Sir George Gillett, the new Commissioner for the Special Areas,
last week gave his approval to a scheme recommended by Mr. Malcolm Stewart in his last Report, for removing unemployed families from the depressed areas to more prosperous districts in the Midlands and the South of England-. Under the scheme, elderly unemployed men with families will be settled on cottage homesteads, with single detached houses and half an acre of land : rentals of 10s. 6d. a week will be arranged, giving a return of about 3f per cent. on the money invested ; the men will be provided with £20 of capital for raising vegetables, fruit and poultry, and while they are unemployed will continue to receive unemployment pay. A start will be made with 250 homesteads, at a (Kist of £125,000, which will be met by the Special Areas Fund. - The advantages of the scheme- are clear. It will remove from the depressed areas elderly men who are unlikely to find work again ; and it will allow their children to grow up in districts where employment is plentiful. On- these grounds it is to be recommended ; yet this, like all removal schemes, has its unfortunate aspect. For it is always the most energetic and able who volunteer for them, and,- in this case, the loss of the best of the older generation, long settled in areas which culturally and socially have owed much to them, be appreciable. -
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