GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND. 



THE CORN PRODUCTION ACT, 1917. 



OFFiciAiv source: 



The journal of the board of Agriculture, Vol. XXIV. No. 6, I^ondon, SeptembLTi9i7. 

 Memorandum explaining the principal provisions of the corn production 



Act, I9I7,AS REGARDS AGRICULTURAL WAGES IN ENGLAND AND WALES. The Board 



ot Asricultxire and Fisheries, September 191 7. 



The Corn Production Act, passed on the 21st of last August, affects 

 two great sections of the British agricultural population, the wage-earning 

 labourers and the tenant farmers. To the former a minimum wage is se- 

 cured ; and the latter are in the first place guaranteed minimum prices for 

 their wheat and oats for the six years from 1917 to 1922, and in the second 

 place protected against a raising of their rents which might deflect to their 

 landlords the profit arising from such minimum prices. The protection 

 given by this Act to agriculture and its restriction of tlie freedom of agri- 

 cultural contracts represent a principle new in British legislation. 



We propose in this article to deal only with Parts II and III of the Act, 

 which concern, respectively, minimum wages and the limitation of rents, 

 and to leave on one side Part I which regulates the minimum prices of 

 wheat and oats. We purpose further to deal only with the Act as it affects 

 England and Wales, omitting the particular provisions for Scotland and 

 Ireland. 



§ I. The fixing of agricultural wages in England 



AND WALES. 



a) Agricultural Wages Board. — The Act provides for the establishment, 

 b}' the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries, of an Agricultural Wages Board 

 for England and Wales, of which the main function will be to fix minimum 

 rates of wages for workmen employed on agriculture. The term workmen 

 includes women, boys and girls, and the term agriculture includes not only 

 farm work but also work on osier land, and in woodlands, orchards, market 

 gardens and nursery grounds. 



The Wages Board will consist of three classes of persons, namely : a) 

 " appointed members ", otherwise persons directly appointed by the Board 

 of Agriculture and Fisheries, who need not necessarily be engaged in agri- 

 culture but who will be expected to judge impartially between employers' 



