2 JUNE 1928, Page 18

HELP FOR AGRICULTURE

[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR,—As an occupying owner may I thank you for your well-informed and sympathetic article on Credit for Farmers ? Is it possible that the writer has been trying to farm for profit ? No one expected any scheme could provide money for working capital, but we did expect • a Long-Term Credit Bill that would liberate money that is, or might be, locked up in land. It is here where the scheme has caused such disappointment.

The present proposals for providing only two-thirds of the present value of a farm at 5 per cent. plus expenses and sinking fund offer no better terms than can be obtained from a private solicitor. While the landlords enabled the tenant farmer to pull through the hard times in the last century, it

was the country solicitors who helped the freeholder to weather the storm, and often they sustained heavy losses by doing so. If Mr. Guinness cannot make a better offer than the present one he had much better leave things as