Mr. Burns, as President of the Local Government Board, has
done a very sensible as well as a very courageous thing in refusing to 'allow the Guardians of the parish of Lambeth to buy an estate of five hundred and sixty-seven acres near Basingstoke for the purpose of establishing a farm colony and sanatorium. The cost of such an experiment would in all probability have been very heavy, and the success most doubtful. We must never forget that under the old Poor Law there were plenty of parish farms for setting the poor on work, and that the results achieved were as a rule most dis- couraging. We are strongly in favour of wise and well- considered measures for keeping the people on the land, and for taking those back to it who are fitted to go back. Again, we should have no objection to seeing . tramps and vagrants compelled to live under strict discipline on farm colonies, where work of a reformatory and recuperative character would be obligatory and desertion severely punished. Between pro. posals of this kind and the purchase of a landed estate by Guardians, to be worked on the principle of unlimited liability there is a world of difference. The ratepayers of Lambeth' may thank Mr. Burns for having saved them from a very serious peril.
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