§ Dr. Petersasked the Minister of Agriculture what is the objection to land taken over by the Cambridgeshire war agricultural executive committee and purchased by a farmer, who has maintained several hundred acres of fenland during the past six years, being released to the purchaser, who has proved himself to be an excellent farmer and who, by farming the land himself, would save considerable expense to the nation?
Mr. HudsonI assume that this is the case about which the hon. Member wrote last February. If so, the objection to the release of the land, as was explained in a letter sent to him on 22nd February, is that the land comprises a number of isolated fields scattered about the fen and forming part of a large area which has been reclaimed and put under cultivation by the war agricultural executive committee. Plans are in hand for the regrouping of the land in this fen to form economic farming units, and if the particular fields in question were released at the present time, the committee's plans would be considerably hampered. The present owner was aware, when he544W purchased the fields, that the executive committee were in possession.