I would like to follow the hon. Member for Cardigan (Mr. O. Evans), who has just sat down, by asking the Minister to-day to see that agricultural workers have such special clothing as they need placed at their disposal without coupons and that they have their fair share of any extra-food that may be given to certain workers in the country. Food not only keeps up your strength but it keeps you warm, and it is an important consideration that the agricultural worker, being out of doors in winter, should, if he is to do a hard day's work, be well clothed and well fed. I would like to comment on one other point raised by the hon. Member. It is with regard to forms, and if repetition of this matter can help the Minister to reduce the number of forms, let me repeat that there should be fewer forms and that they should be simplified. The big farmer has to employ clerks to fill them in, and the little farmer has no time and very little inclination to do this job after a hard day's work. I know the difficulties, but if the Minister could put a really able Civil servant on to nothing else but simplifying forms, it would simplify his work as well as the farmer's work.

A special point of interest to my constituents; and no doubt to others, arises where the farm is on a hillside or fell and owing to the nature of the ground it is not possible to plough up very fruitfully. For the same reason the farmer in this situation cannot sell very much milk. It follows that he does not get very many coupons to provide himself with feeding-stuffs for his beasts, and I question whether it is economic and fair to leave the situation as it is. I know the difficulty of extending coupons for feeding-stuffs to any class, but it seems to me that this is a particular class where justice and economy both point to giving them increased feeding-stuffs, because they cannot grow it themselves, and they, after all, are the people who provide the cows which, in turn, provide the milk for the lower ground. The Minister has told me that this matter is under consideration. I want to urge him to give it his sympathetic consideration and to deal with it as quickly as he can.

May I say a word or two about the call-up? I suppose every industry must make sacrifices to the Armed Forces, and I do not think any of us who are interested in the land would wish that this industry should make less than its full contribution, but I would like to emphasise that from the point of view of feeding this nation it may well be said that a man who can grow a ton of food is doing as vital work as a seaman who can bring a ton of food into the country. There are the alternatives. If you do not grow a ton of food you have to ship an extra ton, and it seems to me that the power of the Minister's argument in dealing with the Minister of Labour should be fortified by this House to enable him to point out the absolute necessity of leaving sufficient skilled men beside the unskilled soldiers and women who come in to make up the numbers required to help.

I suppose that everybody welcomes the decision to raise the minimum wage for agricultural workers to £3 a week. I wish to congratulate the Board upon their recommendation and the Government on implementing it. Later in my remarks I shall have something to say indirectly about wages, but at the moment I want to observe that it is supremely important that the Minister should soon, and if possible to-day, assure farmers that this increase in wages will be taken into account in assessing prices for next year, for the farmers cannot be expected to meet this increased charge unless it is so taken into account. While on the subject of prices, I want to make a plea to the Minister and the House to alter to some extent their attitude towards the farmers. It does not do any harm to the country to let the farmer make a bit of money. For long years the farmer has been struggling against a country that did not recognise him and his value, and it is for that reason, among others, that he has been unable to pay better wages. The farmer has been looked upon at less than his value to the nation, and the agricultural labourer has been looked upon as a humble person who ought not to have, and who could not have, more than a very low standard of living. Those conceptions should pass out of our minds. Human nature being what it is, the most economical way to secure increased production is to let those engaged in the industry make some money. If they make too much money, the Chancellor will take it away in taxation, and rightly so; but to feel hesitation about letting them make money is to take the heart out of their work and not to save the taxpayer anything in the long run.

I turn now to post-war considerations, and what I have to say links up to some extent with what I have been saying about the farmer making money. I know that there is a fundamental conflict of political principle between those hon. Members who would like to be assured that the land will remain private property in every sense, with as few restrictions upon the rights of ownership as may be, and other hon. Members who feel that the land situation will never be satisfactory until the land passes into State ownership. It seems to me that a decision of such magnitude as this could be taken only after a period of peace in which its implications and consequences could be fully understood by our people. We are fighting this war to win the freedom to decide such issues for ourselves. We are trying to preserve a system in which a free Parliament, freely elected, may determine such issues. I submit that it is not the kind of issue which it is fruitful to debate now or to decide in a rush election immediately after the war. I do not know whether it would be asking too much of my hon. Friends opposite to suggest to them that that fundamental issue, although it may be placed before the electors by them as one of their goals, is not the kind of issue that should be or could be decided at such a time. If anything approaching that view can be taken by my hon. Friends opposite, could we not, therefore, look forward to a period during which the fundamental issues that will divide the House and the country can be set on one side so that we may arrive at a policy which will have some chance of enduring for a few years. If, after the marvellous unity which we now have in the agricultural industry, we were to break up into controversy on fundamental matters which really are more electioneering than practical issues, it would be a tragedy for the whole of agriculture and for the country.

I submit to the Minister that the time has come for him to recognise in the most formal way that he can that a solution of the post-war problem and a settlement of it on broad lines for five years, perhaps, is one of his most important tasks. I ask him to recognise that, and to show that he recognises it by setting up machinery for giving to this matter wider consideration than is now being given to it. I have no doubt that each of the political parties is considering its post-war policies in all spheres of the country's activities. I have no doubt that the Minister of Agriculture is considering what he may propose to the House at some particular time. I have no doubt that the Minister without Portfolio has on his agenda the future of the land and the future of agriculture. Without knowing any Cabinet secrets, which we ought not to know, we can all guess that these matters are receiving consideration in a variety of places. But there is no focal point at which consideration has been given to this matter. I suggest to the Minister that he should set up the most formal kind of inquiry he can in the shape of a Royal Commission. He may say that this is not the time when one can get the ablest men to sit down and consider these matters. I think they ought to be found, and I think the Minister's influence, and that of the Prime Minister, should be used to find them and charge them with this most important duty.

May I have the indulgence of the House for a few more minutes in order to argue why I think this should be done now? We are bringing into our agricultural system all kinds of new ideas. There are new kinds of controls, new kinds of interferences. We have had to cajole and persuade the farmers, a most independent group of men and, on the whole, a group of men not accustomed to co-operation, to co-operate with one another and with the Government. We have had to overcome all those difficulties that arise the moment you take away natural economic controls and replace them by human controls. If you appoint local people to judge this or control that, they may be suspected of having local friends; if you appoint people from the Ministry to exercise these controls, it is said that you cannot farm from Whitehall—which is profoundly true. Whatever you do, you are in difficulty. The new system has got to work and has become known and understood. The Minister no doubt understands a great deal of what is happening in agriculture now throughout the country. The farmers and farm labourers understand it as it affects them. The general public is beginning to understand a little. Even those who speak for organised labour are showing great political courage.

Only a few days ago, there was in the "Daily Herald" a leading article in which an appeal was made, not to the farmers or farm workers to do this or that, but to town-dwellers to realise the important place which agriculture ought to hold in this country. A statesmanlike appeal was made in the "Daily Herald" calling upon town-dwellers to recognise the obligation that rests upon them to sustain and support British agriculture. I welcome that appeal. If now there is that feeling among town-dwellers, be it born of fear or of a new sense of duty to their fellow men living on the land—never mind what is the motive—and if there is among the representatives of town-dwellers a feeling that a sound agriculture is a sound national asset, surely now is the time, to use a vulgar phrase, to cash in on that sentiment for agriculture. There is a tide in the affairs of men,Which taken at the flood, leads on to fortune, and now is the time when those directly or indirectly interested in the land—landowners, surveyors, shopkeepers in the market towns, farmers and farm workers —should come together to take advantage of the unity of spirit which now exists. In a democracy groups of people with varying interests can only be brought together by stereotyped and regular methods—by publicising what is in your mind. One of the notable methods of calling attention to what is happening—and this would be desirable in this case—is to set up a Royal Commission where public evidence can be taken and where public discussion can be provoked. I ask the Minister to consider whether this procedure should not be adopted.

Science, transport, cinemas, mulitple shops and the wireless have all come to our aid in the last 25 years to make life on the land more agreeable, and now we have added a wage which is reasonable and which in some measure bridges the gap between the low wages of agriculture and the higher wages of industry. If on top of that we can give stability, we shall have ensured that agriculture, instead of fading away, shall remain perhaps our greatest industry. I recently made a close inquiry to discover how the B.B.C. is serving the farming community, and I found that very great attention has been paid to helping the farmer and the farm worker in every possible way. They are being given a greater share of the available time because of the supremely important service they are rendering to the community. Five or six regular programmes are made available to a very large audience, and I feel that a tremendous contribution towards the nation's agricultural problems is being rendered by this movement.

In conclusion, I wish to say a word about the Government generally. The Prime Minister, in opening the Debate, said that he hoped there would be no Amendments to the Address, and that he was not proposing to seek any scalps or submit any resignations in response to popular clamour or outside arguments. I feel that he does well to ask the House to give him a clear, unamended and absolute Vote of Confidence. I am sure most of us feel that we might be able to do a particular job better than a particular Minister—it is only natural that we should. But I cannot help feeling also that there is a great deal to be said for a team which has worked together; they have a corporate spirit and a loyalty engendered among them which it would be a mistake to break up from outside. I feel we should leave it to our Prime Minister to judge who should be his colleagues. The Prime Minister is a man who has his ear to the ground, and we should give him a clean and wholehearted Vote of Confidence.