The Department of Agriculture for Scotland
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9299.1949.tb02704.x |
| Date | 01 December 1949 |
| Published date | 01 December 1949 |
| Author | Patrick Laird |
The
Department
of
Agriculture
for
Scotland
By
SIR
PATRICK
LAIRD,
C.B.,
F.R.S.E.
Agriculture is the oldest industry in
the country and it is natural, there-
fore, that we can find traces of agri-
cultural legislation right back to very
early times; but
it
was not until
1889
that a Government Department
in the modern sense was set up to deal
Myth agricultural affairs. The Board of
Agriculture established in that year
was responsible for the administration
of agricultural legislation for the whole of
Great Britain. (It did not cover
Fisheries until 1903.) The Secretary
for
Scotland, a Minister first appointed
in
1885,
was to be a member of the
Board, but as the Board never met he
had not much say in its work, and it
was not until 1911, when the Board of
Agriculture for Scotland was constituted,
that the interests of Scottish agriculture
came into the hands of a Scottish
Department responsible to the Scottish
Minister. The new Board took over the
powers and duties in relation to Scottish
agriculture which the Grest Britain
Board had previously exercised, with
the notable exception of the admini-
stration of the Diseases of Animals Acts.
It
also inherited powers from the
Congested Districts Board, which had
been established in 1887 to administer
certain services
for
the benefit
of
the
Highlands and Islands, and which
ceased to exist when the Board of
Agriculture was appointed.
The Board of Agriculture, like several
orhers in Scotland, was a real Board,
consisticg
of
experts appointed from
outside the Civil Service, who, however,
were
certificsed
oa
appointment. The
staff cocsisted
of
Civil Servants recruited
in
the ordinary way, but did not include
an
"
Administrative
"
cadre as such.
The system of
"
Admiaistrative Boards
"
mas condemned in
1914
by the Royal
Commission on the Civil Service
(Fourth
Report,
paragraphs
67-71)
2nd
the Haldane Cnmmittee on theMachinery
of
Governmei
t
(1
31
8)
;
and in
1928
the
Secretary
of
Stzte for ScoTland (Sir
John Gilmour) got an Act through
Parliament which abolished the Board
of Agriculture and two other similar
bodies, substituting Departments
on
the more usual model with a single
permanent Head. The powers of the
superseded Boards were transferred to
the new Departments
"
acting under the
direction and control
"
of the Secretary
of State,
not
to the Minister himself;
and another ten years passed before
this somewhat anomalous position was
rectified and the powers transferred
to
the responsible Minister (Reorganisation
of
Offices (Scotland) Act, 1939).
The effect of this last-mentioned Act
was to leave the Secretary of State free
to
draw departmental boundaries as he
wished. But
so
far there has been
no
occasion to alter materially the spheres
of
duty of the four Departments for
which he is responsible. These are
the Scottish Home Departmenql Scot-
tish Education Department, Department
of Agriculture
for
Scotland and Depart-
ment of Health for Scotland. (The
Department
of
Health
is
also the
Scottish equivalent of the Ministxy
of
Town and Country Planning.)
If the first Chairman of the Board
of
Agriculture (Sir Robert Wright) were
to rise from the grave, it is
wt
only
the
administrative changes in the scene
that would surprise him. The work
also has changed out
of
all recognition.
He would still see the Department
deeply involved in the dwclopmcnt
(far beyond even his hopes) of agricultural
education and agricultural research
;
and he would still see a considerable
amount of work going
on
in the admini-
stration of well-established Acts snd
services such as those relating to destruc-
tive insects and pests, relaths
of
landlord and tenant, land improvement,
fertilisers and feeding stuffs, and the
development of the crofting areas.
But
,
what a variety
of
new tasks, and con-
sequently what
a
change of emphasis
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