154 THE LAND AND ITS PROBLEMS 



So we come to the root of the matter : education and 

 training. 



There is any amount of latent capacity amongst our 

 agricultural labourers, but it must be developed by 

 training. Because a man is a skilled labourer it does not 

 follow that he would be a good farm manager. Many 

 labourers have risen to the position of farm bailiffs in 

 this country ; but if their qualifications, and the results 

 they achieve are compared with those of the Danish 

 farm manager, the amount of leeway we have to make 

 good at once becomes apparent. But then the Danish 

 farm manager, in the first place, is a well-educated man ; 

 and, secondly, he undergoes years of training before 

 he is entrusted with the management of a farm. 



Even supposing the system of labour-managers under 

 the State is developed— and this may be described as 

 the nationalization of the agricultural industry, as distinct 

 from the nationalization of the land— all labourers, even if 

 qualified, could not be managers. And from the point 

 of view of labour, will the labourer-manager be any better 

 than the tenant-farmer-manager of to-day ? It is 

 notorious that the labourer, who rises to the position of 

 manager in any industry, is often the hardest task-master 

 of all. I am not here defending the tenant farmers ; a 

 large proportion are bad farm-managers, chiefly because 

 of defective education and training. So again we come 

 back to education. 



Putting aside the question of nationalizing the land 

 or the industry, 1 too large a question to go into here 

 and unprofitable for it would only be discussing wild 

 experiment based on no concrete precedent — let us sum 

 up certain points in regard to the tenure of land. 



(i) The great estates are in process of breaking up, 



1 See Appendix No. VII. 



