Now, assuming that we can keep our foreign trade, and assuming that we can get more food by foreign trade than we could produce by the same amount of work, is it quite certain that we are making a good bargain when we desert our fields for our factories?
Suppose men can earn more in the big towns than they could earn in the fields, is the difference all gain?
Rents and prices are higher in the towns; the life is less healthy, less pleasant. It is a fact that the death-rates in the towns are higher, that the duration of life is shorter, and that the stamina and physique of the workers are lowered by town life and by employment in the factories.
And there is another very serious evil attached to the commercial policy of allowing our British agriculture to decay, and that is the evil of our dependence upon foreign countries for our food.
Of every 30 bushels of wheat we require in Britain, more than 23 bushels come from abroad. Of these 23 bushels 19 bushels come from America, and nearly all the rest from Russia.
You are told at intervals—when more money is wanted for battle-ships—that unless we have a strong fleet we shall, in time of war, be starved into surrender.
But the plain and terrible truth is that even if we have a perfect fleet, and keep entire control of the seas, we shall still be exposed to the risk of almost certain starvation during a European war.
Nearly four-fifths of our bread come from Russia and America. Suppose we are at war with France and Russia. What will happen? Will not the corn dealers in America put up the price? Will not the Russians stop the export of corn from their ports? Will not the French and Russian Governments try to corner the American wheat?
Then one-seventh of our wheat would be stopped at Russian ports, and the American supply, even if it could be safely guarded to our shores, would be raised to double or treble the present price.
What would our millions of poor workers do if wheat went up to 75s. or 100s. a quarter?