MR REW ON NORTH DEVON 34 1 



not received a 30 per cent, reduction he would have been 

 ruined, and even vi'ith it he has made a very poor interest 

 on the capital he employs, that he knew of cases where 

 reductions had only been 10 per cent., others where there 

 had been no reductions, and cases where new tenants have 

 had greater reductions than the old ones were offered. 

 Those who had no reductions had fared very badly, are in 

 a desperate position, and near starvation. 



It is obvious, therefore, that Mr Britten admits the whole 

 case on which the proposal of arbitration is based, and that 

 his reply that " tenants have, as a rule, been enabled to take 

 care of themselves " must be taken with much qualifi- 

 cation. 



I regret, further, to note that the passages to a similar 

 effect in Mr Rew's valuable report on North Devon have 

 also been excluded from this chapter in the same way as the 

 passages from Mr Pringle and Mr Speir. 



After stating with precision the complaints made by 

 farmers as to insecurity, the position of the sitting tenant, 

 and the results of competition, Mr Rew goes on : — 



" I am bound to say that it was more common to protest 



against the present rents as excessive, and to say that 



landlords ought to reduce them." 



Resolutions in favour of arbitration in all cases of dispute 



between landlord and tenant, including the question of rent, 



were adopted at meetings at South Molton and Barnstaple.^ 



Mr Rew explains that, in his opinion, those who advocated 



the fixing of rents by an official authority had not thought 



out all the conditions and consequences of their proposals, 



or in all cases made up their minds whether arbitration was 



to be voluntary or compulsory. But they wanted it to meet 



the case of tenants who could not get a fair reduction. 



It is unsatisfactory that the report of the majority ignores 

 the proofs thus afforded in our inquiry that this legitimate 

 demand for reasonable valuation of land for rent is not being 

 met, and ought to be met by some machinery. 



And I submit, further, that the omission to discuss 

 arbitration on its merits, or even to allude to such a scheme 

 of revaluation as that suggested by Mr Gilbert Murray 

 is a grave defect in the report and likely to arouse much 

 doubt as to its adequacy and impartiality. 



In this connection it is a matter of surprise that this 

 ' Rew, North Devon, pp. 17 and 18. 



