150 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



think the farmer would say, ' Let it wait till my lease is up.' 

 And as regards woodlands, I think the average farmer looks on 

 woodlands as a sort of gathering-place for wood pigeons and 

 game. I do not think he bothers his head about the true 

 interests of forestry. By all means let us please the farmers. 

 We feel with the farmers that landscape gardening is not 

 forestry, and we do not want to propagate fads or fancies. 

 No forester in his senses wants that. Now, I conclude by 

 saying that if the Central Authority is to use the Boards of 

 Agriculture — and I do not see why it should not to some 

 extent — we must see that the Forestry Authority is endowed 

 with the real control of forest policy, that it has some say in 

 the personnel of the forestry sections of the Board, so that it may 

 be impossible for the permanent officials to make forestry any 

 longer the Cinderella of the departments. We want something 

 like the method in France, though somebody else better qualified 

 than I could tell you how the French manage these things. We 

 therefore ask for a Central Forest Authority to deal with that 

 subject alone, with sufficient knowledge and experience to 

 command confidence, free from party politics, and endowed with 

 adequate powers and funds. It should be the duty of this 

 authority to formulate a comprehensive forest policy for the 

 United Kingdom to organise research, to direct and co-ordinate 

 forest education, to allocate funds for schemes of afforestation, 

 and to encourage and assist private enterprise. I beg to move 

 the following resolution : — 



'That this Meeting of the Royal Scottish Arboricultural 

 Society, specially convened, hereby approves of the 

 recommendations of the Forestry Sub-Committee of 

 the Reconstruction Committee, and particularly of the 

 recommendation that a Central Forest Authority, 

 equipped with funds and powers, be created for Great 

 Britain and Ireland, and urges the Government to 

 carry these recommendations into effect without delay.' " 



Mr Robert Forbes, Kennet, said: — "I rise to second this 

 resolution. I think by this time forestry has proved itself of 

 sufficient importance to deserve a Central Authority of its own, 

 but I do not think it matters very much where that authority 

 is located, whether it is in London or in Edinburgh, so long 

 as we get it entirely free of any other department." 



