§ Mr. Hawkinsasked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food whether it was with his authority that Mr. Emrys Jones, a senior official of the National Agricultural Advisory Service, stated in a public lecture at Queen's University, Belfast, that 60,000 small farmers would be far better off if they went out of farming.
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Mr. PearlI am afraid the hon. Member has been misled by newspaper reports. Mr. Emrys Jones made no reference to any figure of 60,000 small farmers in his recent lecture at Queen's University, Belfast. He did, however, in reply to a question following a recent talk to the N.F.U. Branch at Colchester give this figure as his personal estimate of the number of small farms at or below the lower limits of eligibility of the Small Farmer Scheme whose occupiers, even if given all the technical assistance available, could not be expected to get from them an income equivalent to an agricultural worker's earnings. He did not suggest that the occupiers should necessarily go out of farming. Mr. Jones was of course following the normal practice of the N.A.A.S. in giving to gatherings of farmers a broad picture of economic and technical trends in agriculture.