MINUTES OF EVIDENCE. 



17 



5 August, 1919.] 



Sir. DANIEL HAM,, K.C.B., F.R.S. 



[Continued. 



guarantees will increase supply without increasing 

 price. We will leave the market price free ; and 

 the smallholder who wants oats, we will say, to 

 grind for his pigs has all to gain by having plenty 

 of it grown round about him. 



334. Yes; but not being mainly a cereal grower, 

 he gets no direct advantage from the guaranteed 

 price for cereals? No, he does not. 



335. And is it not possible that the guaranteed 

 prices for cereal production would create a general 

 tendency for rents to move upward, and that the 

 rent of" the land which the smallholder cannot use 

 for cereals but which, if otherwise used, might be 

 used for cereals, would tend to advance? I do 

 not think the smallholder's rent, as a rule, gets 

 pushed UD bv the rent of farm land round about ; 

 the smallholder's rent ie nearly always conditioned 

 by the convenience of rthe land and by its quality. 

 I see corn growing mainly on land the smallholder 

 can do little or nothing with. 



336. 3/r. Xicholls: I wanted to ask you a further 

 question with regard to the Holbeach Farm Colony. 

 That I think you said has been running about 18 

 months? Yes, since Michaelmas, 1917. 



337. What I wanted to know was, in speaking 

 about the returns from that not being much use to 

 us, is it not a fact that that farm has really been 

 cultivated by the Board to get it ready for the 

 settlers who are going in, and that, therefore, it 

 would not be expected to be an economic success 

 from the Board's point of view? It has paid its 

 way. It made a considerable profit during the one 

 year for which accounts are available. 



338. Now the outskirts will be divided, and 90 

 men settled on it following up what Mr. Lennard 

 mentioned ? Yes. 



339. Do .not you really think that when the 90 

 men get settler], it will employ more labour and 

 really settle more men? When I speak of settling. 

 I mean sticking them fast on it. Thev will feel 

 settled. They have got something there of their 

 own, and there will ho a better production from 

 the same farm than there was prior to 18 months 

 ago when it was taken over? Yea; that farm will 

 br much intensified by being cut up. It is piece 

 of the richest land in England, most capable of 

 intensive production. A man will live more oom- 

 fortiibly on that land on 10 acres. It will be farmed 

 for celery, onions, potatoes, and so on. Before 

 it was growing corn and so on. That is a very 

 special piece of land. 



340. Then, with regard to the security of tenure for 

 the farmer, a great point has really been made on 

 that. Do I take it from what you said that you 

 really think farmers could get a better security on 

 their holding if they would agree to take a lease? 

 What a man really wants is to feel he is settled and 

 he can spend his money and feel he is all right there, 

 say, for 20 years. If he wants to be there for 20 

 years, do you suggest it would be better for him to 

 take a lease, say, for 10 years, and a second for 20 

 years, rather than hang on with this year to year 

 business? I think, if the system of farming on leases 

 became general, it would encourage a man to put his 

 capital into his business and make certain arrange- 

 ments for his withdrawal at the close. But tenure 

 is a very big and complicated question, which one 

 would rather like to go into at length, if at all. 



341. The only point which was in my mind was that 

 the farmer says, " I want something to make me 

 secure " and he cannot be secure on a yearly 

 tenancy. Has not he some remedy in his own hands. 

 and to say: "I will take this farm for 10 years." 

 Then, of course, the labourer wants security, and the 

 farmer could turn round to his horsekeeper and say : 

 " I will give you a lease for 10 years In your cottage." 

 That would help us over one of the other troubles 

 also. Do you think there is really anything in that? 

 I think as certain forms of farming grow in this 

 country, the tenants must obtain leases, or else the 

 whole thing will stop. 



J6125 



342. Another point with regard to the question of 

 rent. It has been suggested that as soon as the 

 Government guaranteed 'prices, the advantage really 

 went to the landlords. From your knowledge, 

 do you know whether during this period there has 

 not been, on the part of farmers, a very much greater 

 demand for the land, and they have been running 

 after the farms, with the result that the fact that 

 there has been the demand has really sent up rents 

 rather than the Corn Production Act having done it? 

 Certainly, the Corn Production Act did not do it; 

 because, as I say, its guarantees have been over- 

 shadowed by the market prices that prevailed, and I 

 should say, from all knowledge that is before me, 

 either personally or officially, rents have not been 

 raised during the war period to anything like the 

 extent that could have been exacted. One of the 

 reasons for the large volume of sales, we are confi- 

 dently told, is the fact that the owner 'can realise 

 cash for the land at a figure altogether out of scale 

 with the rents. We can give you some remarkable in- 

 stances of that kind within our purview. 



343. Then with regard to the fixing of the scale 

 between the price and wage in the Corn Production 

 Act, is it within your knowledge that farmers, during 

 quite five years before the war, were constantly 

 advocating, "If we could get 2 a quarter for out 

 wheat, then we could give 1 a week or 25s. in wages," 

 and that that had something to do in the minds of 

 the Government with their coming to a settlement. 

 They said, roughly, " This has been made an offer, 

 and we think it is a rough guide for us "? I would 

 say again there was no bargain of the kind made at 

 the time the Corn Production Act was passed ; but, 

 of course, in the figures that were put down, what 

 we had to guide us were the previous demands that 

 had been mailc on behalf of the labourers, the 

 existence of the minimum wage of the National Ser- 

 vice Department, and again the history of the trend of 

 corn prices for five years before the war, and the 

 evidence that had been put forward, say, at the 

 Milner Commission, as to ,what sort of guarantee 

 would tempt the farmers then. You are quite right 

 in saying 40s. had often been mentioned as the price 

 farmers wanted to see guaranteed on wheat. 



344. Is it within your knowledge that the wheat 

 prices did actually go up to 4 a quarter before the 

 wages were fixed by the Board at 30s., and that even 

 after the wages were fixed some farmers refused to 

 pay that 30s.? Yes; there have been prosecutions, 

 certainly. If I remember rightly, corn prices had 

 gone up to over 80s. before tho Act became law. The 

 Bill was passed in August, 1917; and it was in June, 

 11J17, that the highest level of corn prices was reached, 

 because that was just before control came on. 



345. Do you really think that we can ever hope 

 to be relied upon in this country as a wheat or cereal 

 producing country, in competition with tho soils of 

 the new countries? It is not the soils; it is the 

 the extent of them the fact that you can get a fine 

 flat area for next to nothing that renders the wheat 

 from these new countries so cheap. I do not know 

 that it is always going to be so cheap from these new 

 countries. As I say, wheat was often the crop with 

 which men broke in the wilderness. But I will again 

 say, I hope a great deal of our farming, if we can 

 pet the land under the plough, will develop in tho 

 direction of crops which are worth more than wheat. 

 As long as we have' the land under the plough, 

 let the farmer grow what is most profitable 

 to him. If he has the land under the plough, 

 and then we are pinched, as we were two years ago, 

 it can be put in wheat with a minimum of trouble, 

 and the land is there ready for the wheat to go in. 

 But if he grows chicory, celery, potatoes, or caraway 

 seeds, or anything of that kind in the intermediate 

 time, it will pay better to let him do so. 



346. Reference has been made to the heavy clay 

 soil being very difficult and almost impossible for 

 many of the farmers. Is it within your knowledge 

 that some of tho heavy clay land is often the best 

 cereal producing land in the country, both in quality 

 and quantity? Yes; you can grow the finest wheat 



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