong, and I support with the greatest satisfaction the suggestion of my noble friend. I only wish it went a great deal further.

LORD BLEDISLOE

My Lords, I have heard with some relief the announcement on the part of the noble Earl of the willingness of the Government to allow some sort of Committee to be set up to inquire further into this question. I may state at once that I say so, not because I wish to disparage in any way the qualifications, or the capacity or impartiality of the Committee which has already reported. All the gentlemen upon it are well known to myself, and I believe them to have carried out their very difficult task to the best of their ability. But why I do think it is desirable that some further Committee should investigate this matter is because we are faced this winter with a serious prospect of a milk famine, and in view of the serious shortage of concentrated feeding stuffs and the serious effect on milk production of the recent drought, and the shortage of hay and roots, it is most important that you should not allow a large number of farmers in the South-West of England to remain in a dissatisfied and disgruntled condition and taking steps, as some are, either to dispose of their herds of cattle or substantially to reduce them. There is another factor which I think the noble Earl should have taken into account. That is that unfortunately this prolonged drought has nowhere been more serious or more prolonged than in those very counties which are handicapped by the differentiation of price.

On general grounds, may I say that this question presents a very good indication of the danger of prolonging Government control beyond the period when it is absolutely essential? It is far more difficult to exercise Government control without a sense of dissatisfaction now that we have reached the Peace period, than it was while the war was in progress. As regards this particular milk question I for my part have to admit that in certain parts of the South-West of England the price of milk, prior to the war, was, as a rule, lower than in many parts of the Midlands and North. But surely it is wholly impossible, even assuming that to have been the case, to suggest the county boundary as a proper boundary in any differentiation of price. May I tell your Lordships that I look out from my home—I, fortunately, live in Gloucestershire—upon other land which supplies the Bristol market, rich land in the Berkeley Vale, which sends milk to the same market that is served by my Somerset friends in whom Lord Strachie is interested. Their land is, if anything, far better than most land in Somersetshire, and they are able to obtain twopence per gallon more in the same market.

When my noble friend Lord Devonport was Food Controller I had the privilege to serve as Chairman of his Dairy Farmers' Committee, and we investigated this very problem at considerable length. We came to the conclusion that the only possible way to differentiate in price, if you must differentiate, was to take the pre-war level of price and add a constant increase of price all over the country to the pre-war price. By that means you are able, at any rate, to avoid a sense of grievance on account of differentiation, because you are able to plead that, under pre-war conditions, there was a difference in price and that you have simply added an increase which is the same all over the country. I venture to suggest that when this matter is again examined it may be worth while to consider the principle which was adopted at that time and which caused very little, if any, dissatisfaction.

LORD ST. LEVAN

My Lords, I wish to support what has been said by the noble Lord who has just spoken about the danger of a reduction in the production of milk in the South Western counties. Not only is that reduction unfortunate in itself, but I should like to point out that it is a reduction in the very best kind of milk in the country—the milk produced in the South West of England—owing to the Channel Island breeds and the fact that the grass grown there is of high quality. I believe it would be most unfortunate in the interests of the country if anything took place to curtail production. I know there is a danger of such curtailment on account of this differentiation of price. Farmers have got a good deal to contend with besides the price of food and the shortness of hay that has occurred owing to the drought. There is also a difference in the labour question now. When farm labour stops work on Saturday afternoon until Monday morning there is a good deal of extra work for the farmer and his family, and the result is that they find they have almost more to do than they can manage. We must not forget that they have the means of using their cattle to other advantage, because they can turn the cows into beef which will pay much better, if the price of milk is reduced from that to which they are accustomed. I am glad to hear that the noble Earl is going to grant a Commission. As Lord Crewe said just now, it will allay the great feeling of unrest and dissatisfaction and will give an opportunity to those concerned to prove their case to the satisfaction of all parties.

THE EARL OF CRAWFORD

My Lords, I presume a Committee will be appointed. I hope that an impartial Committee may be set up. I take note that every Peer who has spoken up till now has condemned what the Government have already done.

On Question, Motion agreed to.