RESULTS OF THE ACT 363 



application was in the first instance received in 

 response. Many, if not all, County Councils would 

 have sat down satisfied after this that they need 

 take no further steps in this direction. 



Summary of Conclusions on the Results of 

 the Act. 



A general consideration of the foregoing reports 

 in search of conclusions leads one first to see how 

 very little there is to be learnt from the experience 

 of fourteen years' working of this Act. The little 

 that there is, allowing for subsequent qualifications, 

 might be summed up as follows : 



1. That the renting, rather than the purchasing, 

 powers of the Act have been most used. 



2. That there is a distinct tendency to a readjust- 

 ment of the original lots, which has as a result the 

 survival of the best tenants on more suitable areas, 

 as regards size, for cultivation. 



3. That the Act is workable, but only really 

 satisfactorily in those cases where its administration 

 is fostered by local knowledge and sympathetic 

 County Councillors, and that where this is not the 

 case no progress is made. 



4. That the agricultural conditions under which 

 the various holdings have succeeded are very varied, 

 and the success is not due to any uniform nature of 

 facilities as to soil, markets, etc. 



These points will now be considered in detail. 



