Lieut.-Colonel Acland Troyte:

I agree almost entirely with what has just been said, and with what was said by the hon. Member for Normanton (Mr. T. Smith), and congratulate him and those associated with him in the success of their efforts to get an increase in wages for agricultural workers. Every decent farmer wishes to pay as good a wage as possible, but he cannot do so if he does not get a fair price for his products. I hope that the Minister will give attention to the prices of farming products in order to enable the farmer to pay a fair wage to agricultural workers. If some announcement of that sort can be made at once, it will have an encouraging effect among the agricultural community. People seem to think that agricultural workers should have a lower wage than anybody else, quite overlooking the fact that agricultural workers are skilled, and are entitled to as good a wage as the workers in any other industry.

The thanks of this country are due to the farmers and to the agricultural workers for the splendid way in which they have responded to the appeal which has been made to them for increased production. The thanks of the country are due also to the people who get a good deal more kicks than ha pence, members of war agricultural committees. I am a member of a committee, and I am surprised at the tremendous amount of work done in attending meetings and inspecting farms. Most of these members are farmers, and are all busy men, in spite of which they find time to do a tremendous amount of important work. The work is not always very pleasant, although farmers almost invariably meet us with very good humour. They most willingly do all they can to help us. It is not pleasant when you visit a man who is struggling along and not doing very well, and you have to persuade him to break up a field. You know perfectly well that, after all that work, he will get less profit, although perhaps more production, than if the field were left as it is.

It is not pleasant to go to a farmer and decide that he must be turned out of his farm because his farming is so bad. It is most distressing to have to tell this to a man who may have lived on the farm all his life. He may have been a good farmer, and now, owing to infirmity or age, is unable to keep the farm in proper condition, and he has to be moved out, because of the national emergency. Questions have been put in this House on the subject, and remarks have been made which make it appear that some people think agricultural committees are a bit hard on farmers who are farming badly and that they turn farmers out a bit too quickly, without giving them a proper chance. I can assure hon. Members that that impression is not correct. I regret that I do not agree with a right of appeal being granted, because it would mean delay. When you decide that a farm is in bad condition and ought to be improved, and the man responsible ought to be moved out, you do not want to have much delay for fear you lose the next year's crop. Hon. Members must bear in mind that we are now approaching the third harvest of the war. If farms are not kept in good condition by the present occupiers it is urgent that they should be got into proper condition before the next harvest. We cannot afford that any of our land should produce less than the maximum possible amount of food.

The sympathy of agricultural committees is, I think, practically always on the side of the farmer, perhaps too much so in some cases. I can speak only for my own county, but under the measures adopted there you may be perfectly sure that no man is turned out of his farm unless there is good reason. First of all a farm is inspected by one or two members of the area committee. They report to the area committee, and then two other members from different parts of the district visit it again. They again report, and if it is still thought that the farmer ought to go, two members of the cultivation committee go and inspect the farm again. After all this inspection, the farmer still has the right to appeal to the cultivation committee and to appear before them to state his case. If there is the least hope that he may make good, he is given three or perhaps four months to do so, and is not turned out until that time is past.

There is one way in which the Minister can help agricultural committees a great deal, and that is by letting us have our next year's assessments a good deal earlier than he did this year. This year it was left a great deal too late, which makes matters very difficult. There are some farms which have not been inspected even now. If a man knows that his farm is in bad condition, he will try to get it looking in good order before the committee come round by ploughing up his dirty aristas, and it is then impossible to judge what action should be taken.

The hon. Member who opened the Debate asked whether the ploughing-up policy had been successful. I think there is not the least doubt that up to now it has been successful, but I think we have just about reached the limit of the amount of land that can be turned over, without grave risk to the maintenance of the fertility of the soil. There is very little old pasture left, which, after being turned up, will produce more food than it is producing at the present time. It is not the least use forcing farmers to break up pasture simply in order to say that so many hundred thousand more acres have been ploughed if the result is to be a reduction in food production. The Majority of corn crops in my district will be second-year or in some cases third-year crops. Proper cropping must be maintained, or else we are going to have a great many crop failures. I hope and believe the Minister realises this, but I suggest that when he is allotting the amount of arable land required from each county he should allow for temporary pasture. At the present time he allots a certain number of acres of arable land to each county. That only includes corn, roots, beet and potatoes, but temporary pasture, one or even two grass ley should be counted in this area. Although we cannot expect to keep to the proper rotation in war-time, we must have good farming if we are not going to see a reduction in the amount produced. You cannot go on producing corn time after time without a deterioration of the yield.

Another thing to which attention should be paid is the price of grass seed. I think it is likely to go up very high, and I hope the Minister will put some control on it, because there is a lot of land which will have to be put down to grass. Another thing which is required for the maintenance of soil fertility is sheep. I think we all know that you cannot maintain arable fertility unless you have good flocks of sheep. There are two other difficulties that farmers have to face. One is the shortage of manures. I think the Minister realises this and is doing all he can. The other, of course, is the shortage of labour. I most sincerely hope that the threat to call up a large number of agricultural workers for the army will not be put into effect. It is most important that we should be able to maintain our skilled workers on the land. It is impossible to increase arable land without labour to work it, and substitute labour cannot be obtained. I know we shall be told to use the Women's Land Army. The Women's Land Army have done most excellent work, but there is a prejudice against them among many farmers and even more so among farmers' wives. In any case there are certain jobs they cannot do.

The Army also gives us a great deal of help, but there are limits to that. Sometimes men are sent for three or four days and then taken away to some other job. The Army have been most helpful in my part of the world, but they also have their difficulties. They want to be told two or three days beforehand when men are wanted, but, of course, that depends on the weather, and a farmer may say he wants men on a certain day only to find that it is too wet, so that when the men arrive they have nothing to do. Schoolboys too have given a good deal of help. As a rule the local authorities have arranged school holidays so as to make the boys available at the times when they have been most required, but I think it is time that education authorities realised that it is a great deal more important, for instance, that potatoes should be put in at the proper time than that schoolmasters should have full classes. Boys should now be allowed to assist even during term time when important work of this kind has to be done.

Then there is the question of pests. The rat pest is one which ought to be dealt with, and I think it would have been better if the Minister had done more about that than he did about the rabbit pest. At the present time I understand that he is trying to force agricultural committees to take on a large number of officials to deal with this pest. It would be a great deal better, and more rats would be killed, if instead of appointing more officials he had offered 2d. or even 3d. per rat tail. There is an Order under which both the farmer and the thresher are responsible for putting netting round ricks that have been threshed. It is important that this should be done, but it should not be a divided responsibility. I think the responsibility ought to be put definitely on one or the other, and in my view it ought to be the threshing contractor.