made available themselves, because there are no compulsory powers of dealing with adjacent property. I purpose now to show that there exists in London a large demand for such sites.
The Trustees of Mr. Peabody, whose name—although he was not a native of this country—must always be mentioned as that of one of the greatest benefactors that our metropolis has ever had (hear, hear), not only inform me, in the letter I have quoted to the House, that they have been endeavouring without success to get the sites I have mentioned, but they state in their last report that, out of a total fund of 578,000l.—including all the bequests of Mr. Peabody and such profits as have already been received from the dwellings they have built, while they have spent on land 102,000l., and 198,000l. on buildings, making 300,000l. in all—they have still left about 278,000l. available for the purposes of the Trust. There can be no doubt that the Trustees of Mr. Peabody would lose no time in employing that money if they could only meet with the sites which they want, and yet I have shown to the House that such sites exist in great quantity.
Then, I am told by my hon. friend, the member for Maidstone, who will second my motion, that his company have refused money which they would be glad to put to use if they could only get sites. The great difficulty is to obtain sites, and if my right hon. friend opposite (Mr. Cross) sees his way to get over that difficulty, I have no doubt the demands on the part of philanthropists, semi-philanthropists, and those who desire to build for their own private gain, will do the rest. If my right hon. friend would only bring the supply to the demand he would do a great and most useful work.
I am told by the secretaries of other societies and companies that their hands are tied behind them, that they are crippled for want of land. Well, then here we have this plentiful supply of sites, and this demand for sites, and the question is how to bring this demand to touch the supply. It reminds me of cases which used to interest me very much when I was a student of chemistry. When you have apparently in close contact two substances which have a strong affinity for each other, they may remain in contact for years and years without any union taking place; but once apply heat or the electric spark, or some other power which will bring them into more than mere mechanical contact, and you set up an action of an interesting and important character. That electric force can only be applied in this case by the action of Parliament.
