90 



UoYAL COMMISSION ON AGKICULTUKE. 



, 1919.] 



MR. JAMES DONALDSON. 



11.716. Why do they pay thi'm? 1 have told jou: 

 t > keep roof over their head* and preserve their 

 interest*. 



11.717. But does not that mean that they were 

 obliged to pay these high prices, because if they did 

 not pay them, someone else- would: Not always; and 

 the man who wry often has been running it up has 

 been the land speculator or, in other words, the land 

 grabber, to my own personal knowledge. He is the 

 man who really and truly had no interest in the land 

 whatever, but simply thought he could sell it to 

 another farmer who might be in the same predica- 

 ment another day. That is how these prices have 

 become inflated. 



11.718. You do not suggest that these land specu- 

 latont did not know their own business? No; they 

 were taking advantage of the market, because there 

 were so many farmers being displaced. They kne>\ 

 that the demand for land was great because the farm- 

 ers had been displaced. 



11.719. By someone else? By someone else. 

 11,790. Therefore, on the whole, there was a largo 



number of persons who had sufficient confidence in the 

 future of farming to pay high prices for land? I have 

 not said so. That is exactly what I have not said, 

 and you must not put that into my mouth. I said 

 it was an emergency scheme. 



11,731. Yes; but I fail to see how this emergency 

 scheme arises unless there was a large number of 

 persons anxious to get hold of the land? Because a 

 number have been displaced; and if you get two 

 bidders for the same thing, you know what happens. 



11,733. Yes; but the displacement of these fanners 

 means that some have already taken their place and 

 therefore the total number seeking the land is not 

 larger, I think? I am not going to argue the point. 



11.733. Mr. Nicholli: I only want to ask you 

 whether I am right in thinking that the members of 

 your Union when they agreed to your coining here, 

 really thought that we ought to have the evidence 

 from the Union in mild doses, and that yours should 

 be the first one? No, not at all; nothing of that 

 sort entered their heads. 



11.734. Surely you talked this matter over and came 

 to a definite agreement that at any rate you were 

 not to interfere with policy:' Exactly; nor results. 



11.735. But was it suggested that the policy would 

 be a stronger dose? I am a bit puzzled about this? 

 When we have an indication of what the Govern- 

 ment require from UN, then we shall be able to frame 

 our policy. 



11.736. There was a definite understanding that 

 you should come one, two, three; and that you your- 

 self should be a kind of introduction? What we 

 understood the Commission to require from us was first 

 costs; and we were hurried in the preparation of 

 those costs, I may tell you. 



11,727. Here is a statement, and in this statement 

 I notice reference is made to matters which I would 

 have taken to be matters of policy. The practice 

 of co-operation is one, and factory farming is another '' 

 We only say that that may be an alternative. 



11.738. To an ordinary man like myself, that is 

 introducing very strong policy. You have also got 

 Sm:ill Holdings in it? No. I think you will find 

 that when our policy comes out, it will be something 

 tery different from thia. 



11.739. Are you the Chairman of the Small Hold- 

 ings Committee of the Oxfordshire County Council? 

 I am. 



11,790. Did not you say a little while ago that 

 during the last 13 'months much land had been put 

 under grass that it M reverting back again to grass? 



I did not nay much. There was a very small pro- 

 jKM-tion read out to me, and I said take that as an 

 alion. It is not much. It JB alxmt 90,000 acres, 

 I believe, which is not much for England. We were 

 .[leaking of England, and not t)i<- County of Oxford- 

 shire. 



11.731. It strike* one n* an ordinary man that it 

 in getting on in that direction? Yea; but you hare. 

 to deal with millions of acres in the wliole. 



11.732. Do you know of any farms in Oxfordshire 

 that have been laid down to grass? I know one co- 



two now that are derelict, that have come under m\ 

 ou a oliscrvation. \\ . hud to change the tenants. 



11,73;<. Hut they did uot change them to grans: 1 

 do not know what the succeeding tenants may do; 

 they had gone into grass. 



11,7:11. lour t'.miimttee really is keen to keep them 

 cultivated; that is the real object? We are doing 

 everything we can to get that done. 



ll'73o. And really this land which has gone down 

 t;i grass has been on the farms of large farmers? 

 What we do find amongst the small holders is a great 

 desire for a proportion of grass. Among something 

 like 300 applications, what we have found is that tin n- 

 is a very big desire to have a small proportion in 

 grass, and we are trying to satisfy them to the best 

 of our ability, but cannot do so in all cases. 



11.736. But is not it a general experience that when 

 you get small holders, they really want common 

 ground into which they can turn their stock, and not 

 part of their holding laid down? No, I do not find 

 that in Oxforshire. 



11.737. I am not sure whether I understood you 

 rightly, but I thought you said that some of this land 

 had been you did not use the word, but it is a com- 

 mon word of mine really overstrained during the 

 war? Yes, I quite follow you. 



11.738. And that it wanted rest; and that the way 

 to rest it was to put it down to grass? I did not say 

 so. The way to rest it and to bring it into proper 

 cultivation, speaking as a practical farmer, would be 

 to give it a year's fallow. 



11.739. That is what I should have judged: but I 

 assumed what you said was. that we had been really 

 over-doing the land during the war period, and get- 

 ting more out of it than was being put in? Yes, that 

 is quite true. 



11.740. And that really some of this land had 

 dropped back through that cause, and that all the land 

 that was resting was not fallow, but had gone back to 

 grass, and that was really one of the causes of it 

 going back to grass ; and that it was not the fear that 

 farmers could not live out of wheat growing that had 

 drifted it back again to grass? Would you tell me as 

 plainly as you can what you are driving at? 



11.741. That is what I am driving at. It seemed to 

 me from what you said, that this land was overdrawn 

 and wanting resting? Yes; in other words it had 

 been cropped too severely. 



11,743. Sonic of that land had gone back to grass, 

 and it really was resting while it was in grass? I did 

 not say so. 



1 1,743. But what was the assumption ? The assump- 

 tioti is that you can fallow, that is, keep that land 

 still arable. As a practical man I tell you the 

 proper course to take with land, when it has been, as 

 yon put it, overstrained, is, when the time permits 

 of it, to give it a year's summer fallow, and keep 

 cultivating it and eradicating the weeds, and you 

 will be restoring the fertility of the soil again. 



11.744. I have done a great deal of it and that was 

 my view : but I gathered from your answer earlier 

 on that it was not your view? -1 have given no other 

 view I can assure you. 



11.745. But you do not assume that all the land 

 that wanted rest was under fallow? No; you take 

 it bit by bit. 



11.746. And some of it has gone back to gra.ss to 

 have a rest? If you have an analysis made of that 

 statement, yon will find how much of it had gone 

 back to clover. Clover would only bo for one year; 

 then you might have had two years' grasses. You would 

 want to analyse it very carefully in order to have 

 the true answer to your/question. 



11.747. There wus one other point with regard to 

 that which is really an industrial point. I think 

 earlier on you gave a case when- flie number of A 1 

 men among the rural population was a. greater pro- 

 portion than from the towns. I want to know whether 

 you could tell us during what period of the war that 

 was? I think that was about the third year of the 

 war. 



1 1 .74H. That is what I was thinking ; because, know- 

 ing as I do a good deal about the rural area, the 

 first call was on the industrial workers and very 

 largely the best A 1 men went first. Then came 



