Lords Sitting of 17 April 1957

Preamble
The House met at half past two of the clock, The LORD CHANCELLOR on the Woolsack.
Prayers

THE LATE LORD STANMORE
2.36 p.m.
THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR COMMONWEALTH RELATIONS AND LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COUNCIL (THE EARL OF HOME): My Lords, by the death of Lord Stanmore we have been deprived of one of the oldest and, during the long period of his active service, in his quiet and unassuming way, most influential Members of the House. Sadly enough, he was almost a stranger to the post-war generation of your Lordships here, for he was seldom able to come to the House during the last ten years, owing to increasing physical disability. To those who were privileged to enjoy his personal friendship, he displayed his brilliant conversational gifts and his charm almost to the very end. I myself, as a comparative latecomer to your Lordships' House, cannot speak of Lord Stanmore from personal acquaintance, and the noble Viscount, Lord Samuel, is far better qualified in every way than I to speak of him. Lord Stanmore was a life-long Liberal and he entered this House as long ago as 1912. For many years he was Chief Whip of the Liberal Party, and in 1944 succeeded the late Lord Onslow as Chairman of Committees here. He held this office until 1946. Throughout all this time he acted on the countless Committees where his wisdom and his guidance could best serve the House. Your Lordships will wish to join with me in paying a grateful tribute to a long life so usefully spent in the public service.
2.38 p.m.
VISCOUNT SAMUEL: My Lords, my noble friend Lord Rea is attending the funeral of Lord Stanmore, and he has therefore asked me to speak on his behalf and on behalf of all our colleagues on these Benches. Lord Stanmore, as has been said by the noble Earl the Leader of the House, in the kind words which he has addressed to your
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Lordships, entered this Assembly as long ago as 1912, and for more than twenty years from 1923 he was Chief Whip of the Liberal Party. Firm and staunch in his political convictions, he had a kindly and courteous temperament which gave him great influence in the House, and he was a unifying influence in a Party which has always taken pride in the personal independence of its individual members, and has not seldom suffered from it. He was one of the comparatively small group in the House—but more numerous, I think, then than now—who took a pride in regular attendance at all the Sittings. They could be relied upon to be seen here day after day, whenever the House sat, and Lord Stanmore was one of the most assiduous among them. That, however, did not prevent him from doing social work outside this House, particularly for the hospitals, and he was for very many years Treasurer and Chief Officer of the great hospital of St. Bartholomew, as well as helping in the work of the King Edward Fund.
In this House, as has been said, he took a most active part in the Committee work, and was happy to be appointed by the House in 1944 Chairman of Committees and Deputy Speaker. For all his services he had been appointed to the Privy Council in 1932. Because of old age he held the post of Lord Chairman of Committees for only two years, and a severe malady laid him under heavy disabilities during his later years. It is only a few weeks since I went to see him, and it was evident then that the end could not be far away. But he was still keenly interested in public affairs, and he asked many questions about recent events in your Lordships' House and about those Members of a younger generation who are now assuming the duties of leadership. The House has lost in him an old and faithful servant.
2.41 p.m.
VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH: My Lords, I follow that very graceful tribute by the noble Viscount, Lord Samuel, with a desire to associate my colleagues and myself with what has been so ably expressed by both the noble Viscount and the noble Earl the Leader of the House. I felt that as most of us here did not know Lord Stan-more it was more appropriate that we

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should give the noble Viscount, Lord Samuel, preference, so that he might pay the graceful tribute which he has just now paid. We are all aware, of course, of the general character of the work which Lord Stanmore did, and we know how it is being assiduously performed to-day by our noble friend who is present now. We feel that we must pay tribute to one who served the House so long in different rôles and who was so faithful in his official duties. I should like to associate my colleagues and myself in an expression of sympathy and condolences with Lord Stanmore's relatives.

CITY OF LONDON (VARIOUS POWERS) BILL
Read 2a, and referred to the Committee on Unopposed Bills.
CATTEDOWN WHARVES BILL
Read 2a, and referred to the Committee on Unopposed Bills.
SUNDERLAND CORPORATION BILL
Read 2a, and referred to the Committee on Unopposed Bills.

ISLE OF WIGHT TELEVISION MAST
2.43 p.m.
LORD MOTTISTONE: My Lords, I beg to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether a public inquiry will be held before any departure from the Isle of Wight Development Plan is allowed to permit of the erection of a television mast and station for the Independent Television Authority in an area designated as being one of great landscape value.]
THE MINISTER WITHOUT PORTFOLIO (THE EARL OF MUNSTER): My Lords, the Isle of Wight County Council have notified my right honourable friend the Minister of Housing that they propose to grant planning permission for
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a mast and station on Chillerton Down. They have reached this conclusion after very thorough consideration of the circumstances. My right honourable friend has not yet taken a final decision, but his provisional view is that circumstances do not warrant his intervention.
LORD MOTTISTONE: My Lords, in thanking the noble Earl for his reply, may I ask him this supplementary question? Are Her Majesty's Government aware that a satisfactory alternative site is available outside the area designated as of great landscape value and, therefore, in a far less damaging situation, which I believe would be acceptable to the Independent Television Authority, if pressed?
THE EARL OF MUNSTER: My Lords, it is true that an alternative site at George's Down, which is south-east of Newport, has been considered, but it is regarded by the I.T.A. as very much inferior to the site where it is proposed to install this mast.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
THE EARL OF HOME: My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper.
Moved, That Standing Order No. 34 be considered in order to its being dispensed with for the purpose of giving precedence this day to the Motion standing in the name of the Viscount Hailsham for the re-commitment of the Shops Bill over the Motion standing in the name of the Viscount Alexander of Hillsborough.—(The Earl of Home.)
On Question, Motion agreed to and ordered accordingly.

HOUSE OF LORDS OFFICES COMMITTEE
Order of the Day for the consideration of the Third Report from the Select Committee read.
The Committee reported as follows:
1.—OFFICIAL SHORTHAND WRITER.
The Committee approved an increase in the scale of fees for the Official Shorthand Writer as agreed with the House of Commons and the Treasury, with effect from the 1st April, 1957. The Committee were informed of negotiations with the Treasury for an increase in the annual retaining fee, and authorised the payment of the revised fee when agreed.
2.—HANSARD TEMPORARY STAFF.
The Committee sanctioned the payment from the 1st January, 1957, to temporary reporters of the revised attendance fee as set out in the appendix to Treasury Establishments Circular No. 14/57, dated 20th March, 1957.
3.—CUSTODIANS.
The Committee sanctioned the application to the Custodian staff of Treasury Establishments Circular No. 15/57, dated 1st April, 1957, relating to shift allowances.
4.—REVISION OF ALLOWANCES.
The Committee approved the application of Treasury Establishments Circular No. 8/57, dated 27th February, 1957, providing for the revision of allowances for special duties with effect from 1st July, 1956, to members of the staff of the House of Lords to whom it applied. The Committee also sanctioned a consequential increase in the superannuation award to Mr. P. Johnson.
5.—ACCOUNTANT'S OFFICE.
The Clerk of the Parliaments informed the Committee that he had appointed Mr. R. W. Hill, the Assistant Accountant, to be Receiver of Fees and Accountant on Mr. P. Johnson's retirement, Mr. E. W. Field as Assistant Accountant and Mr. R. A. Devin to the executive post, all with effect from 1st March, 1957.
6.—RETIREMENT OF A CUSTODIAN.
The Committee were informed of the retirement of Lionel Grantley Fitzhardinge Berkeley on the grounds of ill-health.
The Committee sanctioned the payment of a gratuity and an additional allowance under the Superannuation Acts, 1859 to 1949, to Mr. Berkeley after 8 completed years' service.
7.—LIBRARY SUB-COMMITTEE.
The Committee have considered the Report from the Sub-Committee on the Library, and have agreed that the Viscount Esher should be co-opted as a member of the Sub-Committee. They have also noted the view of the Sub-Committee that, in the not very distant future, it will be necessary to make further provision for the storage of books.
8.—RECORD COPIES OF PUBLIC ACTS.
The Committee considered whether the record copies of Public General Acts, as well as of Private Acts, should be printed on good durable paper instead of vellum, but with a vellum cover. They have appointed a Sub-Committee, consisting of the Earl of Limerick, the Earl of Listowel, the Lord Merthyr and the Lord Rea, to study this question and report.
THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (THE EARL OF DROGHEDA): My Lords, I beg to move that this Report be now considered.
Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.
THE EARL OF DROGHEDA: My Lords, I do not think that there is anything in this Report to which I should
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draw your Lordship's especial attention, and therefore I beg to move that the Report be approved.
Moved, that the Report be approved.—(The Earl of Drogheda.)
On Question, Motion agreed to.

PRIVATE BILL STANDING ORDERS
THE EARL OF DROGHEDA: My Lords, these Amendments to the Private Bill Standing Orders are a number which have been necessitated by changes in the names of Government Departments and other changes of that kind, and I do not think that I need say anything about them. I beg to move that the Amendment be made.
Moved, That the following Amendments be made in the Standing Orders relative to Private and Provisional Order Confirmation Bills, etc., vizt.:—
Standing Order 30, page 24, line 11, leave out ("Fuel and").
Standing Order 39, page 27, paragraph (1), leave out ("Commissioners of Crown Lands") and insert ("Crown Estate Commissioners"); leave out ("Fuel and").
Paragraph (3), line 24, leave out ("or").
Paragraph (3), line 25, insert ("or Ghana").
Standing Order 175, page 72, line 44, leave out ("6") and insert ("10").
Appendix C, Part VIII, leave out ("£3 18 9") and insert ("£4 14 6"); leave out ("£0 1 3") and insert ("£0 1 6").
—(The Earl of Drogheda.)
On Question, Motion agreed to: the said Standing Orders amended accordingly.

SHOPS BILL [H.L.]
2.48 p.m.
THE MINISTER OF EDUCATION (VISCOUNT HAILSHAM): My Lords, I understand that during my short absence abroad conversations took place between the usual channels and that it was ascertained that the course indicated in the Motion in my name on the Order Paper would be most acceptable to your Lordships' House. I therefore have great

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pleasure in moving the Motion standing in my name.
Moved, That the Order of the 2nd instant directing that the Report of the Amendments be received on the 7th of May next be discharged, and that the Bill be recommitted to a Committee of the Whole House on Tuesday, 7th May, next.—(Viscount Hailsham.)
VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH: My Lords, I am much obliged to the noble Viscount. There was a good deal of feeling that, as a considerable number of matters had been left over for consideration from the Committee stage, it would facilitate the passage of the Bill if we had any new proposals thoroughly discussed. We thought that if we re-committed the Bill, with, of course, the Government's consent, we could have full discussion. I hope that it may be possible then to avoid any discussion on Report stage. It is not that we want especially to take up extra time of the House.
On Question, Motion agreed to, and ordered accordingly.

AGRICULTURE
2.49 p.m.
VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH rose to call attention to the condition of agriculture; and to move for Papers. The noble Viscount said: My Lords, I rise again to call the attention of your Lordships to the condition of agriculture. In thinking about the situation of agriculture, my mind was directed back to the reception which was given to the Annual Review and Determination of Guarantees, published in March, 1956. In that year there was a widespread storm of indignation among sections of the farming community. This year there has been only a whisper here and there. The leaders of the National Farmers' Union have received the special praise of the Minister of Agriculture, who described them as "statesmen" for not opposing the proposals of the Minister in the price guarantee.
Apparently the N.F.U. have been fairly successful under their new title of "statesmen" in not making too much fuss about the matter, but as I go about the country—and I daresay that noble Lords in all parts of the House have the
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same experience—I find in regard to the present Annual Review a sense of strong misgiving about the situation. It arises largely from the general condition of the industry, as the farmers themselves know it; and it is growing upon farmers, as I talk to them and they talk to me, that their personal net gains from farming are going down, while the personal net gains in practically every other industry or walk of life are going up. Even on the rather rough and ready estimates which are made from time to time of net farming incomes in the Annual Review, I think it is quite apparent that the farmers' net incomes, as returned there, have gone down steadily since the year 1952–53. Even the assessment which is made this year of their incomes, which I find rather high—and I shall be surprised to find in eighteen months' time, when the return comes out from the Board of Inland Revenue, that it is supported by actual taxation assessments—is at a lower figure than the figure of 1952–53. So there has been a continuous decline.
If we adopt the method usually adopted of portraying to the public this general movement in incomes of sections of the community, we find that there is an index figure of 100 representing the year 1950. The farmers' net incomes rose from 1950 to 1952–53, on the average, by an amount which brought them at that time to about twenty points above the figure for 1950 in the index. Since then, however, there has been a steady decline. They were on what has been described by the Prime Minister as "a plateau" for about eighteen months or two years, but since the end of 1953 the incomes have declined, until they are now no more than ten points above the index figure of 1950. But if we look at other returns of incomes, we find that there has been a continuous upward rise; and although I daresay one could find a few small classes, like people with fixed incomes from investments, old-age pensioners and people of that sort, who have not made similar rises, the great majority of the people in the country have gone rapidly up. I am looking now at the Economic Survey for 1957, where on page 11 we see Table IV, the Return of Personal Income and Expenditure.
Even coming down to the disposable income, as apart from the receivable income, and allowing for all deductions for taxes on income, National Insurance

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contributions, and less remittances from abroad, the incomes of these people have risen from £11,293 million in 1952 to £14,859 million in 1956. That gives general support—I do not say it gives detailed support—to my statement that in regard to almost every other class of the community incomes have gone up steadily between 1950 and 1956. But, as I say, even in respect of the returns made in the Annual Review and Determination of Guarantees, that is not the case in respect of the net incomes of farmers.
I cannot see that that is an indication that the farming industry, as a whole, is in quite the position that it ought to be. After all, when there are discussions upon wages and conditions in any industry, and when objections are made, in public meetings or in another place, about the lack of increase of wages or about the increase of profits, and when it is said, as some people say, that profits should be taken out of the industry, there are loud protests from members of the Government and their supporters. It is said that profit is the essence of business, and if the business is not run for a profit, and a good profit—one that will help you to put by for future years so that replacements can be made at their actual cost, even if helped sometimes by depreciation allowances—then the business had better not run at all. That is the kind of answer we get. But when we come to deal with the farming situation, that is just about what it seems to me many farmers fear the Government are doing to-day.
The situation has largely arisen from the general policy which has been applied in agriculture by the present Government since 1951–52. They were so anxious to change the kind of general overall system that we in the Labour Government had been applying that they brought in, stage by stage, all kinds of decontrols. Some they could not introduce at once, but they brought them in as rapidly as they could. They reduced the subsidies to consumers; they changed the subsidy on bread; more recently, they have made it exceedingly difficult for the only remedy that can be applied to the milk industry at the moment—that is, to ensure a much larger and wider consumption of liquid milk out of the national product of milk—by the removal of the subsidy
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on milk, thereby increasing the price to the consumer.
Then, as recently as last autumn, they finished off that process when milk was raised to 8½d. a pint, which brings the future winter price for certain, at least to the milk consumer, to something like 5s. 8d. a gallon, or an average price of 5s. 6d. a gallon over the year; whereas by the time the dairy farmer has received the reward for his gradually and steadily improving milk production over the whole year, his total yield, after the cost of transport has been deducted, will barely reach 3s. 2d. a gallon. I might add that the consequence is that the farmers are being severely cut in this last twelve months in the reward they get for their milk, and the average reduction, I suppose over the winter months has been certainly more than 4d. a gallon—it has been 5d. in certain months and 7½d. in others. Perhaps the noble Earl who is to reply to the debate will be able to tell us what the price of milk will be for the month of March; it may have been published but I have not seen it. I am not sure what the actual cut in their return has been, but certainly it has been an average of 4½d. a gallon.
We see that, not only in the case of milk but also in other sections of the farming industry, the policy of the Government has led to great difficulty to the farmer. Your Lordships will remember the great chaos caused in the pig industry some two and a half to three years ago. I was hoping that my noble friend Lord Silkin would be here to-day—unfortunately he is very busy—because he particularly wanted to speak to the House about the big reductions in pig returns. Certainly the pig section of the industry has passed through varying waters in the last three years, and for a time there was a serious decline in the numbers of the pig population. That has been climbing back steadily until now, only to be met in the last few months, under this free-for-all system, by a still further decline in remuneration—a decline which has led many friends of mine who are, as they say, "in pig production," to look at the future with some grave doubts.
Why does this general feeling of misgiving of which I have been speaking exist at the present time? It arises, I submit, from the free-for-all policy which the Government have been adopting, as I

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think is shown in the White Paper itself, and the manner in which the Government's decision has been announced. If your Lordships look at page 5, paragraphs 15 and 17, you will see that, after all the great claims made on behalf of the long-term policy of guarantees, that they would not fall below a certain figure, in effect, when they are worked out, there will be a decline. Now let us see how the matter is approached in paragraph 15. It says that
" The total value of the guarantees…for this purpose at the 1957 Annual Review was calculated to be £1,197 million and 97½ per cent. of this is £1,167 million "—
that means to say, the minimum figure to which it can be reduced under the long-term guarantee, is £1,167 million. Paragraph 15 goes on:
" After the addition of the relevant cost increase "—
that is where farmers are already out of pocket for the past year—
" of nearly £38 million, the lower limit for the Government's determination would he an increase of just under £8 million in the total value of the guarantees."
That is to say, on the basis of the long-term guarantee process the farmer could be left with a debit on account of guarantees of £30 million.
It is true that as you go on to read paragraph 17, you see that the Government have been forced, possibly by the arguments of the farmers' leaders, to realise that they ought to do something about the guarantees themselves. So, instead of giving only the increase of £8 million, referred to in paragraph 15, they propose to raise the increase to £14 million for the current year. But that leaves £24 million, on the basis that for the current year, we shall have the same experience as in the year 1956–57. Farmers have to make up for themselves a balance of £24 million for the year. Let it be said straight away that £24 million is a larger sum than has been left for the farmers to meet in any one year since 1949. It means also, since this system of Annual Reviews, and things having to be made up by what is called increased efficiency year by year, that the farmers will, by the end of the year in which they get this cut of £24 million, have made up something like £125 million per annum cumulatively in efficiency. I should say that one would have considerable difficulty in finding other industries in the
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country which could match such a difficulty as that. That means increased efficiency—not merely increase in output.
Look around and see the conditions under which the other industries work. For years now the great majority of them have been able to build themselves up behind a considerable tariff wall. They may have been able—I do not deny it—to make improvements in plant and that kind of thing, by the protection they enjoy; but that protective tariff has to be paid for, and it is paid for by the consumers of the country. Yet directly we come to what the Government themselves have admitted again and again is a just set-up for the farming industry—considering their subsidy and what is given to general industry in tariff protection—everybody talks about the farmer being "feather-bedded", when in fact, while the wages of his own workers have been steadily rising, which I am glad to see, the returns to the fanner are going down. I should be glad to hear whether the noble Earl accepts the facts which I have been putting before him in that connection to-day.
I was referring just now to the fact that milk was an important question. What has been done in regard to milk means a large slice out of the profits of the British agricultural industry. I do not know what fellow farmers in the House may say, but I myself should be rather sorry to be wholly in dairy farming. There seems to be so much more interest and general ability in keeping up a standard of farming and husbandry if you have a mixed farm as well as a dairy. That aspect—the proper development of ley farming and grass production—has always interested me very much. If you take the general way in which dairy farming has been treated in the Review I regard it as rather shocking. I remember—and I put it down on paper—a statement last year by a farmer a long way from the district I know anything about. Mr. Robert Foster, of Skipton, said this about last year's Review:
" The Review is a smack in the eye for all those who have responded so well for increased production in the past for more milk, pigs and eggs. It is a mere flea-bite Review so far as the grassland farmer is concerned, and a disgrace to a Government which has frequently and forcibly announced its intention of supporting a healthy and prosperous agriculture."

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He was speaking of last year's Review—
" We had expected at least 2d. a gallon increase on milk and considered we would not be over recouped with perhaps 3d. a gallon. "In dealing with milk in the Review this year, the Ministry admit that since then there has been another increase of 2d. per gallon in the cost of production of milk, but feel that, having regard to the general economic circumstances of the country at present (that is how I think they have been able to persuade the National Farmers' Union leaders not to oppose the settlement), they must not encourage milk production further.
I admit that the Minister himself, on March 14 or 15 last year, uttered a general kind of warning about the future of milk. But what is going to be done about it? Many of these farmers—in fact, the majority of them—have been building up their milk production for years; and it really does take years to build up a really good herd.
Who are the men who, according to the advertisements we see in the marketing papers we read, the Stockbreeder and the Farmer's Weekly, are getting out of milk at present? It is not the small man. The man who is getting out of milk at present is the man who advertises, through the most widely known nationally recognised auctioneers, the disposal of a dairy herd—it may be Friesians; it may be Ayrshires; it may be Shorthorns, but always herds which have been built up at great capital cost. Because he has capital, he is able to make changes in policy. You see at the top of the advertisement: "Owing to the decision of Mr. So-and-so, or Sir Somebody So-and-so, or Lord So-and-so, to change his basis of farming, the whole of the herd is to be offered for sale. Come and bid!" At least two-thirds of the farmers are not in a position to change like that, because most of them are unable to face the two-and-a-half to three years without any farming while they change, in the hope of ultimately getting a cash return from livestock or some other alternative cultivation. They are unable to face it. That is a fact. It is the big man with capital who may be able to stand up to this kind of non-continuous agricultural policy such as we have had in the last three or four years.
How do the Government propose to carry out their object? They are quite
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frank about it. They say that what they feel bound to do is to reduce the profitability at present to be found in milk, pigs and eggs. But I have already shown by my argument to-day that profit in these matters is already too small for the farmers. If we take the index of bankruptcies which I was able to obtain from the noble Earl the other day, whilst they are not startling figures—
THE JOINT PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY, MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES AND FOOD (EARL ST. ALDWYN): They certainly are not.
VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH: They are not; but the figures over the last five years are much higher than they were. They are higher by from 50 to 60 per cent. I am not saying that they are startling figures, but they give a clear indication of the direction in which things are going at the present time. In my view, the condition of our country as a whole is not such that we can afford to let the agricultural industry down.
Let us take for a moment the question of how far attention is being given at the present time to the proper maintenance of the agricultural industry in relation to the great problems of our balance of payments and the maintenance of our gold and dollar reserves. I should have thought that at such a time as this it was essential that in every case in which the Government could work it under your free system—and one of the great troubles is that they have not been willing to exercise proper control—in every case where the home-produced article can satisfy the home market, home production should be the object. In fact, that is what is being urged all the time, in each successive farming Paper, upon the farmer himself. The Government fear that, where milk is being produced in growing quantities by the small farmer, it is being done by means of increased purchases of imported feeding-stuffs. The farmer is being urged over and over again to substitute home-produced feeding-stuffs. If that is the doctrine for the farmer to follow (I am sure he is doing that very well at the present time), then I would say that the Government's policy in regard to farming in general should be to seek the largest possible output

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from farming and to use that output to help in maintaining the balance of payments and our gold and dollar reserves.
The Government, however, do not seem willing to do that. In fact, the situation to-day in regard to our balance of payments and our reserves shows that, whilst we get a temporary relief here and there from month to month, the general situation is exceedingly bad. Our gold and dollar reserves are not so very much higher than they were in 1949 when the decision to devalue was taken. When you deduct from the published figure the fruits of the sale of the West Indian oilfields; when you deduct what has been borrowed from the Monetary Fund; when you deduct what has been received, in effect, by the action of the United States and Canada in letting us escape our current commitments and interest upon debts—when you have allowed for all that, then our net balance of gold and dollar reserves is less than it was in 1949. The position is much more serious than the majority of the people in the country seem to realise. It seems to me that, instead of saying in a Paper that they want to reduce production, the Government ought to be all the more concerned to see that production is increased. Yet, as I say, there seems to be a campaign on foot to make it more difficult for the farmer, and especially the milk farmer, to maintain his present production.
I noticed—as I expect other noble Lords also did—a report in The Times last Monday week (I think it was) of statements made by Dr. Sinclair, of Magdalen College, Oxford, on various matters. It is true that he comes from Oxford, and we always like to jibe at Oxford a little as being the home of lost causes—and we hope that in this case it is a lost cause. He was doing his best to try to persuade the country that milk is a bad food for infants and is not reliable; that milk should not be given indiscriminately and poured down the necks of children; that it is very dangerous for them. That was his view. And yet for the last forty years that I have been in public life we have been urging the production of more, better, cleaner and richer milk. We have urged that it should be used in the schools and in our welfare institutions. Returns have been made by the medical officers of health year by year since that practice was begun, and one can see unanimous reports about the great improvement in
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the health of the children, in their stature and in their general physical condition. That seemed to be associated in the doctor's mind—whether he had been inspired or not, I do not know—with the idea that generally we were doing far too much in the social and welfare services.
On that subject, the Government of course, hold different views from mine. I do not think they are doing far too much. They certainly did not help the farmer by taking the last bit of consumer subsidy off milk last October, and by raising the price when we wanted to increase liquid sales. They have not helped by recently substantially increasing the cost of milk to the nursing mothers and other people in attendance at the welfare centres. I am not surprised that Mr. Gaitskell was adding up these various things which have been taken from the people who needed them most in the country. At the very time when they are pursuing this policy of trying to reduce the production of milk by the farmer, the Government are finding £34 million for the relief of surtax payers. I must say that I find it exceedingly difficult to reconcile these policies.
I hope that, in spite of what has happened, all of us engaged in the farming industry will do our level best to keep it going, because the country needs the farming industry, and needs it very badly. Better arrangements may have to be made for disposing of surplus milk. I cannot for the life of me see why, because there has been a temporary increase in supplies of New Zealand butter and an unloading by Holland in this country of surplus stocks of butter from last year, farmers should be reduced, as we have been for the last two months, to selling milk for making butter here at 12·45 pence per gallon. There is not all the control of people who handle the milk and sell it, together with other farm products, that is brought up against the farmer every year. But if your Lordships' look at the general situation I have been portraying, of what is now being received from dairy farming, I am sure you would be persuaded that, whilst you would not perhaps agree to making it a nationalised industry, it would nevertheless be worth while for the milk marketing boards of England and Scotland to manufacture for themselves. If they can

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get only 12·45 pence per gallon to-day for milk sold for making butter, that seems to me to be just the psychological moment for the marketing boards themselves to go into manufacture. Then in the long run it would be for the suppliers from the farms to lay less stress, perhaps, upon winter milk and to have a more general spread of milk production and a mixing of the general results on a reasonable basis for the whole industry.
In regard to the other things concerned, I notice that whilst the guaranteed price of wheat is again to suffer a reduction, it is proposed on this occasion to make an increase in the guarantee for oats. I think it must be remembered—I hope the public will remember it—that although these guarantees are mentioned, large numbers of farmers never receive anything from them at all. The deficiency payment on the acreage of oats, as affected by, say, a standard price in the guarantee, reaches directly only the man who sells his oats off the farm. For example, last year most of the people who were growing oats had an unfortunate harvest with very poor returns—I do not suppose that there has been a worst oat harvest for a quarter of a century. What happens in such a case? The price of oats, in short supply, goes up, at least for the first few months of the season, at the market, and the people who have oats to sell are all right. But the people who have tried to follow the Government's dictum of growing their own supplies for feeding their cattle and their dairy herds, get no "whiff" at all of the guarantee or anything to help them in their partial loss. The scheme does not seem to be working out equitably. However, I should like to ask the noble Earl, in regard to the position of the oat producer, whether there is going to be a further announcement as to the last harvest, and whether there is still some deficiency payment to be made. I know of cases where a man who produced oats for the last harvest has been very hard hit indeed, and nothing has yet been paid.
My Lords, I am sorry to have detained your Lordships for so long, but I am most keen on this subject and very interested in it. My last word on the whole matter is this. I say that the Government have been engaging in what we call the free-for-all, instead of the
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ordered control that came about during the war and was continued after the war. I do not know whether any of my colleagues in the House are, like myself, used to looking from time to time for help and guidance at the works of the late adviser to the Minister of Agriculture. Fisheries and Food, Professor Scott Watson. But when I was thinking about this debate to-day I remembered the ninth edition of the book which he published jointly with Professor Moore on agriculture, and what he said in the introduction to it. This is what he said in 1949, in the ninth edition:
" Moreover, since it can be hoped that farm costs after the great rise of the past ten years have now become more stable. Section IV of the book has been re-written in terms of the wage rates and prices ruling in 1948–49."
How interested he must be, seeing what has happened since, to look back upon writing that introduction! But it is the extent of the rise in farmers' costs, the extent to which the rise in wages all over the country has entered finally into the price which must enter into all the needs of the farmer, and how all this has been due to the free-for-all and the rise in the cost of living, that paints the real situation to-day. I beg the Government not to go on producing Budgets of the kind they produced the other day, but to produce a financial policy and a controlled policy for the country which will do something to give farmers the hope of a long-view position of stability and prosperity. My Lords, I beg to move for Papers.
3.27 p.m.
THE EARL OF DUNDEE: My Lords, if the noble Viscount, Lord Alexander of Hillsborough, were not a member of the Opposition Front Bench, our general debates on agriculture might perhaps not be so frequent as they are; and they would certainly not be so good. It is much easier in this House than in the other place to have a number of broad general debates on any subject, and we are indebted to the noble Viscount, who combines regular attendance in the House with the hard and praiseworthy occupation of a country farmer, for giving us the opportunity of discussing this subject. When we listen to him I think we realise that we listen not primarily to a politician, but to a man who loves farming, and we are all particularly delighted by the robust, bucolic vitality with which the

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noble Viscount always addresses himself to this subject.
The noble Viscount is an opponent of the Government and I cannot agree with everything that he said. But I am a little reluctant either to restraint his own ardour—if that were possible, which it probably is not—or indeed to dissuade Her Majesty's Government from being impressed by it, because anything that is said in that sense from this side of the House may sometimes be apt to give the impression that the farmer is having a comfortable and easy time, which he certainly is not. About a year ago, when I last had the honour of following the noble Viscount in debate, I ventured to make a few lighthearted remarks to your Lordships about the "bullish" nature of the bull market in Scotland. But my farmer friends at home did not think this was at all funny. They took it very seriously indeed, and some of them even seemed to imagine that I was trying to behave like a "bear" in the bull market.
I am most anxious not to say anything which might encourage Her Majesty's Government to act the part of an animal which has never been particularly helpful in the rearing of live stock. I would never accuse the present Prime Minister of being a bear—and he certainly does not look like one. But he did tell the Scottish Unionist Party Conference at Ayr last week that he "squeezed us because he loved us". We have all to be a little careful not to become too familiar with these powerfully demonstrative animals. The purpose of these affectionate but suffocating embraces which we all have to endure from Her Majesty's Government is to try to prevent inflation and to prevent personal incomes from increasing faster than production. I should like to ask your Lordships to make a very brief comparison between the White Paper on Agriculture, published last month, and the Economic Survey, published this month, to which the noble Viscount, Lord Alexander of Hillsborough, has already alluded, and which does not deal only with agriculture but summarises the whole economic position of the country.
In the agricultural White Paper, dealing with the Price Review, paragraph 5, which is headed: "Changes in Income", says:
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" The forecast of actual net income for 1956–57 is £317 million, compared with a revised figure of £325 million for 1955–56."
That is in the year before.
" When adjusted for normal weather conditions net income is estimated at £334 million for 1956–57; the comparable figure for 1955–56 was £306½ million."
I suppose that that is the official way of saying that the farmers might have earned a little more than they actually did if it had not rained so much. Let us now look at the income of the whole country as given in the Economic Survey for 1957. In paragraph 34 it is stated:
" Personal income rose sharply between 1955 and 1956. Total personal income rose by about £1,200 million or 8 per cent."
So that the personal income of the country as a whole rose last year by £1,200 million, while the income of the farmer has been reduced.
Let me now finish paragraph 5 in the agricultural White Paper, which concludes by saying:
" Although actual net income is lightly below that of last year, net income under normal weather conditions is forecast to be about equal to the highest previously recorded, in 1952–53."
I take that to mean that if we do not have the usual snowstorms in May, and incessant rain from June to September, the income of the farmer is estimated to be about the same as it was in 1952. May we now look at what national income was in this year which is looked on in the agricultural White Paper as a kind of annus mirabilis. These figures are given in the Economic Survey of last month, in the table to which the noble Viscount, Lord Alexander of Hillsborough, has already alluded. In 1952 the total national income was £12,900 million. In 1956 it is given as £16,900 million. That is an increase of £4,000 million, or nearly 30 per cent., in the last five years since 1952; while the income of the farmer, provided the sun, wind and rain all coordinate their activities in accordance with the best Civil Service traditions, is expected to be no greater than it was in that year.
Looking now at production, your Lordships will have seen from the agricultural White Paper that agricultural production rose last year by three points, from 156 to 159 (pre-war as 100). What of total production for the country as

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as given in paragraph 33 of the Economic Survey?
" Between 1955 and 1956 gross domestic production rose by just over 1 per cent. Most of this increase appears to have come from increased output by the distributive and service trades and from higher agricultural output. Industrial production did not expand at all."
So this small increase in our overall production is almost entirely accounted for by agriculture. Let me remind your Lordships that the purpose of our dis-inflationary policy is to prevent incomes from rising faster than production. It seems evident from the financial survey that while personal incomes in the country as a whole have risen in one year by £1,200 million with no increase in industrial production, the farmer, who has increased his production substantially, is not expected to receive an income higher than that which he received in 1952 when the general income was about 30 per cent. lower than it is now.
I think it is evident from the facts revealed to us in these White Papers that the British farmer is a much better fighter in the national battle against inflation than he is in his own battle for his own pocket. The fall in the world price of primary products may have put the National Farmers' Union in a relatively weaker bargaining position than they used to be; but I do not think the farmers' representatives have ever used their bargaining position to obtain an advantage which was contrary to the national interest. There has never been by any farmers' representative any such statement as there was in a recent industrial dispute, that the farmers' individual interests must come before those of the country. There have never been strikes or threats of strikes in agriculture, nor have there been any restrictive practices in farming, although it is often peculiarly difficult for the farmer to change and adapt his traditional customs in accordance with new circumstances.
Whenever the Agricultural Wages Board does anything to bring agricultural wages more into line with the general level of wages, that is always regarded as a signal for everyone else to ask for more; for there is thought to be some kind of divinely constituted differential between the wages of the country worker and the wages of the townsman. Farming has given the national economy more, in exchange for less, than
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any other industry. It has increased its production by more than 50 per cent. The rate of production per man is of course more than that, while in the building industry and the coal trade that rate has fallen. The rate both of workers' wages and of remuneration of individual farmers is far less than that of other sections of the community whose incomes have been rising while farmers' incomes have remained steady. It can therefore be said that farming to-day is putting more into the national economy and is taking out less than most other people are doing.
The noble Viscount's Motion is framed in the most broad and general terms, and I thought it right to put these general considerations before your Lordships because they are too often forgotten by the country, and sometimes perhaps by its rulers. I will conclude with a very few remarks about the Price Review and the amount of annual assistance, on which the noble Viscount said a good deal. It may perhaps, from many points of view, be a disadvantage to the farmer that the amount of money which the Treasury is to contribute to price support is pubblished every year in the Budget. Everybody always knows what it is and can quote it straight away. Nobody can tell you off-hand how much assistance is being given to other industries.
The noble Viscount referred to the various kinds of assistance and subsidies given during the tenure of office of the Labour Government. When all the payments given at that time are added together, they represent a much larger sum than the present cost to the Exchequer. I am not going to discuss at this moment whether it was a good thing or a bad thing to alter the manner in which they were given, but I think the noble Viscount would agree with this, which is the important thing from the farmers' point of view: that at that time those payments did not represent an effective subsidy to the farmer because the guaranteed prices he was getting from the Government were below the general level of world prices.
The noble Viscount said just now that that does not prevent anybody from thinking of the farmers as being kept alive and subsidised by lavish sums of money from the taxpayer. He said everybody says the farmer is "feather-bedded." I

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do not know whether he remembers that the first person to use that phrase was a member of his own Government, who, I think, had to resign office in consequence—a right-wing member of his Government. I remember a pamphlet being published at the same time by the left wing, representing that farming was being expensively maintained at enormous subsidies high above world prices, which at that time was completely contrary to the facts. The prices of wheat, oats and barley which the Ministry of Food bought from abroad were higher than those of the cereals bought from the British farmer. This pamphlet very wisely concentrated on the prices given for Argentine beef, which were, in fact, less than the beef prices being paid to the British farmer. But it did not mention any other part of the world where there was a free market for beef, like North America, where the prices were higher than those we gave to the Argentine or paid to the British farmer, which was the root of the bitter grievance against us of the Argentine Government. They thought we were taking advantage of our position as practically the only buyers to drive a very unfair bargain. The important fact is that at that time the British bottom was below world level; now the British bottom is above world level. Perhaps the most important thing has not been the change in Government policy but the change in terms of world trade.
The £245 million which is being taken this year for agricultural price support represents a real contribution to agriculture from the British taxpayer. I think your Lordships will agree that it is not an inflationary contribution, and I have at least tried to show that in the figures I have quoted, it is a very good national investment. But at a time when our finances are so strained, it must be very difficult indeed for the Government and the National Farmers' Union to adjust this sum which can be spent on agricultural price support to the best advantage and according to the best pattern.
In the White Paper it is explained that the main objectives are to encourage greater production of better quality beef and mutton and also to grow a far larger proportion of our own feeding-stuffs at home. Having regard to our foreign currency problem and the general condition of the country, it is, I think, the right policy. But it is hard on the dairy farmer.
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I have never tried to embark on any kind of dairy farming, so I cannot claim to speak with any knowledge, but I can claim to do so without bias. I think there is no branch of the farming community to-day which is having a harder time than the small dairy farmer. All his costs have gone up a great deal; he sometimes has to work himself seven days a week; it is extraordinarily difficult for him to get labour to look after the animals over the week-end. Last year his price was reduced by three-halfpence; now it has gone up again by only one farthing. In many cases his receipts are quite insufficient to cover his costs.
In some respects dairy farmers are perhaps the victims of a long-term dietary miscalculation on the part of the country. Before the war and for a very long time all our nutritional experts assured us, and they probably still do, that milk was the best kind of human food for anybody, and all our emphasis in agricultural policy was placed on dairy farming. It was always expected that when people earned more wages and became more prosperous they would buy and drink a great deal more milk. Now our consumption of food in general has gone up; people are living better and eating more, but they are not choosing to buy more milk. The White Paper points out that there is a danger of our milk production exceeding our requirements. It is pointed out that the milk manufactures are very often more cheaply imported from the Commonwealth, and the White Paper is deliberately designed, as it says, to reduce the profitability of the dairy industry.
In a free country no Government can compel people to drink what they do not want. I am not myself a nutritional expert at all. I would never dream of offering anybody a glass of milk if I thought he would prefer something else. But it is generally acknowledged that milk, although it should not exercise a monopoly in diet, is one of the best articles of food, and that we should probably do very much better if we drank as much of it as they do in Scandinavia and Switzerland. I wonder whether the Milk Marketing Board are doing as much as they ought to do to advertise the sale and consumption of milk.
I remember that before the war the Scottish Office and the Ministry of Agriculture asked the Board to embark on a big advertising campaign

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for milk, which they did, I think, with some success. We did not have television then; we did not have the I.T.V. on which you are allowed to advertise. Now I may be unobservant—perhaps I have not noticed it—but I have not seen much sign of a great advertising campaign to encourage people to drink more milk. When we think of all the patent medicines, cosmetics and other unnecessary things which the impressionable public is persuaded to consume by nothing more than the constant psychological pressure of advertising, surely it would be money well spent if the Milk Marketing Board were to do a great deal more than they are doing now in advertising to promote a greater consumption of milk. We do not want to make people drink milk if they do not want to, but surely it is better to try to make them drink milk than a whole lot of other things. And remember that in a free country it is only by advertising that public taste can be developed and led along.
In our debate yesterday a noble Lord—I think it was the noble Viscount, Lord Gage—referred to what he called the bipartisan policy in agriculture and to the great benefit which it had brought to this country. That, I think, is profoundly true. We have benefited enormously from the fact that there is no longer any fundamental dispute between the main Parties in the State. I listened carefully to what the noble Viscount said, and I do not think he said anything which could in any way be interpreted as undermining this bipartisan farming policy. On the contrary, I think he has shown a good deal more enthusiasm about it than a great many other people in all Parties. The difference between more controls and bulk purchase, which the noble Viscount favours, and the policy of average deficiency payments without controls may be important. I do not think it is fundamental. All I would say about it is that the policy of average deficiency payments without controls gives a slant to efficiency which I think has not been ineffective. I am sure that all Conservative candidates for the House of Commons who have to explain the Government's agricultural
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policy to their constituents would be highly delighted if all Socialist hecklers at their meetings took exactly the same line as that which has been taken to-day by the noble Viscount. Therefore I do not intend to disparage anything which the noble Viscount has said in moving this Motion. I hope that it will all help to keep the public well informed, as it ought to be informed, of the good service, the indispensable service and the not very highly paid service which agriculture is giving to our national economy.

COMMONWEALTH PRIME MINISTERS' MEETING
3.52 p.m.
THE EARL OF HOME: My Lords, with the permission of the House I should like to interrupt the Business to make a short statement. The Prime Minister has been in communication with the Prime Ministers of the other Commonwealth countries, and it has now been arranged to hold a meeting in London beginning on June 26 next. I feel sure the House will join with me in welcoming this event, to which we all attach the highest importance.
VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH: My Lords, I am sure the whole House will join in that wish which has just been expressed by the noble Earl the Leader of the House. I hope the Conference will be very successful. As we have been talking to-day about agriculture, may I express the hope that perhaps the noble Earl, Lord Home, will be able to say a word at that Conference for British agriculture.
THE EARL OF LISTOWEL: May I ask the noble Earl whether the Conference will be attended by all the Commonwealth Prime Ministers in person and whether he has any idea how long the Conference will last?
THE EARL OF HOME: My Lords, these conferences usually last about eight or nine days, and I think that this one will be of that kind of duration. So far as I know, all the Prime Ministers will be present, with the possible exception of Mr. Strijdom, who may be represented by Mr. Louw, the Foreign Minister.

AGRICULTURE
3.55 p.m.
Debate resumed.
THE EARL OF MALMESBURY: My Lords, in rising for the first time to address your Lordships, I hope that I may be accorded the indulgence which I believe is customary on these occasions. I too am very grateful to the noble Viscount, Lord Alexander of Hillsborough, for initiating this debate, which of its very nature must cover a wide field in matters relating to agriculture. I rather regard agriculture as a person who was knocked down and was picked up again in time for the First World War; was knocked down again after the First World War and, in between the wars, was picked up again just in time for the Second World War. When the Second World War finished, the patient was in a daze. Much has been done for agriculture. Much had to be done. The patient was a tough patient and has recovered.
I have attended many agricultural conferences in the country. I have taken the chair at some of them, and no matter what the title matter of the subject was, the theme always seemed to run: "If only more capital could be injected into the industry, how much more we could do—at reduced costs!" At the passing of the Agriculture Bill the injection will be given. It is an excellent Bill, in my opinion—I am referring, in particular, to Part II, which deals with the farm improvement scheme. It is bold and courageous, and it must not fail through had planning. The Bill defines the scope and conditions of the scheme in very broad terms, therefore giving much flexibility to the planners. The object is to improve the farming of our land. When an application for a grant is received, the best local brains in the industry should be employed before a grant is given. The production of the farm should be planned, and the requirements studied.
What are the main requirements? The positioning of the buildings, ease of working, ease of access, and internal roads. Roads are again mentioned in the Fourth Schedule. They are a most important factor with the present trends of mechanisation. It is the divisional executive officer—and he came into being at the beginning of this month—who
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administers the grant, and he has the sole responsibility of deciding if a scheme is one which has or may present, difficulties. Should he decide that there may be difficulties or problems, he must then refer the application formally to the chairman of the county agricultural executive committee. But he will do that, I repeat, if, and only if, it is a difficult case. I am in no way criticising the administrative side of the regional offices, but in my view this procedure places an unfair burden on the divisional executive officer. How can a man who is receiving many applications form a true picture of a scheme relating, possibly, to a farm many miles away from his office? Every application, in my view, should be prejudged a difficult case.
As the prudent landlord would expect, the life of any building which receives the grant is scheduled to be not less than fifteen years. Everyone, of course, hopes for longer; but then no-one is a prophet. Time and motion studies can be very misleading. The time of half a man may be saved—so the studies say—but does experience bear this out? The relevant factors must all be weighed: the total bill for labour, feeding, warmth and all the many other considerations. I would suggest that in addition to the Agricultural Land Service and the National Agricultural Advisory Service a picked member or members of either the district committees or estate and husbandry sub-committees should be brought in to inspect and advise on each application. Obviously, circumstances will vary in every county, but it must be right to call in the best and most ex perienced local brains.
As I have said, the farm improvements scheme is a brave and bold one, and it must stand or fall by the full appreciation of its immensity and scope. I should like to mention a further point on improvement grants. These have been met with a great deal of enthusiasm—so much so, in fact, that regret is being expressed that no financial payments can be made before the autumn. This unavoidable delay is caused, as your Lordships know, but the necessary statutory procedure. I would say that that delay is a blessing in disguise, as it gives those concerned—by which I mean the actual owner or farmer or occupier of the land—time to consider his scheme. It gives the officials, and

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I hope the members of the district committee and estate management committees, and anybody else concerned, time to consider carefully these applications, because the one thing we do not want is for anybody to be able to "shoot at" the scheme and to say, "Look how much money has been wasted."
This scheme has got to be a success. It has a life of ten years, or possibly twelve, and we have to put it to the fullest and best possible use. Your Lordships will remember that immediately after the war, when there were building restrictions, if anybody wished either to construct a new farm building or to repair an old one, he required the blessing of the old war agricultural executive committee and that some of the applications were, shall I say, not at all well thought out. They were either too lavish or just plain shoddy. Of course, there were the plans and schemes which were necessary and correct, but among them were schemes which were bad through over-economy or through waste of money. We do not want that to happen again.
I should like to offer a suggestion with regard to the National Agricultural Advisory Service. In many counties, for the sake of supposed economies, there has been a tendency to centralise the district advisory officers. I have come to believe that the clerical expenditure saved by this centralisation is more than spent on the extra travelling. If the efficiency of farming has to improve, it is important that this front-line advisory service should be based where it is most required, and not in an office, possibly away from the district, where it is difficult for the shyer and more backward farmer to approach the district officer. Possibly he has not the time to take a trip, or is too nervous (as a number of farmers still are) to get on to the telephone to approach what he thinks is a rather formidable headquarters. Where these district officers have been centralised, I should like to see them being put back into their districts and given local offices. I suggest that we should follow what is happening in the United States, where the equivalent of our district officer has his office based on the equivalent of our local authority. I can see no reason why these arrangements should not be made and why the district
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advisory officers should not be given a room and clerical help in the local rural district council offices, the Minister, of course, defraying any expenses that may be incurred.
Agriculture is going through an exciting time. It is a testing time. I would say that the owner, the farmer and the farm worker, in their own ways and in a relationship which is close and friendly, are all relishing their job—to make the industry more efficient. I am sure that the encouragements that are being given are showing, and will continue to show, results.
4.7 p.m.
VISCOUNT BLEDISLOE: My Lords, it is a real pleasure to me to congratulate the noble Earl, Lord Malmesbury, on making his maiden speech in an admirable and timely contribution to the discussion of our present-day agricultural problems. I appreciate the privilege that I have of commending his maiden effort, partly because his father was an old friend of mine—and a very charming man he was; he was largely responsible for bringing me into Parliamentary life over fifty years ago—and partly because, by a curious coincidence, the noble Earl has stressed those very considerations which I want mainly to emphasise this afternoon. He has made it evident to me that he is a practical and prudent economist, especially when, in connection with the proposed improvement grants, he speaks about the necessity of the injection of more capital into our leading industry.
I should like to say how glad I am that my old friend and political opponent, the noble Viscount, Lord Alexander of Hillsborough, with his strenuous eloquence, and speaking as a farmer, has once more introduced an agricultural debate in your Lordships' House. I would only say, in passing, that I have never listened to any speech which has provided more emphatically convincing arguments for the present policy of Her Majesty's Government. I am bound to tell the noble Viscount, quite candidly, that there is little in his detailed arguments with which I should agree, except with his emphasis on the enormous importance of an absolutely new and far-sighted development in the reorganisation of our agricultural industry. He talked about there being to-day, in his opinion, grave misgivings amongst

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farmers. I have an exactly contrary impression. During the time since the Agriculture Act, 1947, was passed, I have never known a greater tendency to remove misgivings on the part of our agricultural community, and notably the smaller farmers—I prefer to say, the smaller husbandmen—than appears to be prevalent in the country to-day.
It is aways a pleasure to listen to the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, and I am bound to say that, for my part, I fully endorse all that he said. I cannot help looking back over the thirty-nine and a half years that I have had the privilege of being a Member of your Lordships' House and saying what often occurs to ray mind: how enormously this House has improved, particularly amongst its younger Members in the practical knowledge which they display in regard to the greatest of all our national industries. I know it would be improper for me, having been a Member of both Houses of Parliament, to compare the two, but I am bound to say that when it comes to considering the needs of the rural population, I cannot help feeling that this House is far more effective and more convincing to the general public than is another place, under present conditions.
To hark back to the admirable maiden speech of the noble Earl, Lord Malmesbury, and, indeed, to the justification for this debate at the present time, the Government's policy, as it seems to me, consists of two main sections. One of them is what the Minister describes as "long-term assurances"—that is, in regard to guarantees and subsidies in relation to commodity prices—and the other is capital grants. It is with regard to capital grants that I should like to say a few words this afternoon—capital grants as affecting the requirements both of small ownership and small occupation. It is the small owner and the small farmer who most require assistance at the present time.
I would remind your Lordships that our troubles in this connection are mainly due to a continued and serious agricultural depression which lasted for at least thirty years in the latter part of the 19th century and seriously impoverished the landowning class: in fact, I might almost say wiped out, in an economic sense, something like 40 per cent. of the country squires of this country. Unless you mean
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to nationalise agricultural land—and I do not think anyone is prepared to advocate that to-day, in view of the very personal character of the agricultural industry and the necessity for individual enterprise and resourcefulness—if the nation is not going to provide the necessary capital equipment in order to make the industry really efficient and prosperous, then the only alternative, in view of the relative impoverishment of individual landowners, is, as my noble friend Lord Malmesbury put it so well, to provide a sufficient infiltration of fresh capital in order to equip properly and effectively our farms and smallholdings in this country with the necessary requirements to make the best possible use of up-to-date science and technology as applied to the industry.
In this connection, I want to mention particularly the existence of the Country Landowners' Association. That is a body which was formed exactly half a century ago on the initiative of two remarkable men, neither of them themselves landowners but belonging to landowning families. One was Mr. Algernon Turnor, the private secretary of Disraeli, who most strenuously advocated progressive methods and scientific principles as applied to the industry, and the other. Sir Horace Plunkett, the great pioneer of agricultural co-operation in Ireland, both dear old friends of mine.
The actual founders of the Country Landowners' Association, if I may remind your Lordships, were the late Mr. Walter Long (who eventually became Lord Long), the penultimate or sixth Earl of Onslow, Mr. Henry Abel-Smith, and myself as the first secretary, serving in an honorary capacity. I am indeed, if I may venture to remind your Lordships, the sole surviving founder of the C.L.A., and I look forward, if I am permitted to live for another six months, when, God willing, I shall celebrate my ninetieth birthday, to taking part in the jubilee of that now powerful and influential body. I mentioned it particularly because it is not fully recognised perhaps what an invaluable work the C.L.A. have done for the benefit of our most vital industry, especially during the last twenty-five years. I am glad to be able to say that it has always identified itself entirely, not with property defence but with property justification, so far as our rural areas are

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concerned. To show that that is recognised it has had the most valuable support and encouragement from all Government Departments during the period of both Labour Governments and Conservative Governments during the past twenty-five years.
What I wish to emphasise is this. The landowning fraternity in this country has been largely responsible for the progress and development of our greatest industry. I would remind your Lordships that three of the greatest names in our agricultural history have been the names of Coke of Norfolk, the first Earl of Leicester, "Turnip" Townshend, the second Viscount Townshend in the 18th century, and that grand old squire Sir John Bennet Lawes, of Rothamsted, the founder and conductor of our leading and most important agricultural research station in this country. I may also, perhaps, refer back to the time when, in the early part of the 19th century. Great Britain was leading the whole world in agricultural progress under the wise guidance of people like Liebig and Sir Humphry Davy, and profiting in every possible way from enlightened developments on the European Continent, particularly in the State of Hanover; benefiting from lessons which could be learnt from overseas, and so improving beyond all knowledge and efficiency our own great and most vital industry. I have every reason to believe that, if only agricultural landowners, large and small, conduct their business with knowledge and with sole regard to the national welfare, they are as deserving of support from any Government in the future as they were 150 years ago.
I am not going to be tempted by anything that the noble Viscount opposite has said to be drawn into what I may call the details of price revisions and guarantees at the present time. Being vigorously opposed on principle to subsidies and guarantees, except as an interim method of arriving at a more normal and freer system of agricultural economy (inevitable, I am afraid, as a process of transition), I remain, for my part, obdurately opposed on principle to a continuance of these annual price fixings; and I hope and believe that that part of the Government programme that deals with capital grants is more calculated to put our agricultural
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industry on a more sound and lasting footing than anything that has occurred since the Agriculture Act, 1947, was passed.
I have always held the view that there are three forms of control: there is self-control, which must always be reasonably modified in the public interest; there is Government control, and there is what has been found in other countries more useful that either, mutual control, based on the co-operative principle. There are two countries only that I know in an agricultural sense almost as well as I do this country—namely, New Zealand on the one hand, where I had the privilege of being Governor-General for five years, and Denmark on the other. They are remarkable for the fact that their outstanding prosperity and relatively small—one might almost say non-existent—Government control are due, first of all, to the fact that the whole agricultural machine is governed by co-operation developed in every possible regard in relation to the industry, and secondly to the fact that there is no effective Government control in the actual internal economy of the industry.
I have always been fond of the good old Latin motto Fas est et ab hoste doceri. I interpret the word hoste not as meaning "enemy", but as meaning "foreigner" or "competitor". We have in the past obtained invaluable lessons from countries like Hanover and others, particularly in the 18th century. We have derived invaluable lessons from imitating what is best in other countries. I think the time has arrived when we might most usefully, particularly in regard to this new and revolutionary agricultural policy that has now been promulgated by the present Government, look to certain other countries, notably, perhaps, New Zealand and Denmark, and follow some of the methods employed there. For my part, as an old farmer I do not like to see the agricultural industry becoming a mendicant industry. I do not see any reason why it should. If we follow such examples as those two countries are able to give us, there is no reason why the once so proud yeoman of England, or of Britain, should not hold his head as high and as proudly in the future as ever he has done in the past.

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I want to say only one thing more, and I have said it before in this House. When we look at the difficult position of the small farmer, we must impress upon him that he has got to be an ardent co-operator; he has got to carry on the system of mutual control, rather than look for Government control and help in every direction. Is there not too much of a tendency to ask the small farmer to imitate the larger farmer in his methods of farming? I myself believe that there are good openings for the small farmer if only, with reasonable help and co-operation, he turns his hand to certain methods of husbandry for which there is a reasonably good prospect of prosperity.
I live in an area which I believe is destined, subject to these considerations, to become an almost ideal area for market gardening, and particularly for the growing of first-rate fruit. From my own experience—and I am rather, if I may say so, a fruit grower, a grower of dessert apples on an increasingly large scale—I am confident that there is plenty of scope in that area for what I may call intensive husbandry of that particular kind. It requires encouragement on the part of the Government. When I hear that a subsidy is provided for certain fertilisers, namely, nitrogenous fertilisers and phosphatic fertilisers, I feel entitled to ask: why not a subsidy for potash fertilisers?—potash being essential for successful fruit growing. And it has been found by experience every year that passes to be even more essential for the successful production of dessert fruit. I will not take up any more time, although I could indicate, had I time, certain other what I may call specialist jobs quite suitable for the small farmer with new encouragement from the Government.
Do let us sometimes apply tariff imposition to the importation of competitive agricultural land produce of, shall I say, an indifferent kind. We know perfectly well that, during the winter months, a large amount of rosy and attractive-looking apples come into this country, mainly from Italy and Spain, with little or no flavour in them; but, because they are attractive and are available when, let us say. Cox's orange pippins grown in England are not available, the more ignorant customer runs in and purchases them for the benefit of her children. That is a case in which, in the best interests of the development of what
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could be made a most profitable form of intensive husbandry with the due exercise of a tariff policy, we could have a very valuable development of productive husbandry of an intensive character, at any rate in certain areas of England.
I hope your Lordships will forgive me for talking at such length, but while emphasising the great value to the community, both in the past and, I believe, in the present, of rightly minded, progressive agricultural landowners, I want your Lordships to recognise the value of the work they are doing. Unless the agricultural land is nationalised, which very few people in this country with any sense or knowledge of the industry would want, the land-owning fraternity must be given every encouragement to play their part—and it may be a very full part—in developing to the maximum extent the future prosperity and welfare of what is, after all, our most vital and important industry.
4.37 p.m.
LORD KENSWOOD: My Lords, whenever I intervene in an agricultural debate I do so with great diffidence. I am not a farmer and I know very little about farming. Therefore, when I rise to congratulate the noble Earl, Lord Malmesbury, on his maiden speech, I do so in all humility. I hope he will not think it arrogant of me, a mere nobody in farming, to say some words of praise to a man experienced in agriculture. I am quite sure that what he said made very good sense. It certainly appeared so to me. I hope very much that he will bring his acumen and his good reasoning powers to bear on other questions as they arise in this House. I certainly look forward keenly to hearing him speak again.
I have already said that I know very little, or pretend to know very little, about farming. The reason I speak now is because I am keen on the welfare of this country. I am also closely associated with a housewife who is a consumer and, therefore, also keenly interested in prices. Although I am not of the farming fraternity, I live in a county and a country that is predominantly farming I speak continually with farmers, and I cannot agree with the noble Viscount, Lord Bledisloe, when he says that they are not anxious about their future. I have found that they are very anxious

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about their future. I believe that I, as an outsider, can possibly see some reasons for their anxiety, although those reasons may not be so apparent to people who are continually worried about their own particular industry.
I think there are two reasons which are particularly cogent—although there are other reasons, of course—why various Governments wish to keep agriculture alive here. The first is that we have passed through two very anxious wars, when it was touch and go whether we would not be starved out by the submarine campaign. It is possible that we shall have another war, and if we had an agriculture so organised that we could withstand siege, we should certainly be in a much stronger position than we should otherwise be. I believe, therefore, that it would be much more reasonable and logical for any subsidies given to the farming community on account of security to be added to the approximate figure of £1,500 million which is allocated to security. Surely farming should be the fifth arm of our security and defence forces—the Army, the Navy, the Air Force, Home Defence and Agriculture. If that were done, then those people who think of "feather-bedding"—there are some people here who think of the agricultural policy being carried out as "feather-bedding"—would, to some extent, have to "pipe down". I do not think farmers are "feather-bedded"; on the contrary, so far as I can see they are having a pretty raw deal.
There is another reason why I believe in helping the farming community, as has been done by different Governments. It concerns the anxiety which we feel about foreign currency, a point which has already been touched upon. The point I wish to emphasise is this. If, within a short space of years, we manage, as we hope we shall manage, to conquer our external financial difficulties, what are the then Government going to do about the farmers? Are they going to let farming slide? Are they going to say, "Well, we can get food much more cheaply from abroad"? After all, everybody in this country is a consumer, and only the minority of workers and capital suppliers are farmers. Are the Government going to give way then to the clamour for cheaper food, and let the
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farmers go to ruin, as they did before the last war? To my mind, that is an important consideration. I cannot say that the same argument is as cogent with regard to security, because I am not optimistic enough to believe that we shall become sensible with regard to armaments, anyway within my lifetime. But still the fear there exists. As soon as the farmers cease to be a vital need to the country on those two counts, what is going to happen to them?
I do not propose to speak at any length (though there is a great deal that I should like to say on this subject), but the question of milk production has arisen. We are told that we are overproducing milk. We are selling milk for manufacture at far below the cost of production. Is that really necessary? Within the last few days I have spoken to two young farmers, both under thirty, living in two adjacent counties in Wales. They have both told me the same thing—that within the last three years or so they have begun to build up herds of milk cows. They have put a great deal of thought, capital and labour into increasing their herds and erecting milk parlours. My son is a farmer and he has quite a good Ayrshire herd. He has put a lot of money into building milk parlours. I asked him what he is going to do about that, now that the demand is for a smaller supply of milk. He replied, "I am going to increase my supply of milk—I cannot help myself. Until I get the optimum number of cows in my herd, my cost of production per gallon will not go down sufficiently according to the calculations upon which I invested this capital."
My Lords, does it not seem more reasonable (this point has already been touched on) that, instead of discouraging farmers from producing milk, we should do much more—and we can do much more—to encourage people to consume liquid milk or the products of liquid milk? The noble Viscount, Lord Bledisloe, has said that we can learn from other countries, just as other countries have learned from us. Very well, then; let us go ahead. We are told—I do not know with what reliability, and certainly I was most surprised to hear it—that our per capita consumption of liquid milk is higher than in the United States of America. I have thought about this, and I have wondered

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what was the reason for these statistics. I believe that these statistics are rather misleading. We are, more or less, a compact kingdom. The United States is a widespread, far-flung nation. It has not only forty-eight States, but a number of colonies as well. These States and colonies on the other side of the Atlantic are divided into different kinds of communities, and milk plays a different kind of importance in the diet of the people, particularly young people.
I have lived in the United States and in Canada, and my observations led me to believe that over there the young people drink much more raw liquid milk, and milk products in various forms—such as chocolate milk, and so forth—than they do here. My son went to what amounts to a public or residential school in Canada. I was greatly interested to see how much milk the teenagers drank with their meals. I am quite sure that the learned professor at Oxford, already alluded to by my noble Leader, would have, been appalled to think of the insides of these youngsters turning into swamps. But not a bit of it! One immediate result is that my son is three or four inches taller than I am, who was not brought up on much milk. When he came over here, he went to a well-known public school where milk consumption was not greatly encouraged, although some of the older boys were allowed to drink beer. I do not want to say anything against brewers—this is not the time to say it—but I am quite sure that the difference in physique between the boys from those two schools, the Canadian and the English, is quite extraordinary. The physique of the youngsters on the other side of the Atlantic was greatly superior to that of the apparently weedy boys I met over on this side.
I am going to suggest that a study should be made in America and in Canada to see why it is that there teenagers drink more milk. I have certain ideas in my own head about the reason. One is that at schools in those countries the milk is presented in a much more palatable manner than it is here. For one thing, it is very cold and in summer becomes a most agreeable drink; whereas here it is not so palatable. I would certainly ask the Milk Marketing Board, or whoever is responsible for encouraging the consumption of milk, to investigate
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this problem. I do not think that exhortations and advertising are enough. I think that one must encourage children to drink milk at an early age, so that they really like it and can continue to drink it. Not only that, but the way milk is supplied here for direct consumption is nothing like as attractive as it is on the other side of the Atlantic, or even in Central Europe. That is all I wish to say at the moment because time is passing. I very much hope that Her Majesty's Government will look into this matter a little more closely.
4.50 p.m.
EARL BATHURST: My Lords, I, too, beg to congratulate the noble Viscount, Lord Alexander of Hillsborough, and thank him for introducing this Motion into your Lordships' House this afternoon. When the speech of the noble Viscount and the delightful speech that has just been made by the noble Lord, Lord Kenswood, are merged together, I cannot but believe that it is an echo from the past, from our forbears, certainly mine and no doubt of many noble Lords present in the House, from the days of Protection and the repeal of the Corn Laws. The noble Lord, Lord Kenswood, introduced a vital aspect of farming to-day, that of national defence. I wonder whether the friend whom the noble Viscount, Lord Alexander of Hillsborough, mentioned (I believe his name was Mr. Foster), given that he is dissatisfied with his life on his farm, has considered either selling it or letting it by tender for the highest offer obtainable. I feel that much the more accurate yardstick of the prosperity of the industry is the fact that there is to-day, throughout the land, such a demand for farms. I believe there has never been such a demand for farms to rent, or so few farms available to prospective tenants.
When my noble friend Lord Dundee mentioned the publicity of the Milk Marketing Board, which was also referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Kenswood, I wondered whether he had ever heard or had ever seen the Milk Marketing Board's publicity figure, Miss Zoe Newton, whose picture has appeared widely in the Press and on hoardings in most public places. I suspect that the difficulty is that neither the noble Earl nor members of the public at large are keen to spend time or money in milk

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bars, ice-cream parlours and similar places. The noble Lord, Lord Kenswood, mentioned his colleagues on the Milk Marketing Board. Every year it is my pleasure to play two cricket games, with my estate staff, against the Milk Marketing Board, and when the game is "at home" we provide our own milk from our own cows for the occasion. On that particular day the amount of milk required is somewhat less than on other, normally popular, days. Possibly that is one of the reasons why Miss Newton may not have had success and has not come to the notice of the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, the noble Viscount, Lord Alexander of Hillsborough, my kinsman, Lord Bledisloe or the noble Lord, Lord Kenswood.
I know how much we all wish it were possible for the noble Lord, Lord Kenswood, to be able to see with his own sight the land that is around us and the changes, both technical and in the veterinary sciences, that have taken place in the agricultural world in but the past few years. But the noble Lord can hear, and one of the features of the agricultural scene is the appalling noise and danger that there is in a harvest field. He told us, too, of the right that exists for every farmer to grumble at his lot.
I have mentioned the insatiable demand that exists in these times for farms to be rented or bought, but there is one tragedy and I am surprised that the noble Viscount and the noble Lord opposite have not brought it up: that is, the inability of an old farmer in these times to retire in the kind of mental and physical comfort to which in old times he was accustomed to retire. It is not his fault; it is the fault of the times, of taxation and of the difficulty of amassing savings. Possibly in the farming industry more than in any other, personal expenditure is needed to keep one's own little piece of the industry up to date and together as a going concern; and one of the reasons for the bankruptcies of which we have heard and for the fact that there is ill-feeling on the land in certain directions is, I am certain, because an old farmer, a good farmer maybe, cannot nowadays afford to retire to the kind of life to which he has been used. As a result, he still keeps going, making enough and not losing anything, but
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stopping a younger man, one of the yeomen of England of whom we have heard, from stepping into his shoes. That yeoman is unable to pay sufficient to the older man to furnish provision for that older man's retirement.
I believe that the White Paper on Long-term Assurances for Agriculture, and the White Paper on the Annual Review have gone a long way, and we thank Her Majesty's Government for introducing those two documents to save and to help farmers towards long-term stability for the industry. There is, however, frequent mention of a "viable unit". I take it that that means some type of farm land and that ultimately men from the Ministry will be able to work out what a viable unit will or will not be; but I am quite certain that the type of farm on which it is most easy to live is that which is owned by a landlord and is let to a tenant at a fair and economical price. With the system of death duties that exists in our country to-day, that type of farm is steadily going out of the agricultural industry.
If a tenant dies, the landlord takes the farm in hand, and that is one more farm—one more viable unit, if that is the correct term—which is not available to a hard-working, industrious and clever farmer. If a landlord dies, the tenant has the right, or at least obviously has first call, to buy that farm at a given price. He therefore becomes an owner-occupier and, dependent upon his financial position, he will either sell the farm at a very inflated price (which represents a capital appreciation) or will carry on farming on his own. That is one more farm which is not available as a viable unit to a man of limited means who wishes to take up the best method of husbandry for the land. I believe that, although admittedly very considerable concessions are given in respect of agricultural land, death duties are one of the major causes of wastage of suitable and good land, in viable units which are not available to the yeoman farmers of to-morrow.
I would bring forward one further topic, which really depends more on the will of the noble Viscount, Lord Hailsham, in his Department of Education. We have heard a great deal about the demand for scientists and technologists for the future, but we have heard

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little about the demand for good husbanders and good men who can tend animals. Many of your Lordships will have been in a scientific laboratory at school or at a university. We have all had to learn a certain amount of science, and many—I most certainly class myself as one of them—have completely failed to understand the technical aspects of the scientific professions, with their signs and symbols, formulæ and laws. I believe that there are countless thousands of children who have taken the eleven-plus examination who will never make scientists and who will be in the same boat as the majority of the Members of your Lordships' House who are not of a scientific bent. Would it not be possible for the Minister of Education to build up, publicise and make popular the idea that, for those who cannot aspire to be Harwell atomic scientists, there is just as much honour in being a good husbander and tender of animals? I believe that there are many children coming out of school, boys and girls—many more than is popularly thought—who far prefer the life on the land to that in the workshop, factory or office. I believe that they should be given every consideration and encouragement by my noble friend the Minister of Education.
Lastly, rather than the land, rather than the subsidies, rather than all the assistance Her Majesty's Government are able to give us, I believe that it is good housing and pressing on with amenities in the rural parts of the country that will prove the greatest asset to our farming community. A good house or a good cottage is worth all the land, the phosphates, the modern tractors and animals and so forth that Her Majesty's Government are able to help the farmer with in the way of subsidies. The farm worker and the farmer himself want good water and good electric light; and, above all, a good bus service for the farmer's wife arid the farm worker's wife. I believe that if some of the subsidies—£294 million is the figure we have heard—could be directed towards speeding up electrification even more than is being done at present, towards improving water supplies and subsidising cheap bus services, it would go further than the normal subsidies we consider in the Price Review and the White Paper.
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I would ask the noble Earl who will reply whether it would not be possible somehow to make a standard system whereby the electricity hoards are able to give the same service throughout the country for electrifying farms out of the way from their areas. It seems a most extraordinary position when one department of a taxpayer's industry refuses to lay on an electric light supply to a farm which happens to be situated in the other department of the industry, even although the distance from one pole to the farm may be shorter in that part than the other. It seems an out-dated approach to the modern industry we need.
I congratulate Her Majesty's Government on the long-term guarantees, and I am sure the farming community is happier now than for a very long time. I do hope, in view of the incentives given now and the new ideas given in the Budget a few days ago, that Her Majesty's Government will be able in the very near future to take a really bold and courageous stand upon death duties, not only in the agricultural industry but in all industry and in all classes of capital and earners in our country.
5.5 p.m.
LORD FORBES: My Lords, several noble Lords seem to be worried about the future of the dairy industry, so I want to put forward a suggestion which I hope will be of real constructive value. First, however, perhaps I might add my comments on the recent Price Review. It would appear that my right honourable friend the Minister has won the confidence of the farmers' representatives, and this has led to good co-operation between the two parties and to the production of a Price Review which is fair not only to the farmers but also to the country. The key to this Review would appear to be that there should be a selective expansion of output and that production should be obtained at less cost by relying on home-grown feeding-stuffs and grass. With this I am in entire agreement. In 1953 we imported 2¾ million tons of concentrated feeding-stuffs. This year the figure is estimated to be 5 million tons, costing £123 million. The figure is going up each year, and we must bring it down.
I am not too happy about a reference in the Price Review to "selective expansion of output". Here I think we should aim at something better. Not

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only is farming to-day highly technical and scientific, but large numbers of farmers have sunk large amounts of capital into their farms in an effort to bring down the cost of production. This, I think, precludes at once any idea that my right honourable friend the Minister might be like a signalman in his signal box, having levers that he can pull to stop or give the "Go ahead" to any particular type of farming. It is quite wrong to think that a farmer should have to change his type of farming merely to fit in with the nation's requirements of to-day, which quite likely will not be the nation's requirements tomorrow. I agree that, in certain circumstances, the Minister must have to pull the "Caution" lever, but this should be done only after all other possible channels have been thoroughly investigated. The ideal is that the signals for each main type of farming should remain for as long as possible at "Go". If a surplus does arise which is outwith the control of the farmers' marketing boards, I submit that my right honourable friend the Minister, instead of putting his hand on the "Caution" lever, which at once introduces a certain degree of lack of confidence, should call in all his varied and extensive advice to try to evolve a method of overcrowding the surplus.
Let us see how this might be applied to our present so-called milk surplus. First of all, we should be quite clear about the cause of this milk surplus. It is not due to the fact that more milking cows are kept—the number of milking cows has increased by only a very small proportion: it is due to the increased efficiency of the dairy farmers and, to a certain extent, to the larger amount of imported feeding-stuffs they are now feeding to their dairy cattle. I think it is odd to talk about a surplus of milk when to-day we are importing 90 per cent. of our butter and 50 per cent. of our cheese—though I know that this is necessitated by our Commonwealth trading policy. Here, my Lords, a word of warning. Should that trading policy change at any time, our present milk surplus might well change almost overnight into a deficiency, as it would do if we were ever involved in another world war. That is why I consider it is absolutely necessary to keep the signals for the main type of farming at "Go."
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I believe that we shall have to use a combination of two methods for dealing with the present temporary milk surplus. First of all, we must produce milk from home-grown feeding-stuffs and grass alone. This, I think, fits in with the views of Her Majesty's Government as declared in the recent Price Review. The result would be that although maximum yield would not be achieved, the cost per gallon of milk would decrease, as would the volume for manufacture. The nation, through our balance of payments, would benefit substantially by a large reduction in the amount of imported feeding-stuffs, and also by less milk. Moreover, the farmer would be no worse off, because, although he would be producing less milk, the cost of production would be less. I believe that Her Majesty's Government have recently taken the first steps to bring about this result by the introduction of grants for building silos. I suggest that they take this a step further and provide more encouragement by giving grants towards silage made—like the 15s. a ton grant given in Northern Ireland. I know that in the past there have been difficulties over such a grant, but I believe that these difficulties can be overcome. If it is quite impossible to give a grant for silage, then I suggest that Her Majesty's Government should look into the possibilities of giving a grant towards silage-making machinery. But I should far prefer to see a grant given for the actual silage made.
Secondly, encouragement should be given to the farmer who keeps dairy cows and pigs to separate his milk on the farm The skim-milk would be fed to the pigs and the cream would be sold to the public, through producer-retailers or the milk marketing boards. Unfortunately, at present these is a very small demand for cream. This is mainly due to the fact that, owing to the war-time restrictions, people have almost forgotten what cream tastes like. To-day, the housewife probably takes the top off the milk—not realising that in any case the milk is 87 per cent. water, so that she probably leaves herself with about 99 per cent. water—or she makes synthetic cream. This means that the consumption of cream to-day is a mere fraction to what it was before the war. I am confident that, in this era of freedom, given a little encouragement, people would again take to—I

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do not know whether one should say eating or drinking cream.
In this connection, I was delighted to react in the Press that my right honourable friend the Minister said the other thy that he believed there was every opportunity of whetting the public appetite for cream or half-cream—the kind that Americans pour over cereals. I entirely agree with my right honourable friend. I believe that, with a little drive, it would not be difficult to establish a market for cream—at least, for half-cream, which is within the purchasing power of nearly everyone to-day. My right honourable friend has done great service to the dairy industry by drinking milk himself, and by advertising the consumption of liquid milk. Unfortunately, my right honourable friend's capacity—although not his capability—is limited and he cannot absorb the whole of the national surplus himself. Perhaps my right honourable friend and the noble Earl who is to reply to the debate would now turn their attention to cream with the same vigour that they have been giving to milk.
Before I go on with this suggestion about separating milk on the farm, I must declare an interest. I have a very great interest because, with a few other farmers in the North East of Scotland, I am pioneering such a project in conjunction with our milk marketing board. Although this scheme is still in its infancy, there is a real prospect of great success. Already interest in the scheme has been aroused very far afield. There are many advantages to be gained from separating milk on the farm. There is the saving in transport—because cream is only about one-tenth of the bulk of the milk from which it is produced. Then there is the automatic reward for producing good-quality milk. The higher the butter fat content of the milk, the more cream is produced. The farmer has been asking for some time to have this recognition for quality milk. Here is a way of giving such recognition automatically.
Last, but not least, there is the benefit to be derived by the nation and by the farmer from feeding skim-milk to pigs. Here one finds that quite astonishing results are produced. First of all, barley and skim-milk, with some vitamins added, make an extremely good ration for pigs. This means that no imported feeding-stuffs
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whatever are required. Then one finds that the cost of producing bacon pigs is considerably reduced. I think it will work out at something over £1 per pig—that is, costing the skim-milk produced on the farm at 3½d. per gallon. Then there is the advantage to the nation that the pigs, being fed with skim-milk, grade better. This means that there will be better bacon on the market. The farmer also benefits, since he gets paid for better quality carcases. So there is a way to overcome this milk, surplus and, at the same time, very greatly help our balance of payments, in addition to bringing down the cost of production of bacon and pork. When we remember how magnificently the dairy farmers responded to the urgent call made on them to increase production of milk at the beginning of the war, how magnificently they improved their industry, surely the present temporary milk surplus is a direct challenge, not only to the farmer but also to the Government, to devise a means of changing the "Caution" signal to "Go ahead."
5.18 p.m.
THE EARL OF LONSDALE.: My Lords, the debate to-day has come at a welcome time, as we have all had a chance to digest the Agricultural Price Review. What is being said to-day reveals that there is a great measure of agreement about it. Successive Governments for the last fifteen years have turned the agricultural industry from being a broken-down, nondescript cart-horse into a thoroughbred and now it is being pulled for doing too well. We are getting ourselves drowned in a sea of milk and we are embarrassed by over-production of eggs. I read yesterday that the Danes are complaining rather bitterly about exports of British eggs to the Continent. The emphasis of the Price Review was on reducing the prices to be paid for milk and eggs—those two over-produced items. Such a reduction hits, first and foremost, the small farmer. Milk, eggs and pig-meat are commodities produced mainly by small farmers, and where there is a basic increase of cost that must hit him once again.
It is disappointing to find in this last Price Review that agriculture is not substantially recouped for these cost increases for another year. The Review has kept within the letter of the long-term

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assurances—long-term assurances which are very welcome in that they give stability against violent changes of emphasis on production. But this Review has disregarded the farmer's extra efficiency. His income has been reduced by £24 million. There has been an award of £14 million towards cost increases of £38 million; and the permissive reduction under the long-term assurances of 2½ per cent. is approximately £29 million, so that the possible reduction is almost taken up by the actual reduction of £24 million. At the same time, the long-term assurances point out that the estimated annual increase in the efficiency of the industry is of the order of £25 million, so that the reduction of £24 million in effect covers the industry's increase in efficiency.
This, at any rate, is consistent with the figures of the net agricultural income, which have altered little in the last six years. Since 1952, when the net income was the highest it has been at £336½ million, it has never varied more than a few million pounds in the succeeding years, and for this last year it is estimated that it will turn out to be £317 million. The incomes of farmers as a whole have remained constant over these years, entirely regardless of their achievement. Output in that period has gone up by 10 per cent. over pre-war, and there has been a substantial increase in efficiency. At the same time the cost of living has gone up, and farmers still feel the effects of the cost of living because they cannot get all they require for personal and family use out of the farms on which they live. Wages, salaries and dividends have gone up elsewhere, but there has been no increase for the farmers in their real income in the last six years. They have been under-recouped for increased costs over that period by upwards of £150 million. Now there is a new round of wage increases looming—5 per cent., it is said. If only to reward the enterprise and the efficiency of the industry, it is high time the farmers had a rise.
Returning to the details of the Review, I would point out that the position in regard to milk and eggs hits the small man again, and there is the recurrent problem of surplus production. Some sheep farmers are beginning to wonder whether there will not be a surplus of
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mutton before long. How can we avoid the occurrence of surpluses, or, if they do occur, how can we meet the problem? Surely the most sensible way is to calculate the amount of each of the main commodities consumed in the country, if in fact they are not known already, and to tell the agricultural industry how much of each commodity is required, taking into account the economic condition of the country. The Milk Marketing Board could calculate the amount of milk required and arrange contracts with individual dairy farmers for the supply of definite quantities of milk. Such contracts would give the farmer adequate scope in regard to efficiency. He would know that only so much milk was required from him every day, and he could breed up his stock so that he could produce the same amount of milk with fewer cattle. It would give him the possibility of organising for other forms of livestock. The new Egg Marketing Board could do the same in regard to eggs; and in respect of other commodities which are in danger of being over-produced it would be possible to arrange for the National Farmers' Union to pass on to their members information about the quantity the country requires.
Hill farmers receive the worst knock of all from this Price Review, and not only through the new arrangements for their subsidiary enterprises—eggs, milk and pig-meat. The hill sheep and cattle subsidies have disappeared, admittedly before this Review. The disappearance, particularly of the subsidy on hill cattle, is to be regretted very much, because that forms one of the few real, practical ways of improving upland grazing—by getting cattle from the lowlands up on to the hills. The hill farmers who have done this in the past have found it profitable, and it has paid them to do so with the hill cattle subsidy they used to receive. Now many of them say that it will not be economic for them to take cattle from the lowlands up on to the hills.
In the hill farmer's budget, wool is of first importance, and there has been no extra award for the price of wool. It is the one possibility of some recoupment of costs. The increases in the prices of mutton and beef do not directly help the hill farmer, because, generally speaking, he does not sell fatstock; he sells stores.

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The price of stores is slightly affected by the price of stock when fat, but at the same time the price of stores is more extensively affected by the conditions at the end of the season, when stock is sold. If lowland farmers have no hay, they cannot buy stores from the hills.
I think that this is a deplorable Review, in that the agricultural industry has not been given some reward for its increased efficiency. I think that this is best summed up in what the Manchester Guardian had to say on the subject. It said:
" The settlement is a tribute both to Mr. Heathcoat-Amory's delicacy as a negotiator and to the farmers' sense of responsibility, for the penalties upon them are more severe than they have yet had to face."
That is the view of the Manchester Guardian, one of the more just and responsible of our daily papers. In a pre-dominantly hill farming area in my own county of Cumberland, and Westmorland, the weekly newspaper which has a very wide coverage in the area, the Cumberland and Westmorland Herald, has this to say from the hill farmers' point of view:
" This Review really means that the small farms in the North-West are once more back to the days of the 1930's when we lived by sweated family labour…"
There is another point with reference to hill farming on which I should like to touch. A Committee headed by Sir Arton Wilson was appointed to review the provincial and local organisation and procedure of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. Some of the recommendations in their Report are being put into effect, and one of the first effects appears to be the abolition of the old hill farming committees composed of voluntary members, sub-committees of the agricultural executive committees, and they are one of the most valuable of the county organisations in the hill farming areas. There was the personal touch of larger, experienced and knowledgeable farmers, who could get up into the hills and educate and encourage the more backward and ignorant type of man who is so often to be found on the hill farms. As I say, I think it is a great pity that the hill farming committees have been abolished in hill areas, and that the work they previously did should be taken over by the Ministry of Agriculture staffs, who, inevitably, will not have the same personal touch with, or personal knowledge of, these essentially highly individualistic men
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up in the hills. Under the new local and provincial organisations which are slowly emerging, would it not be a good idea to establish a specialist hill farming service, consisting entirely of people with wide experience of the problems of hill farming, in order to administer the Livestock Rearing Act?
The Arton Wilson Report is a most capable document, and great credit is due to the Committee who produced it. However, now that it is being implemented—although it is difficult to discover yet to what extent it will be implemented—various anxieties are becoming apparent among the agricultural community. First of all the valuable voluntary services of the agricultural executive committees and the sub-committees are largely going, and their place is being taken by seemingly further staff (I am speaking, in particular, of the regional controllers and their staffs), so that the impression is beginning to grow that, rather than fewer staff to administer the grants, there will be a greater staff; in fact, a greater cost, rather than art economy in administration. So far as I can make out, although the Report was published in April last year, there has been no statement, either in your Lordships' House or in another place, as to the extent to which it is to be implemented, and how it is to be implemented. Therefore, I should like to ask the noble Earl who is to reply whether he can say, first, the extent to which the Report will be implemented; secondly, how its recommendations are going to be put into effect; and thirdly, what economy in administration there is likely to be in a full year's working of the revised services.
Finally, I should like to touch on agricultural housing, both farm houses and cottages. If, as we have discovered, the cash income of farmers is to remain static, and incomes of the workpeople are to continue at approximately £3 a week below those running, on the average, in other industries; and if the workpeople receiving this £3 a week less than is paid in other industries are to continue to do three hours a week longer, then I think some serious effort should be made at least to improve agricultural farm houses and cottages. The Housing Acts provide for local authorities to give grants up to a maximum of £400 for capital improvements. I have made inquiries in my area, and of the ten local authorities

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from which I was able to get the information, seven give the grants in full; one gives the grants only in part, and two do not give them at all.
I have heard—though I have been unable to verify this—that there are local authorities who give the Housing Act grants for cottages but not for farm houses. For the improvement of agricultural housing there is the precedent of the Livestock Rearing Act, in that, in a comprehensive scheme, not only the capital works but the works of repair and adaptation qualify for 50 per cent. grants; and that Act is administered by the Ministry of Agriculture. In the same way, could not agricultural housing which is not covered by the livestock Rearing Act be removed from the jurisdiction of the local authorities, so far as grants are concerned, and handed over to the county committees; and could they not be included in the 33⅓ per cent. farm improvement scheme? That concludes the remarks that I have to make, except for this comment. Now that the Farm Price Review has been digested, it seems deplorable that no reward has been given to the agricultural community, to the farmers, for their increased and increasing efficiency, and their consequently greater output.
5.37 p.m.
LORD SILKIN: My Lords, this debate has been remarkable for the considerable degree of unanimity that exists on both sides of the House about the lack of adequate support which the Government are giving to the farming community. We have had those who are engaged in fruit production, milk production, general farming, hill farming and almost every other aspect of the farming industry who have all made the same complaint. I want to say a few words in connection with pig-keeping, which I hope is regarded as an equally important part of agriculture. Every other speaker has spoken from practical experience, and I too want to speak from my own experience as a pig-keeper.
I hope that I can say—I trust your Lords will not mind my being a little personal here—that I am an efficient pig-keeper; at least, I have been told so by an adviser to the Ministry of Agriculture who has inspected my place. He told me that my pig-keeping is the most
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efficient in the country, and that my results are the best—I say "my results" not in the financial sense (I will come to that) but in connection with the production of good bacon. I want to make that point, because it could be argued that if one cannot make a success of an undertaking it might well be due to one's own inefficiency. I want, therefore, to make it quite clear that, whatever may be the difficulties, it is not due to inefficiency.
Nor is it, in my view, due to lack of any of the requirements that are necessary to produce good bacon. It is not due to extravagance in the buying of food: I mix and grind my own food, and I believe that I buy as cheaply as the next man such commodities as I have to buy. Nor is the feeding in any way extravagant. I am sure that it is good because it produces the best results. With all those factors involved, I find, in common with every other pig-keeper that I have spoken to, both inside and outside this House, that none of us can make pig-keeping pay at the present time. There are times when pig-keeping is more profitable than it is to-day, but taking the whole year round I challenge any pig-keeper who keeps proper books—and many of them do not; they do not really know what they are doing—to say that he is in fact making his pig-keeping pay.
I do not wish to weary the House with figures. I could do so, and I will gladly, if the noble Earl wishes. I will gladly give him any accounts from my own experience, or from other people's experience, that he would wish. But I ask him to accept from me that at the present time there is a dead loss on pig-keeping, and that, taking the whole year round, including times when prices are higher, there is no profit in it at all. One produces bacons for human consumption merely for the joy of doing so—and I admit that there is some satisfaction in it at week-ends; to come away from the turmoil of this House, and life in London generally, and go back and apply one's mind to pigs. That gives satisfaction, admittedly; but one would hope to have the further satisfaction of getting at least some financial return on the capital employed, which can be quite considerable, as well as something for one's own activities.

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Let me put to the House, and to the noble Earl, some of the difficulties. The first is that there is virtually a monopoly in the selling of pigs. You sell to the Fatstock Marketing Corporation or to one or two other bodies like Wall's, who are outside the Fatstock Marketing Corporation, but who pay exactly the same price as the Corporation. Their prices from week to week are determined by the prices of the Fatstock Marketing Corporation. So far as that Corporation are concerned, they are absolutely a law unto themselves. There is nowhere else one can go, except auction—and I will say a word about that in a moment. But if you sell your bacon in the normal way, you have to go to this Corporation, or to some other body whose prices are identical with those of the Corporation.
The Corporation announce their prices weekly, and if you buy the Farmer and Stockbreeder or the Farmers' Weekly you can see the prices for the current week. But you have to give from ten to fourteen days' notice before the Corporation will accept your pigs, so that at the time you give them notice you have no idea what you are going to get. The prices fluctuate considerably from week to week. They may go up or down to the extent of 2s. or 3s. a score which, on a normal baconer of 7½score, may amount to 15s. a pig. That is quite a considerable item, and you do not know at the time you give notice what you are going to get. You do not even know at the time you send your pig what the price is going to be. In my own case, we send our pigs out on the Monday, and on the following day, if I happen to be in the country, I pick up the Farmer and Stockbreeder, and then I know the price I am going to get. That is not very satisfactory.
Furthermore, there has recently been introduced a much more stringent grading system. Pigs are now paid for according to the thickness of fat (the noble Earl knows all about this), and on the length of the pig. To a certain extent, one can, over the years, control the length of the pig and develop a particularly long pig, thereby qualifying for the higher grade. But it is a very long-term business. It has been done in Denmark, and to a lesser extent in Sweden, where they developed the landrace. You cannot buy
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a Danish landrace, and the Swedish is not so good as the Danish and is liable to put on fat and to give you a bad grade, even though the length may be right. Nevertheless, with all these difficulties, it has been made much more difficult for the pig farmer to qualify for the higher grades; and, indirectly, this has meant, in addition to the low prices already being paid, a further reduction in the price. I think that anyone who has any experience of pig-keeping will know that in the past two or three months since the new method of grading has been introduced, it has involved a substantial reduction in price or, rather, in the amount realised for one's baconers.
I should like to ask the noble Earl whether it is the Government's policy to encourage people to carry on. It is all very well for certain types of farmers who are not absolutely dependent upon earnings in farming to carry on, but that is not the normal situation. The vast majority of farmers farm for a living, arid it is quite certain that those who go in for pig-keeping are not able to make a living. Therefore, I should like to know what is the Government's policy. I know that they have stated in recent official documents that they have no desire to increase the pig population. But have they a desire to reduce it? If they do not do something about it, they will, in fact, reduce the pig population of this country, and we shall be forced to import more and more pigs from abroad.
It is said that the policy of the Government is to make pig-keeping more efficient in this country, in order that we may compete with Denmark, which is the primary pig producer in Europe, at arty rate. But I venture to suggest that it is quite impossible, for many reasons, for pig-keepers in this country to compete with Denmark. As I indicated, Denmark has a start of some forty or fifty years on us. By virtue of the length of their pig it is not necessary to feed them with the same degree of expensive proteins, like fish meal and other expensive food, as we have to do in this country. The result is that our feeding costs are substantially higher than the Danish feeding costs. I speak with some knowledge on this matter. I spent some time in Denmark since I became a pig-keeper, and investigated the situation thoroughly. I found that their feeding costs are substantially below ours, so that they are

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well able to produce their bacon at a lower price. I would therefore appeal to the Government to make some statement, and tell us what is their policy about pig-keeping. Do they want pig-keepers to continue in their activities? If so, will they not give us rather more assistance than they are giving at the present time?
I said earlier that there was a virtual monopoly by the Fatstock Marketing Corporation, with the alternative for the producer of going to the market and selling pigs by auction. But anyone who goes to any auction mart knows the chancy nature of it. I said that the Fat-stock Marketing Corporation were uncertain in their prices, but auction prices, of course, are even less certain. Anyone who studies prices will see how they fluctuate violently from week to week at the auction markets. Furthermore—and I want to say this quite seriously—I personally have had very unsatisfactory experiences as regards weights in going to auction markets. I have become quite satisfied that one is not paid on the actual weight of the pig which one sends into the market. On many occasions I have had my pigs weighed before they left. I have made full allowances for reduction in weight, due to the short journey that they undertook, and I know pretty well what is the right reduction to allow for. Then I have found that I have been paid on a weight of something like 4 or 5 lb. a pig less than the reduced weight that I had allowed for. That cannot at all be justified on account of the journey or for any other reason.
On several occasions, I have sent my man down to watch the pigs being weighed, and on those occasions the weights were correct. It should not be necessary to have to send a man to spend half a day checking up on the weights of one's pigs. From what I have been told—I cannot vouch for anybody else's experience—it is a common experience that one is not paid on the actual true weights of the pigs that one sends in. I do not want to mention publicly any particular place, but I should like to send the noble Earl some particulars to see what can be done about this matter, because I am afraid that the public are not getting a fair crack of the whip.
EARL ST. ALDWYN: I should be very grateful if the noble Lord would do that.
LORD SILKIN: Yes. I apologise for intervening in an agricultural debate. I think it is the first time I have done so—probably it will be the last. I am most grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, who has given way and allowed me to interpose without giving any notice, but I thought it worth while to draw the attention of the House to the position of pig-keepers, from, I hope, an objective point of view. I should like to give the noble Earl more detailed figures establishing what I have said. I think I can satisfy him. I should also like to give him information about the auction.
5.53 p.m.
EARL FERRERS: My Lords, I am sure that all noble Lords are extremely grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, for intervening and giving us the benefit of his advice. I was most interested and must congratulate him on being such an efficient pig-keeper. I wish, indeed, that I could follow in his most noble footsteps, if only from the point of view of husbandry, if not from that of economics. But I must confess that, although I do not profess by any means to be an efficient pig-keeper, I like to think from my rather sketchy accounts that my pigs make me something and if I were as efficient as the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, I feel that they would make me considerably more.
However that may be, I should hesitate to blame the Government, because I feel that they have offered a form of considerable stability over the past six months. We have had the long-term assurances; we have had the fact that the Price Review refers to the next harvest as opposed to the harvest eighteen months ahead; we have had the improvement grants and, finally, we have had this last Price Review. Although the farmers have had to find £24 million to recoup themselves, nevertheless the Government have produced an extra £14 million, and under these long-term provisions they were forced to use only £8 million. I do not say that that necessarily shows great credit, but, if one takes it realistically and bears all things in mind—because one is a taxpayer as well as a farmer—one cannot fairly say that this was an unjust Price Review.

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There is, however, one snag in the long-term assurances which I should like to point out. The whole basis of those assurances is to give the farmers confidence in the future of agriculture because they know that the Government will not lower their support by more than 2½ per cent. One has the feeling that if the Government drop the support by 1 per cent. they expect to be slapped on the back and given very many thanks for not having dropped it by its maximum. That seems to me to be putting the wrong emphasis on the drop of 2½ per cent., because, for these long-term assurances to have effect, the farming community must feel that they are there to stabilise their industry and not in order to enable the Government gradually to reduce their Exchequer support.
In the light of the confidence and support which agriculture has, I feel that there is one great fault—and the noble Earl, Lord St. Aldwyn, will be delighted to hear that it does not lie with the Government. To my mind, it lies with the farming community itself. I feel that the farming community is making the same mistakes as are being made by the trade unions. They are always telling us how they must prosper and how they must be paid more, instead of saying: "Here we are, working in relative prosperity. It is up to us to endeavour to better our industry as much as we can, in order that we can take any knocks that may come in the future."
As a farmer, one tends to think that food must be produced and, because one produces it, its sale will be certain. That is a great fallacy. In my humble opinion, as I explained in the last debate that we had in this House, it is the duty of the farming community to try to sell their goods, to try to advertise more. As the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, said, there is great scope for advertising one's products more attractively to create and attract the customer. If, on our own initiative, we earl attract customers to our industry, we are giving it a fair basis and broadening the basis on which we can rely in the future. There is a great scope for advertising. It is a plea that I put forward on the last occasion when we debated this subject and it is a plea that I would put forward even more strongly now. The noble Lord, Lord Forbes, mentioned cream. Of course there is no
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sale for cream, for the simple reason that a customer has to go and ask for the cream. One hardly ever sees cream advertised or in a shop. If it is anywhere, it is in a refrigerator. One does not see it. We must, therefore, accept part of the blame ourselves for not putting our goods in front of the customer and encouraging him to buy them.
Now it is the business of the farmer, as I have said, to produce his food and to try to sell it. He must produce the food the consumer wants, and that means that he must produce the quality the consumer wants. I believe that one of the most important places where quality is missing is in the beef industry. I do not profess to be a beef farmer—I know remarkably little about the subject; but if your Lordships would bear with me I can give an instance of what I mean as to how people react to the quality of beef. The other day I bought some meat and I took it home to the lady who was to cook it. She has been in England for some two and a half years; before that she was in Germany. She looked at this meat and said, "It is excellent meat. It is the best I have seen since I left Germany." I must admit that my first reaction was a great swelling of pride at having been such a clever shopper. But in fact I should have been grossly insulted, as should any farmer. The inference was quite clear. Her comment that it was the best meat she had seen since she left Germany meant that the consumer does not know about the quality of meat, and that the farmer does not know about it, and, indeed, does not care about it.
On the credit side—because it is not always as bad as that—one has the remarkable progress that has been made over the last four years in Lord Silkin's industry—that of bacon pigs. I feel that the increase in quality over the last four years in that industry has been quite remarkable and should be a pointer arid a guide to other aspects of the industry. It is surely the result of co-operation between the farmer and the scientist. The scientist has worked out what weight in food is required, how much is required, when it ought to be fed, and how heavy the pig ought to be, in order to grade out correctly. That sort of effort is grossly lacking in the beef industry. I think that there has been remarkably little research into this. People buy their beasts, say, in

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April; they put them out on to grass; they have a look at them in July, say "that beast is fat", and send it off to market. That is not the way to produce quality beef. I should like, if it is possible, to see a little more research into the beef industry, in order that farmers may know what quality beef is and how to attain it.
I must confess that I am baffled about one thing in this search for quality—I refer to this new stipulation about solids not fat in milk. I should be grateful if the noble Earl who is to reply would be good enough to mark what I am going to say, because I should like some information on it. So far as I understand the law as it now is, if your milk contains 8·5 per cent. of solids not fat it is all right. If it has only an 8 per cent. content then you are producing inferior quality milk. I fail to see what difference one half of 1 per cent. of solids not fat will make in a pint of milk which the housewife buys. Before the noble Earl rises to tell me that it is a question of standards, may I be allowed to point out to him that, first of all, you cannot tell, either by taste or by sight, the difference between milk of 8 per cent. solids not fat and milk of 8·5 per cent. solids not fat. The housewife does not know—she cannot tell it; she cannot see it, nor can she taste it. Secondly, the housewife does not know what solids not fat is. Thirdly, the scientist does not know how to correct the beast that is producing low solids not fat. Therefore, I think that this qualification is of little use. I am sure that the noble Earl has some excellent reply, and I should be grateful if he would give it to me.
I am always amused by those who say that they wish their milk to be paid for on a quality basis. The noble Lord, Lord Forbes said that. By that, I presume that he and other people who use the term "quality milk" mean a milk of high butter fat content and a correspondingly low cream line. I fail to see why that should be quality milk. What about this curious milk with the high solids not fat? Is that not quality? Then again, I believe that in America the fashion is to have milk of 2 per cent. fat. Perhaps that is "quality" milk. Those cows that produce this high butter fat content in fact produce fat which consists of large
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fat globules which are relatively indigestible.
VISCOUNT BLEDISLOE: Perhaps I may interrupt—indigestible only for babies.
EARL FERRERS: As the noble Viscount, Lord Bledisloe, has kindly indicated, it may be indigestible only for babies. The Government may be only too pleased at the babies that they have produced, and the amount of milk that they have poured down their throats, and I do not think that the children of our country should be looked down upon because they are unable to drink so-called quality milk.
VISCOUNT BLEDISLOE: I am sorry to intervene again, but perhaps I should have added: and only in respect of Channel Island cattle milk Jerseys and Guernseys.
EARL FERRERS: Exactly. It was Jerseys and Guernseys that I had in mind. I must apologise if I have not made that clear. My point is that Friesian milk, for instance, is more digestible for babies than Channel Island milk. Therefore, why should digestibility not count in regard to the quality of milk? I feel that some clear line of thought and direction should be given by the Government as to what is quality.
I am inclined to suggest that the Government should encourage quality on the basis of cleanliness and purity, as opposed to a basis of content. Indeed, I find a slight but rather pathetic pleasure in anticipating what the housewife in ten or twenty years' time will be saying when she wishes to order her day's supply of milk. Instead of saying to the milkman, "I will have 4 pints of milk ", she will say to him," I will have a pint of T.T. Jersey milk because I like the cream on my cereals; I will have a pint of T.T. Friesian milk because my son cannot digest the Jersey milk; I will have a pint of pasteurised milk because my mother will not believe that any milk is free from germs unless it has been boiled; and I will have a pint of ' high solids not fat ' milk because I am told that it is good for me; and before you go, Mr. Milkman, I will have a tin of national dried milk because my baby cannot digest the fresh milk that you produce—it is too rich and therefore too

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indigestible." That is indeed a slightly strange state of affairs. I suppose that if one always has controls, one will get examples of the absurd. If I may be allowed slightly to digress, may I say that I heard an example of this sort of absurdity the other day. A farmer applied for his petrol ration and was asked what form of conveyance he had. He said that he had a Fordson Major and a stallion. He was allowed 8 gallons for his Fordson Major and 10 gallons for his stallion.
My Lords, there is one other point I wish to deal with. In our last debate on this matter, several noble Lords pressed the noble Earl, Lord St. Aldwyn, to see that the improvement grants were approved by Parliament as soon as possible. He said that the schemes could not be passed through before September. At that time I was satisfied, but I must confess that since then my mind has gradually turned to coincide with the views of other noble Lords. It seems to me that if these grants are not approved by Parliament before September, virtually no building will be done before the winter is over; and therefore no job will be completed before fifteen months from the time the measures were originally announced. To my mind, that is a great waste of time.
I should like the noble Earl seriously to consider whether it is possible to bring these measures before Parliament earlier than would otherwise have been the case. I confess that I remain greatly surprised that a measure such as this, which is acclaimed by all Parties and all interested persons as being an exceptionally good measure, and one which will have a great reception, should take such an extremely long time to get through Parliament, while, on the other hand, a highly controversial measure and one which some noble Lords and many other people did not like at all, such as the Homicide Bill, passes through Parliament as if it were jet-propelled. I should be very grateful to the noble Earl if he would seriously consider bringing the necessary measures before Parliament a little earlier than otherwise would be the case.
House adjourned during pleasure.
House resumed.

ROYAL COMMISSION
6.15 p.m.
The following Bills received Royal Assent:

Customs Duties (Dumping and Subsidies),

Public Health Officers (Deputies),

House of Commons Disqualification,

Cinematograph Films,

White Fish and Herring Industries,

Wakefield Corporation,

Liverpool Hydraulic Power,

Port of London.

House adjourned during pleasure.
House resumed.

AGRICULTURE
6.28 p.m.
Debate resumed.
LORD MELCHETT: My Lords, perhaps the noble Earl who was speaking before the adjournment will forgive me if I do not follow him into the technicalities of milk production and the various means of determining the quality of milk; but I am sure fairly precise answers can be given to quite a number of the important questions he raised, and perhaps the noble Earl who is going to reply will touch on them. I have personal knowledge that in some of the research institutes which specialise in milk a great deal is known, and the knowledge, I think, is fairly easily obtainable if asked for.
I should like to follow, very briefly, the noble Lord, Lord Forbes, who raised the important question of the import of feeding-stuffs. If one turns to the most recent White Paper on the Annual Review and Determination of Guarantees, one finds that the three paragraphs which deal with production policy all make reference to the problem of the increasing importation of feeding-stuffs, or, at least, they all make reference to the importance of reducing the amount of imported feeding-stuffs. In paragraph 10, the production policy is restated as continuing to be that of a selective expansion of the net output with the main emphasis on the substitution of home-grown feeding-stuffs, including grass, for imports; and in the very next paragraph we are told that greater

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and better use should be made of home-grown products, especially grass. The paragraph states:
" In so far as the greater and better use of home-grown products, especially grass, should reduce unit costs of production, it should help the industry…"
In the next paragraph, paragraph 12, which is still dealing with the production policy of the Government, we are told that we must rely
" to a greater extent, for the maintenance of a large livestock population, on home produced resources."
That is really all we are told in this White Paper about production policy. The whole emphasis is on reducing imported feeding-stuffs and making better use of our own home-grown resources.
On the other hand, if one looks at Table D in the First Appendix of the White Paper one sees in fact what has been happening. Here I should like to emphasise once again that this is a continuation of the policy which we have been pursuing for some time. What has happened is that there has been a very big increase in the import of feeding-stuffs. The Table shows that in four years the tonnage has nearly doubled. I think that during that time prices have increased quite considerably, so actual expenditure, from a balance of payments point of view, is a very serious issue indeed, which is clearly recognised by the Government. I believe that as matters stand (this is the point I should like to make) there is little hope of reducing the import of feeding-stuffs. On the contrary, I believe that the import of feeding-stuffs will continue to increase, as it has done during the last four or five years, under the present arrangements of the long-term assurances and the price structure which has been now fairly well established. Because there is limitation to the amount of adjustment which can be made in prices, I think it is certain that we are going to get a continuing increase in the import of feeding-stuffs.
There are three main reasons for this. First, since 1951 or 1952 (it was about the turn of the year when we de-rationed animal feeding-stuffs) the import has been completely free, including that requiring the expenditure of dollars. There is no restriction whatsoever, and the importers are in a very special position—a position enjoyed by practically no other importers of commodities into this country. If you
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want to import machinery, particularly from the dollar area, or raw materials for many sorts of manufacture, either you are subject to restrictions or quotas or you have to prove that it is impossible to make use of home resources or obtain the machinery from manufacturers in this country. The feeding-stuffs importing industry was put in a very special position. Secondly, the marketing of animal feeding-stuffs in this country is a very sophisticated and highly-developed industry. Those engaged in it are very efficient in selling their products. So we have, on the one hand, absolute freedom to import, including complete freedom to spend dollars, and on the other, a highly developed sales organisation which is, I sometimes fear, much more efficient at persuading farmers to buy expensive feeding-stuffs than the Ministry of Agriculture's Advisory Service can be in persuading people to use less imported feeding-stuffs and make more use of grass and home-grown silage or whatever the desirable alternatives may be.
Lastly—I think this is really an important point—under existing arrangements relating to livestock products the farmer is automatically recouped for any increase in the price of imported feeding-stuffs which he buys. Any rise in the price of these feeding-stuffs is automatically taken into account and the increase is made good to the farmers. It is part of the cost taken into account before any reduction is made under the long-term guarantees. So we have a system whereby the Government, in practice, are encouraging people to use imported feeding-stuffs; they are giving every freedom for the materials to be brought into the country. Although I fully support the line of policy advocated in the White Paper, I believe that the Government are beating the air in this respect and I cannot see how we are going to achieve the desirable objective of reducing our imports under this system.
I should like to make just two suggestions as to what might be done to put more direct emphasis from the Government's own price support operations on to the increase of home production and the reduction of imports. First—and here I follow the noble Lord, Lord Forbes—would the noble Earl with his colleagues consider whether we could not introduce

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a direct silage subsidy? It has been introduced in Northern Ireland, and I have taken some trouble to find out what experience they have had there with it. Whereas, I understand, conditions there are quite different from conditions taken over the whole of this country, nevertheless their experience has been encouraging, and I believe we have enough information now to operate successfully a direct silage subsidy scheme in this country.
I should like to see arrangements made whereby we reduced some of the subsidy going into milk prices and put it on to silage, thereby directly discouraging increases in the importation of concentrated feeding-stuffs and encouraging the use of our own grass and silage making. Secondly, I wonder whether the noble Earl could tell us why the Government are so adamant in their attitude towards restricting the imports of feeding-stuffs. Could we not have a quota system? I cannot see why we should be told that if we restricted imports we should he forced back to rationing. After all, the Government say we can substitute home-grown materials for imports. Therefore, there is no reason why there should be a shortage or why we should be forced to adopt rationing. If we introduced a quota system, which could be on a declining basis each year over a period of, say, five years, I feel certain that that would encourage the production of grain and grass and other feeding-stuffs which could be substituted for this enormous quantity of imports.
Lastly, on this point, I have a suspicion that the noble Earl will tell me that a good deal is being done. In this Price Review the Government have increased the subsidy on nitrogen which is a direct help to grassland production, and we have the scheme of help for silos. But I am convinced that these schemes are too indirect, and that they are, not giving sufficient support for it to have any real effect on the import of feeding-stuffs. This is one of the largest single items in the import bill, as can be seen from an examination of the Economic Survey White Paper. I ask the noble Earl and the Government whether they will not give serious consideration during this year to making some alteration in these arrangements for the next farming year.
6.40 p.m.
THE EARL OF LISTOWEL: My Lords, the main theme of most of the speeches to which we have listened this afternoon is that the farming community as a whole—that is, the landowner, the farmer and the farm worker—has done a very good job for the country. That is a proposition with which no one would disagree. I do not think that the farm workers were explicitly mentioned by any of the speakers whom I have heard, but I am sure that that omission was not deliberate, because we should all agree that they are equal partners in the work of farming. Most of the speeches were based on what one might call a retrospective view of farming, and there is something to be said for looking into the future, which is what the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, was doing and what the noble Lord. Lord Forbes, did in his remarks. The future has this advantage over the past: that the future can be changed for better or for worse, whereas we must accept the past just as it was.
What I should like to do in my few remarks is to discuss various matters relating to the future of agriculture. I think that the Annual Review, which is the main topic of our debate, makes it clear that the future of agriculture, like that of any other industry, will depend upon its efficiency. No one would disagree with the statement in the White Paper (and here I quote from paragraph 10, to which the noble Lord, Lord Melchett, referred) that:
" The major objective of policy continues to be that production should be more economic."
Of course, that is the essential feature of production policy. The trouble is that it is not agriculture which is inefficient—as the noble Earl, Lord Dundee, rightly said, the efficiency of agriculture compares favourably with that of other industries—or that its high degree of efficiency is not improving; the trouble is that the efficiency of agriculture is not improving quickly enough in relation to rising costs. This is shown, among other things, by the further increase in the total subsidy to £245 million in the current year.
This problem of increasing farming efficiency, which means reducing the cost per unit of farm produce, is all the more, important because we are told in the

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White Paper that there is every likelihood that the present level of support will be even higher next year. It is true that this year's Review, unlike the Reviews that were issued when Mr. Butler was Chancellor of the Exchequer—and I think that this is an interesting difference—contains no veiled threats or even discreet warnings from the Treasury. On this occasion "His Master's Voice" is completely silent. Obviously, it is very desirable that that should be so. Nevertheless, it is perfectly plain that if the cost of agriculture to the Exchequer rises, so does the Chancellor's mental conflict about the allocation of revenue, which may be reflected in agricultural policy. Another tiresome symptom of the impact of this on the public mind is that there will be accusations of "feather-bedding" from certain, probably rather ignorant, sections of the This makes it more than ever desirable to stabilise ultimately, if we can, our annual expenditure on production grants and price guarantees.
This can be done only under two conditions. The first is that the Government succeed in stopping inflation. We all want to stop inflation. The Government have tried very hard, but I think that the noble Earl, Lord St. Aldwyn, will admit that their efforts have not been successful so far. I daresay the position might have been worse, but no one can say that prices will not still rise and that there is not a serious prospect of even higher prices in the near future. The other condition is that the farmers and the Government together should make an even greater effort than they have made hitherto to improve the efficiency of the industry.
Another important aim of national policy, apart from farming efficiency, is the great importance which agriculture still has from the point of view of helping with the balance of payments. We are still importing about half our foodstuffs and a very considerable proportion of expensive animal feeding-stuffs. This latter expense the Government hope to be able to reduce. The noble Lord, Lord Melchett, was very pessimistic about that. I do not think that I altogether share his pessimism, although I thought that his arguments were novel and fair enough. The main way in which agriculture can help us in the near future
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with our balance of payments is, as the White Paper suggests, by substituting home-grown for imported animal feeding-stuffs. The saving that we could make in foreign exchange if that were done to any considerable degree would be a valuable contribution to our balance of payments. I am sure that nobody would say that we are over our balance of payments difficulties. They still remain a threat to our economic future. If that is so, clearly we must ask farmers to be willing to do whatever they can to help us to save foreign exchange by growing more grass and feeding crops at home and increasing the livestock population, especially sheep and cattle.
I think that the pattern for the future of agriculture that emerges from the White Paper is probably the right one for the country in normal times. During the war we needed milk and corn crops. We now have enough milk. Of course, there have been many complaints, and justifiable complaints, from producers about the effect of reducing the price given for milk; but we have enough milk and do not want to stimulate the increase of milk production, and it is certainly cheaper to import cereals, apart from the coarse grains we need for our livestock. What we need to concentrate on is the growing of grass and the rearing of animals that can be used to take the place of the meat we import now from overseas. We should look for the expansion of farming to the crop that is best suited to our climate—namely, grass—and to the increase in the sheep and cattle population that we can feed by the better use of our own grassland.
But I think there are three main obstacles to the further expansion of agriculture in this direction, and I hope the noble Earl, Lord St. Aldwyn, will give consideration to these matters. I hope that the Government and the farmers will consider seriously the first of these difficulties which must be removed if expansion is to go on in the right way. This obstacle is the continued drift of labour from the land. This has not been mentioned so far in the debate, I think, but it is a very serious matter. Last year, when we were debating the Annual Review, I mentioned that there had been a considerable exodus during 1955. In that year, 34,000 whole-time farm workers left the industry. And

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I added, I think without contradiction from the noble Earl opposite, that if we go on losing manpower at anything like that rate, or even at, say, half that rate—that is to say, 17,000 whole-time workers a year—we should soon find ourselves faced by an acute labour shortage and there would be a drop in food production.
I have looked at the figures for 1956, which come in the June and December returns, and I am afraid that my interpretation of those figures is that they are far from reassuring. I hope that the noble Earl, Lord St. Aldwyn, is less alarmed by them than I am. In England and Wales there has been a loss in the past year of 13,000 whole-time farm workers; in the United Kingdom—that is, taking in Scotland as well—there has been a loss of 21,000 whole-time farm workers. This shows that, even if the decline in the labour force was not as much in 1955, and that, at any rate, the drop is in itself satisfactory, it is still proceeding at a rate that will not only prevent expansion but will, unless it is slowed down, start to reduce output in the not very distant future.
We all know the reasons why young people who have been brought up in villages often prefer to work in the neighbouring town. The main attraction of the towns is clearly the higher wage paid in industry and transport. The gap between the average earnings of the farm worker and those of the industrial worker is now well over £3 a week, and the success of recent wage claims in shipping and the railways, which no doubt we have all studied in the Press, has certainly widened the gap in relation to these particular industries; and these claims may start a round of claims in other industries.
EARL BATHURST: Perhaps the noble Earl will allow me to interrupt for a moment, as he has missed out what seems to me an important point when talking about the wage of the agricultural worker as compared to that of his comrade in the city. The agricultural worker on a good farm must start off something like £1 a week, and possibly £2 a week, better off (depending on the type of council house the town worker occupies) if he lives in a good modern cottage. He has fuel at hand and easy to obtain—that might be worth something like 10s.
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a week; milk and eggs are cheaper for him than for his comrade in the city; and he has no transport to worry about, whereas somebody working twenty miles from a factory can pay up to 15s. a week for transport alone. The living of the agricultural worker must be something in the region of £4 a week cheaper.
THE EARL OF LISTOWEL: I am grateful to the noble Earl for helping me to qualify what I have said, because clearly I should have made that qualification myself. I accept entirely what he says. There are, of course, these incidental benefits of living in the country which supplement the money wage of the agricultural worker. Nevertheless, there is this big money gap, and it is the money gap, coupled with many other things, in-eluding the superior amenities of the towns, which still pull the young people from the villages into the towns. What. I am afraid of is that this process of improved wages in industry—which is very desirable in itself—if it is not coupled with improvement on the land, will result in the continuation of the present drift of workers from the countryside. I think we must recognise that this gap in the money wage between industry and agriculture must be made narrower if young people are to be kept from moving into the towns and working there instead of in the countryside.
But, apart from that, there are many other considerations which have to be borne in mind. Of course, the more distant a farm is from the nearest town, and the fewer its amenities, the more difficult the labour problem becomes. Yet it is from these remote farms in hill and upland areas that we must look for the sheep and store cattle which we need in much larger numbers to-day. I hope the Government will bear in mind the whole range of amenities and attractions which must be provided in the countryside if they are to rival the amenities and attractions of urban life. For this purpose, financial support for agriculture alone is not sufficient; what is needed is a much more rapid expansion in rural social services, such as housing and schools, and in public utilities, such as electricity and water. I hope that the Government are aware of the wide range of measures required to make life in the country, as compared with life in the towns, satisfactory to the young people.

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The second of these obstacles to the greater efficiency of agriculture is the size and shape of farm holdings. The trouble here is really an historical one: it is that property rights in land have grown up in an entirely haphazard way and without any basic relationship to economic efficiency. The majority of farms in this country are of less than 100 acres, and many of these are far too small to give their occupants a reasonable livelihood. For instance, there was a recent survey in the Eastern counties, probably the most prosperous farming area in the country, where it was found that two-thirds of the farms of between twenty and fifty acres in size are uneconomic; and, of course, the number of the small uneconomic farms in the hill and upland areas of Wales and Northern England is much greater and a larger proportion of these holdings is uneconomic. Of course, such farms are handicapped by their shape, by boundaries that divide fields or cut off access to water. The Zuckerman Report, to which I shall refer only briefly, in passing, because we shall be debating it later on, goes so far as to say:
" It is in fact the pattern of occupation rather than the nature of the land itself that makes farming so generally unprosperous in marginal bill areas."
Her Majesty's Government have, at any rate, recognised that it is sheer waste to spend public money on uneconomic farm units, and one of the conditions of capital grants in the recent White Paper on long-term agricultural policy is that farm units should be economic, or could be made so with the improvement proposed; and these capital grants will not be made if the unit is not economic in itself, or cannot become economic with the necessary improvements. Of course, a similar condition already applies to grants given under the Hill Farming and Livestock Rearing Acts. I am glad that the White Paper—not this one, but the earlier one—goes a little further and, in fact, provides an incentive for the amalgamation of these tiny pieces of land by providing a grant of one-third toward the cost of amalgamation schemes. So far, so good. But I do not feel that this is nearly enough to bring about the widespread adjustment of farm boundaries needed for productive efficiency.
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I hope that the Government will study the methods that have been successfully used for this purpose in other European countries. It is not only a matter for the Government, of course, but a matter for farmers, too. Here one hopes that they will bear in mind that the productivity of farm land is really far more important than any particular freehold or leasehold rights. Of course, greater co-operation would also help to overcome this difficulty of size; and the noble Viscount, Lord Bledisloe, emphasised the value of cooperation. But I do not feel that that is by any means the whole answer.
I should like to pass, finally, to the third of these obstacles to greater efficiency, and that is the extremely wasteful use that is now being made of large areas of agricultural land in different parts of the country. We have very little cultivable land in this country. A large part of the country is heath, mountain, streets and buildings, and if the cultivable land were shared out equally between the whole population, the average Englishman would have about one acre, whereas the average Frenchman would have 3¼ acres, and the average American, needless to say, 12½ acres. With those acreages, how badly placed we are in relation to many of our neighbours! If that is so, it is all the more essential that our limited area of cultivable land should produce all the crops and livestock that modern farming technique can give, or that it can produce economically, without an undue expense on our resources. There is probably not much more room for substantial improvement in the use of our best arable and grassland, but the scope for improvement in the use of marginal land is enormous; and this is just the type of land required, both for providing a substitute for imported feeding-stuffs and to rear a much larger number of sheep and store cattle.
As your Lordships will remember, the Government set up about two years ago a Royal Commission to suggest ways in which we could put to better use our 2 million acres of common land. Some of this land will no doubt be found to be more suitable for forestry or recreation than for agriculture. But the Royal Commission have no doubt been thinking about the improvement of many thousands of acres of rough grazing which are included in this area of

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common land. I should like to ask the noble Earl whether he can say how far the Royal Commission have got, whether we are likely to have their Report before long, and whether they contemplate publishing an Interim Report. After all, this is a matter of the utmost urgency, and the sooner the Government get the Report, the sooner it will be possible to take what action may be required.
I believe that a much more substantial contribution, possibly, than that from common land could be made by a better use of marginal land in the upland and hill areas of this island. As I said earlier, I do not propose to-day to discuss the Zuckerman Report on marginal land, because my noble friend Lord Jowitt has a Motion on the Paper which we shall be discussing shortly after we reassemble. I would only draw the attention of the House to one of its conclusions relating to the potentialities of hill land. The view expressed in this conclusion is that the stock-carrying capacity of 3¼ million acres of upland, marginal land in England, Scotland and Wales, could be so much improved that we could dispense with one-third of our annual imports of carcase beef.
I am sure that these three obstacles and difficulties which I have mentioned—the drift from the land, the uneconomic size of many farm holdings and the neglect of our resources of marginal land—can be overcome if the Government and the farming community go on working together for the same purpose. But I feel that if this result is to be attained, both partners will have to do even more than has been done hitherto, and that in looking to the future of agriculture, that is the direction in which we should look.
7.5 p.m.
EARL ST. ALDWYN: My Lords, the noble Viscount, Lord Alexander of Hillsborough, has drawn attention to the condition of agriculture, and he does not appear to think that that condition is, frankly, as healthy as it might be. I am afraid that I must disagree profoundly with his diagnosis. I believe that there is abundant evidence that the state of our home agriculture to-day is one of great confidence, of outstanding performance and of fundamental soundness for the future. There is confidence in what the industry has achieved, in the future prospects that lie before it, and in the policies of Her Majesty's Government.
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Now what are the facts? Despite rising costs, and despite setbacks caused by the weather, farmers have been sufficiently competent and sufficiently industrious to push their net output from 49 per cent. up to 59 per cent. above pre-war during the last five years. There is every sign that their plans, and the continued improvements in efficiency on which they are based, will push up net output still further in the near future. Output of nearly all livestock and livestock products is still expanding though I shall have something to say a little later on about the dangers which may accompany any indiscriminate expansion of output. Crop production is increasing, too, as the continued improvement in yields offsets the transfer of tillage acreage to grass. There is no doubt whatever that this reffects not only abundant faith in the future but a great investment of human endeavour and material wealth. The contribution that this represents to the national economy is second to none in our industrial life. It has been made possible by the full support given by Her Majesty's Government, by both the great political Parties and by the country at large.
The noble Earl, Lord Listowel, was disturbed about the position of the farm worker and about the numbers. There has been a reduction—I do not attempt to deny that at all—and it has been more or less, as the noble Earl referred to it, a drift from the land. But there is no evidence that the shortage of labour is impeding production, and I think we need to keep this matter in perspective. While the number of workers has been falling, output has gone up, and this indicates that increasing efficiency has counterbalanced the effect of the reduced numbers—in other words, the change reflects genuine progress in reducing costs in terms of manpower per unit. If I may take this opportunity I should like to thank my noble friend Lord Bathurst for his intervention on behalf of the status of the agricultural worker.
The noble Viscount, Lord Alexander of Hillsborough, complained that, in the face of cost increases of some £38 million at this year's Annual Review, the Government increased the total value of the guarantees by only £14 million, leaving the industry to bear, by its own increasing efficiency some £24 million increased costs. These matters can only be taken

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broadly. Changes in the value of the guarantees are not the same thing as changes in income, because income is affected by many other factors. But, leaving this aside, the impact of the £38 million increase in costs on the net income of 1957–58, as compared with that of 1956–57, will, in practice, be considerably less than was implied by the noble Viscount. For instance, an appreciable part has already affected the net income for 1956–57; only the balance, therefore, is an offset to increasing efficiency in 1957–58. In our view, therefore, taking a broad account of all factors, the industry will still retain substantial benefit from the improvements in its own efficiency.
VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH: Do I understand that the argument is that, whatever the increased costs have been—£38 million—the farmer, when he is dealing with the Annual Review, is regarded as having already absorbed a lot of that; that he has had no compensation at all on the guarantee; that he has absorbed it and that therefore it is not really taken fully into account in the Review?
EARL ST. ALDWYN: It is most certainly taken fully into account in the Review: it is already reflected in net income. The noble Viscount also said that the industry had never been expected to bear any comparable burden since 1949. In fact, as I understand it, at the last Annual Review conducted when his Party were in power in 1951, there was a cost increase of no less than £76 million, but an award of only £43 million (and even that included over £11 million for wool arising out of the profits from the Korean situation) leaving £33 million of so-called under-recoupment.
The only real embarrassment in the general picture is that output in certain directions has expanded beyond immediate requirements, notably for milk and eggs. My noble friend Lord Forbes mentioned an experiment of separating milk on his farm up North where the skim can be used for stock-feeding and the cream sold. This is most interesting and we shall certainly watch its development. I understand that something on a similar line is going on in the South-West as well. This embarrassment is due partly to the rapidity of the technical improvement,
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partly to specially favourable weather conditions, and partly to the critical part that production of these products, especially milk, plays in our farming. Naturally, this presents us with considerable difficulties, and the necessary adjustments are by no means easy. In the nature of agricultural production changes can only be made gradually. Public policy must take full account of that. This we have done and shall continue to do—in our long-term arrangements such as the long-term assurances recently given to the industry, in our production policy, and in our annual determinations of price guarantees.
We have made it quite clear that our home agriculture is going to continue to enjoy full Government support; that the essential needs of the industry will continue to be met, however stringent the requirements of the national economy; and that there is no question of letting the industry down or of making sudden and unexpected changes of policy. This, I think, is now fully accepted in the industry. It has been illustrated most forcibly in the last few weeks. Confident in the long-term assurances that we have given, the farmers' unions have been able to accept a stern Annual Review settlement called for in the broad national interest. That is a tribute both to the responsible leadership of the unions and to the effectiveness of present Government policies. I hope that I did not misinterpret the noble Viscount opposite when I thought he rather scoffed at the idea that we should consider the leaders of the farmers' unions as having acted in a statesmanlike manner.
We have also made quite clear what we expect of the industry. We no longer need output at any cost, but we still want an expansion in net output in those directions that will help the national economy. These are in the production and use of home-grown feeding-stuffs, including good quality grass, to replace imported feed; and in the production of more good quality beef and more mutton and lamb. We still want a large volume of home-produced livestock and livestock products, though not quite as much milk and eggs as are at present in prospect; and we want this large volume of livestock and livestock products to be produced at lower cost and with less use of imported materials. This

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may well mean some reduction in the present number of dairy cows, for example; but cutting out the least good animals and concentrating on more economic production from the better ones should not hurt any dairy farmer and will be what the nation needs. From our arable farmers we still want the maintenance of a large arable acreage, but with the main emphasis on feed crops and on continued improvement in crop yields.
We are helping and encouraging the industry in many ways to achieve these objectives. In the financial sphere, we have maintained, and where necessary increased, the value of the guarantees. As your Lordships know, we have increased the total value of the guarantees substantially in each of the last three years. This support to the industry, along with its own contribution in improvements in efficiency, has maintained net income despite very substantial cost increases each year, and would have increased net income but for the difficulties caused by the weather—a hazard that the industry must normally be expected to bear.
We have supported this practical assistance by undertaking to maintain the guarantees above clearly defined limits that restrict the freedom of action we should otherwise have, though still leaving sufficient room for us to take due account of national considerations. That is a very real safeguard to the industry and it has been welcomed as such by most farmers—though not, I gather, entirely by "Farmer Alexander." But some critics are suggesting that we intend to use these new assurances not for the protection of the industry but for quite the contrary purpose—to reduce the income of the industry, to discourage home production and to depress the condition of all those who work in agriculture. That is very far indeed from our intention.
We are not, of course, committed to assuring any particular level of income for the industry; nor are we committed to any particular level of production. But we are committed to maintaining a prosperous agriculture, on the understanding that the industry adapts itself as necessary to the national requirements. We have every intention of completely fulfilling our obligation to see that the industry is
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capable of producing such part of national requirements as we consider, having regard to all the relevant factors, should be produced in this country. As your Lordships well know, that is a high level of output, including, as I have already said, an expansion in net output in the directions that we have indicated will help the national economy. At the same time, any responsible Government must leave itself room to take proper account of those factors which may call in any particular year for a reduction in the guarantees—not only factors such as the Exchequer liability, but also a number of factors favourable to the industry, such as its increasing efficiency, the way in which net income may be increasing, and any decrease in costs there may be in the future.
My Lords, we have heard a certain amount this afternoon about the small farmer. I should like to say that we have taken special care in our determinations to be fair to all classes of farmers, large and small. We realise full well the difficulty created by the reliance of many small producers on livestock products, especially milk, eggs and pigs, which are the commodities of which we do not want to stimulate greater production in present circumstances. At the last Annual Review we considered the possible effects on small farmers of all our determinations taken together. I think that the combination of a substantial reduction in the guarantee on eggs, no change in the guarantee on pigs, and a small increase in that on milk is fair to the small farmers, while at the same time taking account of production needs. But we have gone further than this, for we have also had in mind the possible effect on the small farmer in reaching our other determinations, particularly the increase of 2s. 8d. per cwt. in the standard price for oats and the increase of £3 million on the nitrogen subsidy.
The noble Viscount, Lord Alexander of Hillsborough, asked me what will be the position of the oat grower. The determination as to whether there will be a deficiency payment this year, and what it will be, cannot, of course, be taken until June 30. But I cannot see any real hardship to the producer in that, and of course the increase of 2s. 8d. in the price for the 1957 harvest will

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materially raise his chances of getting a deficiency payment for that harvest.
The salvation of the industry does not lie in pushing up the level of the guarantees so that everyone's costs can be covered automatically. It lies rather in still better farming, in improved farm management, in the development and use of better techniques, in ensuring the most economical and efficient use of labour and materials, in the control of disease and in improvements of all kinds in the quality and the marketing of what we produce. The Government, for their part, are providing an immense amount of technical advice and practical help—all designed to promote economic production. The expenditure on production grants in general is rising steadily. It is now running at over £70 million a year, compared with about £60 million in 1955–56. It includes high rates of grant on a number of major items, such as, lime and fertilisers, ploughing up grants and the calf subsidy. In sum, it includes all manner of useful things, to which the grants for silos have been added within the last twelve months.
My Lords, several noble Lords have raised the question of a subsidy on silage itself. We considered this suggestion most carefully, as we have done on several occasions. Last year we decided to introduce the subsidy for the construction of silos, but we did not think that we should be justified, at any rate under present conditions, in introducing a grant on silage itself. The noble Lord, Lord Melchett, compared the position here with that in Northern Ireland. I would point out to him, however, that there they have had a grant on silos for a considerable number of years, and all the silos are built virtually to a standard pattern; so that the difficulties which we in this country would have in measuring the content of the pit are largely overcome. That is one of the big problems which I am afraid we have not yet solved. Hardly two silos are alike, and to get anything approaching an accurate measurement of the content would be an extremely difficult job at the moment. I think that the silo subsidy scheme has been extremely well received. In the first three months of its operation over 1,800 projects, to the total value of about £270,000, have been approved.
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We are helping the industry to improve the quality of its output so as to meet market requirements. For instance, on meat, we are encouraging production of the right kind of product by the new differential system of guarantees for fat cattle and the two rates of quality premium for pigs. We are supporting marketing schemes in those cases where the circumstances call for such schemes and in two cases where there are special doubts and difficulties—pigs and horticulture—the Government have had investigations made by an independent Commission or Committee.
I should like to add my congratulations to those already voiced on the maiden speech of my noble friend Lord Malmesbury. He was much concerned with the details of the management of the grants under the Agriculture Bill. We shall have that Bill, I hope, in this House before long, and I hope that he will take part in the Second Reading debate on that Bill and enlarge on his ideas. The noble Viscount, Lord Bledisloe made one of his more historical speeches. He gave us a broad picture of agriculture over a considerable period; but he raised one particular point—the question of a subsidy on potash. Again, we have looked at this proposal most carefully. The trouble is that the control of potash is still virtually a monopoly in the hands of two, one large and one very small, cartels outside this country, over which we should have absolutely no control. If we were to put on a subsidy there would be nothing to prevent the price from being raised by an equivalent amount overnight.
The noble Earl, Lord Bathurst, raised the question of standardisation of electricity charges. There he has my complete sympathy, but he must remember that the boards are virtually autonomous bodies; and although I never miss an opportunity of impressing upon them the advantages of having standard rates throughout the country, I am afraid that they have not yet fallen in with that suggestion. The noble Earl, Lord Lonsdale, asked how far we had got with the Arton Wilson Report and its recommendations. The position there is that the main recommendations have been accepted, and there has been a reorganisation of areas, which came into operation on April 1. Most of the other recommendations are being dealt with. The

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majority of them are likely to be accepted and will be coming into operation shortly.
The noble Lord, Lord Silkin, was very worried about his pigs, and I greatly look forward to seeing his figures and facts. But I am glad that all farmers do not take quite such a pessimistic view about production as the noble Lord does. The general trend is for an increasing number of gilts in-pig, which would indicate that, by and large, people are finding it a not unprofitable business. I hope, however, that the noble Lord will not take his figures for a short period but over the full year, for I think that is important. I hope he has appreciated the advantage which he has had from the new system of guarantees, which instead of working on fifty-two weeks works on on eight weeks' average, and thus reflects very much more quickly any fall in prices. I think the noble Lord will find that he has benefited considerably from that change.
The noble Earl, Lord Ferrers, was very worried about solids-not-fat in milk. It is getting late and this is a subject on which, no doubt, we could have a useful discussion at some considerable length. I will not weary your Lordships tonight, but will merely say that the fact that the housewife cannot herself detect whether the food which she eats is of high nutritional value or low nutritional value is, in my view, no reason for not aiming at the highest nutritional value possible. As I understand it, the standard of solids-not-fat in the last thirty years has gone down quite appreciably, and that seems to me to be a trend in the wrong direction. The noble Lord queried what we could do about it—and in fact there is quite a lot that can be done. It is one of the few qualities in which hereditary characteristics pass equally happily through male and female. It should not be at all difficult, therefore, to raise the standard with a little selective breeding.
Though I cannot claim, I am afraid, to have dealt with all the questions put to me I will try to deal with others—
THE EARL OF LISTOWEL: My Lords, was the noble Earl going to say something about the Royal Commission on Common Land, a matter on which I gave him notice?
EARL ST. ALDWYN: My Lords, I am sorry. I should like to say a word on that. The Royal Commission do not expect to take any further evidence after their next two public hearings, one at Exeter on April 30 and one at Taunton on May 2. Shortly after that they should be in a position to consider the form of the recommendations they are going to make. Now that the Royal Commission has reached that stage it would be a pity to suggest that there should be an Interim Report. It is such a complicated problem that I am sure they should be allowed to complete their full and mature consideration of the matter.
LORD FORBES: My Lords, before the noble Earl sits down, I believe he said that some dairy farmers could do without some of their poorer cows. Does he mean that dairy farmers should replace those with better cows and produce more milk?
EARL ST. ALDWYN: My Lords, I am not suggesting that the noble Lord should produce more milk. But, after all, if, taking the whole of one's herd, one's expenses are so much a gallon with a number of low-producing cows in the herd, then with fewer low-producing cows one's cost of production per gallon would be more favourable.
LORD FORBES: My Lords, does the noble Earl by those words now suggest that if one has a herd of, say, fifty cows and equipment for that number one can quite easily reduce the number to forty cows? That is just not an economic proposition.
7.35 p.m.
VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGH: My Lords, may I first say how grateful I am to all Members of your Lordships' House for the manner in which they have joined in the debate which I was bold enough to initiate to-day. I did not expect that the noble Earl would agree with my general view about the condition of agriculture, and I hope that he is right and I am wrong and that the Annual Review over the next two or three years will not show any worse results than at present, because we all want to see agriculture really prosperous and improving.
I am not satisfied, however, with the general attitude of Her Majesty's Government on one of the main points—how we

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are going to use agriculture so that it may become an increasing factor in correcting our balance of payments; and before we part to-night I should like to quote paragraph 90 of the Economic Survey, which says:
" The outlook will continue to be dominated by the necessities of the balance of payments. We need a current surplus sufficient to finance our long-term investment overseas and to strengthen our position as an international banker."
It could not have been put more strongly than it has been put in the Economic Survey, and I should have thought that those ministerially responsible for agriculture had a fairly strong card to play in negotiating with the people at the Treasury, who are always so difficult to negotiate with, in the terms in which they have outlined the situation to Parliament and the nation in their own document. I hope that as a result of doing that there may be better results.
One point on which I thought the noble Earl was wrong was on the question of the contribution made by farmers themselves, by way of increased efficiency, in the past nine years. I have the statistical chart with me and have been looking at it. In 1951 there was a bigger margin than the actual amount this year, but the proportion of grant made was certainly a better percentage of the deficiency than it is in this case; so I will give the noble Earl half a mark for that. The outstanding point is that in this debate it is, in my view, proved beyond the shadow of a doubt that the net income of farmers has been dropping steadily since 1952–53 in comparison with the rest of the community. According to the rates published by Her Majesty's Government, the income of the community in general is going straight up, whereas farm incomes have been dropping since 1952–53. Other incomes have been going up, enabling those people to absorb, in spending Power, the depreciation in the value of the pound; but the net returns to the farmers have left them with no improvement
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in income, while the devaluation of the pound operates effectively against them. That is the actual fact of the situation.
I am grateful to the noble Earl for his answer, which I will read very carefully, and if I have any points to make I will send them by post instead of prolonging the discussion now. May I repeat my thanks to all noble Lords who have taken part in this debate and ask leave to withdraw my Motion?
Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.