SETTLING THE SOLDIERS.

Pahiatua Herald, Volume XXI, Issue 5352, 8 February 1916, Page 6

SETTLING THE SOLDIERS.

ACTION IN ENGLAND.

Electric Telegranb—Press Association. Copyright. Londo7i, Last Night. A committee set up by the Board of • Agriculture, which investigated post war-land settlement, especially for soldiers who have been disabled, reports the unanimous conviction that the scheme-of attracting <a Ijarge population to the land of Britain is urgently required.

The committee recommends the immediate establishment of three pioneer colonies in Britain, aggregating five thousand acres under expert guidance, with club rooms, women's institutes and entertainment halls, thus abolishing the past dullness of rural life. It recommends the Government to make the first grant of two mil lons sterling to cany out the scheme. The existing machinery of the Small Holdings Act is inadequate for new needs. Only fifteen hundred applicants have been received for land in the past seven years. An ideal settlement is a village community of a hundred farmers and others engaged in subsidiary agricultuTiai trades. A minimum of a thousand should 1h» set aside for fruit and vegetable settlements and a minimum for dairying and mixed holdings of two thousand acres.