no GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND - MISCELI,ANEOUS 



not, however, carried out to the full extent originally contemplated, the ex- 

 periment not being regarded as entirely successful. 



§ 5. The smali, i,andhoi,ders act, 191 1. 



While the peculiar conditions of the Highland counties were thu3 pro- 

 vided for, there was no legislation dealing specially with the tenure of exist- 

 ing small holdings throughout the rest of Scotland. The Agricultiural 

 Holdings Acts of 1883 and 1908 were designed to protect the rights of agri- 

 cultural tenants, but without special reference to small holdings. The main 

 clauses of the latter provide for (i) compensation for improvements of 

 various kinds carried out by the tenant with special provisions for the 

 benefit of market gardeners ; (2) compensation (a) for damage done by 

 game (b) for 'unreasonable disturbance" by refusal on the part of the 

 landlord to renew the tenant's occupancy; (3) the right of bequeathing the 

 remainder of a lease; (4) greater freedom in the system of cropping. 



Certain Acts had been passed with the object of facilitating the forma- 

 tion of allotments and small holdings, the administration of which was en- 

 trusted to local authorities, but owing to the absence of financial resources 

 other than the local rates these Acts had had little effect. 



In certain districts, such as the island of Arran and the upland parts 

 of Perthshire, the conditions of land tenure were very like those in the dis- 

 tricts already dealt with by the Crofters Act, while in Aberdeenshire and 

 the neighbouring counties there were many small holders who had reclaimed 

 land for cultivation and had carried out other improvements, with or 

 without adequate consideration from their landlords. In the country as 

 a whole the number of small holdings was diminishing and the rural pop- 

 ulation was decreasing. There was, therefore, both from the point of view 

 of the individual small holder, and as a matter of public policy, a demand for 

 a general measure on the lines of the Crofters Act. 



A Bill was introduced in 1895 for the purpose of extending that Act 

 in an amended form to the counties north of the Tay not already included, 

 and to Bute, but it did not become law. The Small Landolders Act, as 

 finally passed, was the last of a series of Bills introduced in 1906, 1907 and 

 1908, which, however, failed to become law during the Parliament of 1906 

 to 1909. It w'as reintroduced in 1911 in the same form as in 1908. and, sub- 

 ject to certain amendments inserted at the instance of the Opposition, 

 was passed by both Houses of Parliament in that session, coming into force 

 on 1st. April, 1912. 



The leading features of the Act (i) are, as already stated, the extension 

 of the Crofters Acts, with considerable modifications, to the whole of Scot- 

 land, and the provision of means for the constitution of new small holdings. 

 The new Act has to be read along with the earlier Act and the amending 

 Acts passed afterwards (which are of relatively small importance), and it 

 constitutes with them the code described as "The I^andolders Acts, 1886, 

 to 1911. " 



I 



