§ Captain Kerbyasked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (1) if he will take steps to amend the 1947 Agriculture Act, so as to ensure that five years' full-time forestry work with the Forestry Commission may count as agricultural service for the purposes of Section 52 of this Act and the 1949 and 1952 Letting of Smallholdings (Selection of Tenants) Regulations, which are governed by it;
(2) if he will introduce legislation to amend Section 52 of the 1947 Agriculture Act and the Smallholdings (Selection of Tenants) Regulations of 1949 and 1952 so as to enable a man who has put in a defined amount of part-time work on a smallholding over a defined number of years to be awarded a tenancy in his own right, despite the fact that he has not been occupied in full-time practical farming for a period of not less than five years.
§ Mr. John HareThese changes would not be consistent with the aim of the present law, that smallholdings should be let to persons of sufficient agricultural experience.