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Sir Arthur Boscawen and Agriculture. [Oct., 



did a great deal more harm than good. Although as Parlia- 

 mentary Secretary to the Ministry he had piloted the Agricul- 

 ture Act through the House of Commons, it was certain that 

 the country, which was pre-eminently an industrial one, would 

 not pay heavy subsidies to the agricultural interest, and indeed 

 it could not afford to do so. He had come to the conclusion 

 that to make agriculture a spoon-fed industry and to couple 

 this with wholesale Government control and interference was 

 the wrong way of proceeding. 



Assistance must be given in other ways, and his idea was 

 that they should look rather to an extension of credit facilities 

 to enable permanent improvements to be carried out and to 

 help farmers in the conduct of their business and also to 

 lightening the crushing burden which fell on agricultural land. 

 Something had been done this year by the change in the 

 valuation for Income Tax, but more would have to be done. 

 He was working himself on these lines, and he could assure 

 agriculturists that they were not without sympathisers in the 

 Government. It was recognised that the gradual destruction 

 of country life and the drain of the rural population into the 

 towns was a grave danger to the country. He should like to 

 see a great extension of smallholdings, with easy facilities for 

 the purchase of their holdings by their occupiers so as to build 

 up a race of peasant proprietors. Smallholdings could often 

 be made to pay when large farms would not. 



One thing from which farmers and consumers alike were 

 certainly suffering was the excessive profits made by middle- 

 men. He had been preaching co-operation for years, but so 

 far not with very great results. But what could be done when 

 farmers acted together was shown by the recent agreement 

 made with regard to milk prices, on which he congratulated 

 the National Farmers' Union. Beyond all things co-operation 

 ■and goodwill between landowners, farmers and labourers was 

 essential. All were suffering alike now. 



In this connection he called attention to the fact that most 

 of the Conciliation Committees, which had been a great success 

 up to date, would be revising their agreements in the next few 

 weeks. When things went wrong and prices fell, the tempta- 

 tion to the farmer to make drastic cuts in wages, which repre- 

 sented nearly half his costs, was very great, but he hoped and 

 indeed felt sure that notwithstanding their difficulties farmers 

 would be reasonable and would not attempt to drive wages 

 down below the subsistence level. If they did, they would 

 entirely alienate public opinion, and there would be an instant 



