THE LAND ISSUE TO THE EDITOR.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 97, 24 April 1912, Page 10

THE LAND ISSUE TO THE EDITOR.

Sir, — A few days ago you dealt with this important question in un editorial You then advised the Government to pa« 3 a Family Settlemont Act. Li my opinion nothing of any constructive value can be expected from the present Government in Und law reform. It i.s but a temporary expedient designed to give a, bogus Liberal Parly a breathing: fapcll after it sultry battle in which it v.as badly worsted. .But even if the Mackenzie Oovernmont did pass such a Bill, its i-e»ulj;?s- would bo practically niL Tijafc any bysbem of ppastiut ownership cau placo the knd issue on an enduring basis it. v delusion which ha? been abandoned by the most Conservative writers, on tho subject. Mr. Robert A. Yerbuig-h, Unionist M.P., and president of tho Navy League, afttu: an oxhaustivo inveiitigation of peasant ownership in i'rance, concludes that "thero is nothing in it that can prevent reaggregation or stop tho drift to the townß." Lady Saltoun found in her travels that tho pcabant proprietors of France, Denmarfc, Italy, and Savoy are burdenod with mortgages, the interest being equivalent to private rent. The imposition of a stiff land tax minus an exemption clause is the only way to open the .idle acres to productive industry, and to increase tfie sum total of wealth and general welfare.— l am, etc., X W. BURKE.