Major BARNESasked the Minister of Agriculture the highest and lowest prices per quarter for wheat and barley during the years 1914 to 1921, inclusive?
Sir A. BOSCAWENThe highest and lowest weekly average prices of British wheat and barley in England and Wales, as ascertained under the Corn Returns Act, 1882, in the years mentioned are as follow:
Schedule for the Annual Agricultural Return, and attention was then called to the immediate necessity of making a claim if it was desired to secure the payment Under the Corn Production Acts. In September another claim form was issued to all who had returned wheat, oats, or mixed corn on the Agricultural Return made in June, but from whom a corn claim had not been received. This was accompanied by an intimation that claim must be made by the 3rd October, and that no further extension of time could be granted. Notices were also issued to the Press on several occasions, in which attention was called to the necessity of making a claim.
It cannot therefore be said that farmers have not been fully informed, and those who have failed to put in their claims must, I am afraid, abide by the consequences of their neglect. I would re- 669W mind the hon. Member that at the present date there would be no satisfactory means of verifying new claims nor of making deductions in respect of negligent cultivation as required by the Act. As regards the particular case to which my hon. Friend refers, a claim form was issued to Mr. Joseph Birch at the beginning of June, and again at the end of September. He made a claim in January on the form issued to him in June. There do not, therefore, appear to be any ground for exceptional treatment in his case.