Labour and the New Social Order lays down that

The party stands for complete abolition of the House of Lords and for a most strenuous opposition to any machinery for revision of legislation taking the form of a new Second Chamber, whether elected or not, having in it any element of heredity or privilege or of the control of the House of Commons by any party or class.

The Webbs in their Constitution for the Socialist Commonwealth of Great Britain say:

There is, of course, in the Socialist Commonwealth no place for the House of Lords.

It will be gathered from the foregoing extracts that while there is no sympathy with the idea of a Second Chamber which shall have any real control over legislation, it is against the hereditary principle that there is a united and strenuous opposition.

8

The most authoritative of the schemes which have been put forward for the reform of the Second Chamber is that which was drawn up by the Bryce Conference and published in the form of a letter to the Prime Minister (Mr. Lloyd George) from the chairman (Viscount Bryce). The Bryce Report is of special interest owing to the manner in which it deals with the hereditary question. It proposes that the functions of the Second Chamber recommended for adoption shall only be exercised by a reformed Second Chamber, and that the preponderating influence in it should be based upon popular election, direct or indirect.

An historical link between the old and new Second Chambers might be preserved, perhaps temporarily, by the inclusion of a limited number of the present House of Lords, but the hereditary basis would by successive steps give place to an elected basis in the composition of the reformed Second Chamber.

It has been the purpose of this article to show that concession after concession to the trade unions and Socialistic organisations, instead of encouraging a spirit of co-operation for the general advantage of the trade and industries of this country, have resulted, instead, in perfecting a formidable machinery which is to be employed for destroying the very foundations of our complex civilisation and, in alliance with the Red International, for destroying the British Empire (see p. 647, footnote).

That the Parliament Act has put into the hands of the extremists a weapon of deadly potentiality, which will render it a simple matter to destroy the Constitution, bring the country to ruin, and the Empire to dismemberment-by parliamentary procedure.

That the emasculation of the House of Lords has deprived the

• See Second Chamber Reform, published by National Union of Conservative and Unionist Associations.

Vol. XCVIII-No. 585

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people of this country of the constitutional bulwark of their liberties, which has hitherto stood between them and the menace of the abuse of Single Chamber government.

That since the passing of the Trade Disputes Act of 1906 the constitutional forces of the country have been steadily yielding ground to the foe they vainly tried to conciliate until a climax has been reached which finds them driven to their last ditch, with a weakened moral and depleted munitions of war.

If the constitutional forces surrender now, in the face of the supreme effort which is being prepared to destroy them for all time, there will be no recovery, and we shall all go down into the pit which the Red International has dug for us.

F. G. STONE.

1925

POLITICIANS AND AGRICULTURE

SINCE the war various political parties have produced Land policies, e.g., the Independent Labour Party and Mr. Lloyd George's policy, based upon the report of his Committee, entitled the 'Land of the Nation,' which is really the sequel to his Land Report of 1913. On the non-political side the Central Landowners have issued a very full Land policy, so have the Farmers' Union and the Agricultural Council for England and Wales.

First as to the Independent Labour Party agricultural policy. Its main features are the nationalisation of land-a very direct control of cultivators by means of county agricultural committees, working under the direction of Whitehall, and State purchase of all the wheat requirements of the nation. Originally there was some idea of giving rural landowners some compensation for capital in farm buildings and improvements, but nothing for the land itself. The land, being a free gift of God, should be as free as the air we breathe and the water we drink.' However, a large number of the extreme Labourites are against any compensation being given to the landowner (vide the strong resolution passed at the Scarborough Trade Union Congress, where the advocates of confiscation proposed that owners of land should be taxed 20s. in the pound and so turn all rental automatically over to the State). This sounds simple, and, of course, could be enacted by a strong Labour Government, but difficulties, little foreseen by the urban extremists, would arise.

Mr. Lloyd George's main proposal is for State ownership of the land (carrying with it considerable State control). He distinguishes between State ownership and the complete nationalisation advocated, for example, by the Independent Labour Party. The distinction, however, is flimsy, and State ownership would lead naturally and easily to complete nationalisation. What is needed to-day is a sound barrier against unsound experiment. Mr. Lloyd George's proposal in no way provides this. He accedes in one breath to the landowner being compensated on the basis of his net income, but with the next breath he states that adequate wages and the fair remuneration of the farmer

must be first charges on the industry! He might as well have said frankly that he too was not in favour of compensation.

Referring to the Liberal Land Report of 1913, we find the main recommendations and findings are:

(1) Establishment of Wage Boards, and, as a corollary, establishment of a Land Court to fix rents. The latter to function, apparently, only for the reduction of rents, never for an increased rent, even when obviously the rent is below the economic level.

(2) New housing schemes; every cottage should be provided with a garden of a quarter of an acre.

(3) Increase in the number of small holdings is desirable; compulsory powers to be used in acquiring land. Occupiers of such land to be tenants of the county council, the State providing the purchase-money.

(4) That there is evidence of much land being under-cultivated, caused by insecurity of tenure and over-development of sport. (A far more definite cause is the general state of undercapitalisation of the farmers.)

(5) Need for access to credit admitted, but no concrete proposals in regard thereto.

(6) Objection to occupying ownership is made, and State ownership preferred.

(7) The strengthening of the Game Laws, and making it illegal for the landowner to let his shooting rights.

(8) Some relief to local taxation is recognised (somewhat grudgingly) as necessary, but no definite proposals are made, except that in general terms improvements should not be taxed. (9) In favour of co-operation, but no definite proposals. (10) In favour of the development of research and of education.

Coming to the present Lloyd George policy. The main planks correspond with the recommendations of the Land Report of 1913, save that to-day State ownership is being pushed as the principal measure.

The official Liberal Land policy, as evidenced in the recent elections, is too nebulous to deal with in detail, but a most important feature in the official programme was that occupying ownership should be developed. This is particularly interesting, since by tradition the Liberal Party has for years opposed occupying ownership; but the growth of the Labour Party and the increasing strength of the land nationalisers undoubtedly led leading Liberals to realise that this was the only effective barrier to nationalisation. Another Liberal plank has been a pious wish to develop small holdings, as evidenced by the unsatisfactory Act of 1908.

On the other hand, the Conservative Party has neither come out with a comprehensive agricultural policy, nor shown itself definitely

in favour of occupying ownership. But the 1925 policy of the Central Landowners' Association provides one that is the very antithesis to State ownership and all that it involves.

Why are the different political parties going in for land policies? In other countries agriculture has not been the plaything of politicians as in England. For a long time our public took little interest in land or agriculture, but since the Great War a new attitude has arisen. People are beginning to realise that land is one of the greatest of the nation's assets-that it is an asset standing at far below par value-and that it could produce far more food and employ more labour than it now does.

Motoring about the country as people do in these days, the more observant notice large areas obviously (even to the inexperienced) ill-cultivated and under-productive. This feeling will be strongly accentuated if the observer should happen to take a motor tour through any of the Continental countries with an advanced agriculture. I think it proper to admit this. No good end is served by people writing to the papers and saying English agriculture is the finest in the world, or by some urban economists proclaiming that our agriculture is as perfect as it could be.

People of varying degrees of extremist views feel that if only the total rental (the vast sum of 280,000,000l.) could be diverted into the public purse it would mark the beginning of a millennium !

There are moderate men who have seen land around towns needed for developments and improvements held up by the owners -perchance rural owners-whose land runs into the town boundaries. There is a general feeling that our present social and industrial position is so bad that only drastic measures can save us. Hence the suggestion of nationalisation. But in other countries agriculture has been developed by far simpler measures. A complex exists in the minds of many people that the large landowner is absorbing each year millions of pounds of profit to which he has no claim. The social order must be changed, beginning with the man who has visible property, easy to lay hold of.

A number of politicians still urge the removal of abuses which they know have been removed. The honest thing for them to do would be to inform the public that this is the case; but such a course would cut the ground from under their feet, and this they cannot do, since they approach the problem from the political point of view instead of the economic. The former rightly handled, class feelings duly fanned, can turn votes in their favour; to preach the latter would, to a large extent, only bore their urban audience.

Let there be no mistake about it, the large majority of those now taking an interest in the land do so because of the political