SEEKS LANDLORD'S BLOOD.

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 1977, 6 February 1914, Page 7

SEEKS LANDLORD'S BLOOD.

MR, LLOYD GEORGE BITTER. " FIGHTING SPEECH ON LAND QUESTION DUCAL OWNERS DENOUNCED, " Br T«IiS?CDh-PMt3 Aecoolatloii-OoßTrlElit- ■ (Roc. Fototmty 5, 11.85- p.m;) ' London, February 4. Mr. Lloyd-George, Chancellor of the Esclicqufirj opened. the Scottish jmid campaign in a speech at Glasgow. Tho housing conditions in Glasgow and Edinburgh, fro said, were appalling. The death rate was double and treble that of other working-class towns. ■ Although there were substantial differences between agricultural condition? in Scotland and England, there was tho same great underlying principles that I'rov'dorico had erea'id the huiti for tho benefit-of all. Despite greater agricultural difficulties, wages' in Scotland ivero higher than iii England, and tho Scottish labourer Was mOi'e intelligent and more independent than his English brother. Tlio housing problem Hn Scottish towns, however,, was w-oi'se than, in England, and tho infantile mortality if as appalling. it had cost Glasgow- a quarter of a million to clear a slum ai-fea which tlio landlord s'hotihl liavn been compelled to clear as a, nuisftnee. They nvnst mnko the land contribute on tlio basis of its real value. The Duko of Montrose had extracted two thousand years' purehaso —on, tho basis of his contr.'iitjutioi.i to the rates—for tho land acquired from him for the Glasgow waterworks. The Admiralty had been foreed'to pay £27,225 for ten acres for a torpedo depot at Greenock, which was assessed for rating at £11 per acre. Tho jDuk'o of Sutherland, in his recent offer to sell his estate to tlio !Go(vorn.mont, <l(&d thrown in every crag and every mountain at 225.' Gd. per acre, He d'anted £479,000 for the Jeaitj scraggy end of .bis huge joint, while his trustees valued his million, acres for probate at £400, There had sever been such it case siivce the days of Ananias and Sapphira. \. .In the great cities, tlle.ro ivero quagmires of human misery seething., rotting, and fermenting, but tlwro iyas an ominous rumbling, aiid tho chariots of retribution were drawing nig'h.- Ho could see tho (lirivn of tlw resurrection of the oppressed people, and tha sim of-that resurrection wis gilding tho house-tops. The Government hoiind to formula to a scheme, which, without unduly disturbing those* using land properly, would piafio tlw burden on tho right shoulders, . ,