LAND CAMPAIGN.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XLI, Issue 13298, 6 February 1914, Page 3

LAND CAMPAIGN.

i LLOYD GEORGE AT GLASGOW. THE SLUM AREA. A TILT AT THE DUKES. VALUATION REVELATIONS. . (Press Assn.— By Telegraph— Copyright.) LONDON, February 5. Mr Lloyd George, speaking at Glasgow, said that although there were substantial differences m agricultural conditions m Scotland and England, there was the same great underlying principle — that Providence created land for the benefit of all. Despite greater agricultural difficulties, wages m Scotlnad were higher than m England, and the Scottish laborers were more intelligent and more independent than the English laborers. He said that the housing problem m Scottish towns was worse than m English towns, and infantile mortality was appalling. It would cost Glasgow above a quarter of a million to clear her slum area, which the landlords should be compelled to clear as a nuisance. He urged that they must make the land contribute on a basis of its real value. The Duke of Montrose had extracted £2000 a year though the purchase on a basis of his contribution to the rates for the land for the Glasgow waterworks. The Admiralty was forced to pay £27,225 for 10 acres for the torpedo depot at Greenock, assessed at £11 an acre. The Duke of Sutherland had thrown m every crag and every mountain at 22s 6d per acre. . He wanted I £479,000 for a lean, scraggy end. of hia thuge joint, while his trustee valued his million acres for probate at £400,000. [ Never was. there such, a case since Ananias and Sapphira! j In the great cities there were quagmirea of misery, seething, , rotting and fermenting, but there was an ominous rumbling, and the chariots of retribution were drawing nigh. He could see the dawn of a resurrection of an oppressed people^ — the sun of that resurrection was gilding the house-tops. The Government, he continued, hoped to formulate a scheme which, without unduly disturbing those using the land properly, would place the burden on the right shoulders.