BRITISH POLITICS.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXX, Issue 8451, 30 May 1907, Page 5

BRITISH POLITICS.

THE ARMY BILL. Received May 29, 10.14 p.m. LONDON, April 29. Mr R. B. Haldane has modified his Army Bill, excluding State school scholars under 16 years of age from the operation of the clause empowering county associations to, establish school cadet corps and rifle clubs. THE BUTTER BILL. Received May 29, 10.19 p.m. LONDON, May 29. The special committee set up to report on the Butter Bill have agreed to Sir E. Strachey's amendment that only milk blended butter should be recognised as a butter substitute; all imitations of butter to be classed as margarine. LAND TENURE BILL. Received May 29, 7.30 a.m. ■ LONDON, May 28. MrJ Louis Vernon Harcourt, First Commissioner of Works, has introduced in the House of Commons a Bill to extend, cheapen, and accelerate the machinery for providing small holdings and allotments in England and Wales. The County Councils are empowered to acquire land compulsorily by purchase or lease, and to sublet such land as allotments or small holdings, creating a class of municipal tenants. The commissioner under the Board of Argiculture is empowered to act where the local authorities fail. When necessary, the purchasing or selling price will be fixed by arbitration. , There is power to raise local loans repayable in eighty years. The Treasury will contribute £IOO,OOO in the first year. The small holdings are not to exceed fifty acres. Allotments are increaded from one to five acres. Mr Harcourt said the Bill would cot set up dual ownership, or confer on the tenantry a saleable tenant right. He did not believe that compulsory acquisition would be widely resorted to. Mr Long, Conservative member for South Dublin, formerly Minister for Agriculture and Irish Secretary, opposed compulsory hiring. Mr Jesse Collings, Liberal-Union-ist member for Birmingham, thought it a mistake to keep small holders in the position of tenants. The Bill was read a first time.