Part of Orders of the Day — Old Age Pensions. – in the House of Commons at on 19 December 1919.
I should like to say a word in support of the remarks of the hon. Member for East Edinburgh (Mr. Rogge). I would be quite willing, and I believe the landlords might. have been quite willing, to leave the matter to the discretion of the Board of Agriculture, who, after all, are sensible men, but there are exceptional cases such as my hon. Friend referred to with which I am acquainted and connected with which I have had correspondence, where it might be hard, and would be a disabling enactment from the point of view of providing small holdings or extending existing holdings. If some loophole could be devised by the ingenuity of my right hon. Friend so that cases of that kind could be provided for, it would be an advantage. No one wants to disturb unnecessarily home farms or the demesne of the mansion house, but something must be done, seeing that the discretion of the Board of Agriculture is not approved by the House of Lords, taking up the cue of the hon. Member for Ayr Burghs (Sir G. Younger). I think some modification might be made.