CHAPTER XXIII 



SMALL HOLDINGS BY 'PRIVATE ENTER- 

 PRISE' 



IT will have been seen, from what I state on p. 67, that 

 in the conversation I had with Mr. Hugh Andrews 

 at Toddington Manor, I found him distinctly sym- 

 pathetic towards the small holdings movement, but he 

 felt, I go on to say, ' that such undertakings should be 

 entrusted to syndicates or powerful combinations, with 

 capital sufficient to enable them to grapple with the 

 housing problem.' 



The suggestion here made is one that, to my mind, 

 is deserving of very serious consideration. It offers the 

 same idea of an ' intermediary ' as, in principle, I have 

 already sought to expound; but it carries that idea 

 further in the importance it deservedly attaches to the 

 inclusion of ' housing ' in schemes for the promotion of 

 land settlement. So long as provision for actual 

 residence on the land is not included, small holdings, 

 of whatever dimensions, are still but little better than 

 allotments. They serve an extremely useful purpose, 

 but they do not entirely meet the necessities of the 

 situation. It may be that a large proportion of the 

 existing small holders do not want to live on their 

 holdings, provided that these are within reasonable 

 distance of a town or village. In this case they prefer 



293 



