We are interested to read some remarks in the East
Anglian Daily Times on Mr. John Burns's common-sense policy at the liollesley Labour Colony. It will be remembered that this colony, established by a philanthropic American, was taken
over as a tax-supported institution when it was abandoned by its founder. Mr. Burns, with the high sense of responsibility to the taxpayer which he has always displayed, has been trying to make the place a training-ground for men who may ultimately become independent in Canada and elsewhere, instead of a flower and fruit farm staffed by unemployed builders and dockers from London, who would enter into a hopeless (and cruel so far as it was not hopeless) competition with expert agriculturists. It is possible to supply quickly the rough training necessary for an emigrant, it is impossible to turn dockers temporarily into expert market-gardeners. But Mr. Burns has been bitterly attacked by Socialists for missing what is regarded as a great Socialistic opportunity. There is no objection to expenditure on a labour colony if it saves the taxpayer in the long run, but there is the gravest objection to perpetuating an unprofitable expenditure, and that is what labour colonies generally mean. Hr. Burns perhaps suffers more acutely than any one from the more or less unavowed tug-of-war between Liberalism and Socialism. He is in a very difficult position, and requires all the support he can get from sane people in his courageous policy.
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