Nelson Evening Mail WEDNESDAY, MARCH 26, 1913. BRITISH LAND PROBLEM.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XLVIII, Issue XLVIII, 26 March 1913, Page 4

Nelson Evening Mail WEDNESDAY, MARCH 26, 1913. BRITISH LAND PROBLEM.

ROME time ago the British Government sot up a commission to inquire into the conditions of life in the rural districts, and the effect of land tenure upon industries, both in town and country, and upon the lot of the people engaged in thofc industries. At a recent meeting;, when Mr. Lloyd George launched his land campaign, he said'-: "It has been suggested that we are conducting a sort of secret /and a clandestine i.nqniry into the private and personal affaire, of a number oi" landowners, with a view of making political and personal attacks upon our political opponents: • Nothing was fiu-Cliei- from' our mind?. Docs any-

one seriously challenge the right of any politician to institute inquiries into the working of the land system of this country which is so.vital to our national life? The very conditions of which we complain in rural life make it almost impossible you should get free and unlettered evidence by means of official inquiries. The people who are. suffering the most are the people who fear the most. We wanted to know what they were thinking. We wanted, to know what they were enduring. Above everything, we wanted to know what they were expecting and what we are to do for them. We circulated a very careful, complete, and searching questionnaire — a very scientific one—one which was prepared by some of the ablest investigators in Great Britain. Eveil hostile papers admitted that it was an able document,"

The results of the investigation have been received by the Government, and the Chancellor thus referred to them : "Speaking quite deliberately, quite calmly, 1 venture to say that those results are startling. When those results are published they will prove conclusively that there are hundreds, thousands, it not millions, of men, women, and children depending upon the land in this country-; engaged in cultivating it-hard-working men and women—who are living under conditions in regard to wages. housing, as well as hours of labour, which ought to make this great Empire hand its head in. shame that such things should, be permitted to happen in any corner of these dominions let aW in this country, the centre and the source of all its glory. It does not, this rich, proud Empire, pay its children who in the oast have maintained and built up its glory, upon whom we have to depend in future against every foe, •enough to keep themselves, their wives and their children, from living above a state of semi-starvation."

While not disclosing the methods it was proposed to adopt, Mr stated that the policy would be "for the veneration of rural life and the emancipation of the land of this country from the paralysing grip of ™ effete and unprofitable system" ; and he did not m tend to rest till he had at least com- : pellcd attention to the subject. A I Treat conservative landowner," he told Ihs audience, "came to me the other ! I do not think he will mind mxe ! peating what he said : 'I have no doubt, iL said, 'that when your proposals come lout I shall condemn them. All the same, ! I am glad you have taken this in hand | It will' create in politics an agricultural 'atmosphere, and I have .been waiting for I that for some time, mat you want is to call attention to the grievances,- the Lron*. the ineptitude of the present I system. There is-plenty, of common sense I in the country to P«t the matter Tight. Th- land of Britain," the Chancellor I went on to say, vis held under conditions kvhich positively discourage capital and I brains bein e invested in ita . develop, Iments..' That land industry, which ought ! to be virile, healthy, independent, pros- '• perous, is under a system, which pcsi- ! t i\~lv discourages prosperity among its I cultivators, saps their independence, and J undermines their vitality. This we can 'substantiate by overwhelming and ir- ! refutable evidence. It is a condition of things which demands the immediate attention of every man who loves his native land and every man who has any heart and sympathy with humanity m despair. The land is the greatest, it is the most essential, of our national assets. It is .common ground, and. at the present moment it is not used to the best advantage in the interests of the community, and we are rapidly reaching a point when the gross waste of our I national resources—humaTi energy human life involved in the perpetuation of that system, means national weakness and national peril." When the last, mails 'to hand left:' England the press was actively engaged, in discussing the pr6r bable line of action that.would" be taken by the 'Government, for the amelioration "of the lot of the rural workers, and it may safely be said that the ball having been.set rolling, the land campaign will overshadow all other Britisli home political questions. Both the great are alive to the necessities of the case, though there will undoubtedly be a. wide diversity of views when it conies to the devisinj; of a solution of the land problem.