86 THE MINORITY REPORT 



down land to grass has continued (more than 1,000,000 

 acres having been withdrawn from arable cultivation 

 between 1901 and 1914). This further reduction is 

 still due, at least in part, to the working of economic 

 causes ; the farming industry is as yet far from having 

 recovered the loss of capital sustained during the years 

 of depression and is still suffering from the sense of 

 insecurity then produced. 



21. But part of it is now due to the working of a 

 false economy. In the first place, the supply of labour 

 has now fallen to such a point that its very scarcity 

 tends, in many cases, to restrict and starve farming 

 operations^ and thereby to reduce still further the 

 opportunities for employment on the land. In the 

 second place, the quahty of farm labour is prejudicially 

 affected by the general tendency of the young and 

 adventurous workers to seek their fortunes elsewhere. 

 This rural exodus has been intensified by our system 

 of elementary education, which, whatever its advan- 

 tages, makes a youth seek his career in a wider field 

 than a country village. The old system of fathers 

 training their sons in the technical work of the farm 

 has to a large extent died out ; education has not fiUed 

 the gap, and it is difficult in many districts to obtain 

 skilled shepherds, hedgers, and thatchers. 



Conditions after the War 



22. We consider that unless the steps we advise 

 are adopted, the unsatisfactory conditions of British 



1 Sir Henry Rew, writing in 1913, stated that " it is evident that 

 at the present time considerably more men could find employment 

 on the land than are now available. There certainly appears to be 

 a fairly general deficiency of skilled farm hands." 



