Small Holdings and Agriculture 



peasant proprietors ? ' 



" My answer to this is that they need not 

 necessarily adopt this course. I consider that 

 without seeking to force unduly the principle of 

 ownership and creating a possibly artificial 

 demand for it (in the same way as the Finance 

 Bill would force on the market land not yet 

 * ripe for building purposes '), they should 

 certainly afford greater facilities for the owner- 

 ship of small holdings, so that cultivators, or 

 would-be cultivators, who did wish to purchase 

 could realise their aspirations more easily, and, 

 if possible, at less expense in the matter of fees 

 and costs than at present. The acquisition of 

 land and the re-sale thereof in case of need 

 under fair conditions should approach as nearly 

 to the buying and selling of other kinds of 

 property as circumstances will permit. 



*' The fact that comparatively few persons 

 took advantage of the purchase clauses of the 

 Small Holdings Act of 1892, which gave power 

 to County Councils to buy land and resell it 

 in small lots, is attributed by Unionists to 

 ' some radical defects ' in the details of the 

 measure. For these defects the Unionists 

 have, it is declared, sought in vain during the 

 present Parliament to secure a remedy. Here, 

 then, a Unionist government in search of a 

 land policy could begin by curing the defects 

 in question, and by making such amendments 



243 



