42 THE RURAL PROBLEM 



opening for a sound business on Socialist lines, conducted 

 for use and not for profit by the Community itself, a business 

 which might soon be developed so as to provide not only 

 cottages, but larger houses as well. 



The chief value of grants-in-aid is that they become ale ver by 

 which the central authority can force the local authority into 

 action. And in this case the lever should be drastically used. 

 For instance, the State should issue peremptory instructions 

 for an expert survey * by an officer of the District Council, 

 acting with an officer to be appointed by the Local Govern- 

 ment Board. No grants for any service should be receivable 

 by the District Council, or Board of Guardians, after six 

 months from the passing of the Act, until such survey is 

 presented. It should also make peremptory provision that 

 any deficiency in sanitary dwellings revealed by such survey 

 shall be made good by new cottages, by whomsoever built, 

 within a year from the survey. The District Council must 

 build if no one else does, and should receive loans at the 

 lowest rate of interest f from the Public Works Loan Board 

 for the full cost, and sinking fund. It should also receive 

 annual grantsj equal to the whole paid for sinking fund and 



* Such a survey, periodically revised, is in practice in Holland, 

 Germany, France, and Belgium. 



f The rate of interest is most important, as it is fixed periodically 

 by a Treasury Minute, and has been as low as 2| per cent., and as high 

 as 4J per cent. The difference, namely, 1J per cent., would make a 

 difference of Is. 2d. per week in the rent of a £200 cottage. The Report 

 of the Select Committee points out that the Post Office Savings Bank 

 Depositors only receive 2\ per cent, on their money, amounting at that 

 time to £150,000,000, and that the Official Trustees had £20,000,000 of 

 charitable funds in hand at 1\ per cent. They suggest that there is no 

 reason why this money should not be employed for so necessary a 

 public undertaking as cottage building. 



% The distinction between annual grants, as here advocated, and 

 capital grants on the lines of the Irish Labourers Acts is important, 

 and is well expressed in a memorial presented to the Prime Minister 

 in July, 1913, bv the Executive Committee of the National Land and 

 Home* League : " We do not advocate a capital grant on the lines of 

 the Irish Labourers Acts, because a rise in agricultural wages, which 

 we believe to be an urgent necessity, would result in a part of the 

 capital expenditure passing into the hands of the local authorities 

 should wages rise sufficiently to allow a payment of economic rents by 

 the agricultural labourer. We therefore advocate instead an annual 

 grant to meet a part only of the loss incurred by local authorities, in 

 order that these authorities may have a motive to raise their rents as 

 wages go up until the cottages are on a commercial basis." 



