WUAT ONLOOKERS THINK OF FREE-TRADE 49 



mark how carefully they avoid all reference to the land as a 

 factor in the most burning social question of the day. 



It is patent enough to the po(;rest intelligence that there is 

 something fundamentally wrong with the system upon which 

 our social and economic arrangements work. 



lb is seen that, in spite of all effort on the part of Govern- 

 ment, of all social and industrial effort on the part of the 

 people, of the enormous contributions from the public purse, 

 and of the still greater aid from private sources, poverty of an 

 alarming type still falls upon the people as a curse ; that work 

 is difficult to get and liard to retain, and that the entire social 

 and economic condition of the people is deplorable. 



It is seen that in Germany and other European States there 

 is very little poverty, that work is abundant, wages good, and 

 the general condition of the people, in these respects at least, far 

 better than with us. 



It is noticeable that this difference is due to the fact, and to 

 one fact only, that in all these countries the Land is the staple 

 industry, and all others are subordinate to it. 



Intolerable Strain of Present Situation 



It is patent to all men that the intolerable strain of the 

 present situation can never be relieved by perpetuating the 

 wrong-headed policy of the last fifty years or so. 



Seven hundred and twenty millions sterling in poor-rates 

 have been raised since the Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834 

 came into operation, and who shall say that the country is 

 better for these squandered millions, or that the position of the 

 people has improved ? * 



Will Government give tax-payers a substantial guarantee 

 that the three to four hundred millions that tliey will exact 

 from them during the next ten years will do more good tlian the 

 two hundred and ninety-six millions which they have paid into 

 the State coffers during the lad ten years ? 



Can Government give the country any assurance, worth the 

 paper it is written on, that Pills of the type of their Scottish 

 Small Holdliujs Bill, or their Small Holdings Bill for England, 

 would really and permanently relieve the poverty of the people, 

 generally improve tlie position, and reduce, even by a trifle, the 

 heavy burden of poor-rates ? 



Is there a single statesman in Parliament, or out of it, \\-ho, 

 calmly and dispassionately viewing the position and nicely 



* Mr. Jolin Burns stated in the House of Commons on September 29, 1909, 

 that £597,000,000 had actually been sjjcnt on poo? ?eUef d,u?ing the last 

 seventy-five years. 



