Not at all (I have an allotment in London). The rules are there because allotments are supposed to be for you to grow food for your own consumption, rather than as commercial small holdings. People sometimes break this rule and you will see a plot that is dedicated (say) entirely to onions.
The sites aren't designed to keep livestock on either, and they are small enough that you have to be a bit careful with hives disturbing neighbours.
allotments are supposed to be for you to grow food for your own consumption, rather than as commercial small holdings
Yes, this is the exact point I am making.
Re:Winning a London Garden Allotment
by londons_explore on Saturday July 30, 2022 @07:11PM
(#32291306)
Indeed - the traditional purpose of allotments is to try to make sure the commoners can feed themselves, so they do not revolt, but cannot become rich.
It would be difficult to police. They just don't want carts with vegetables for sale in the street.
I suspect a lot of the produce would be bartered, away from prying eyes.
> Note the strict bar on using the allotment to improve your economic situation. I laugh at the idea that property rights create freedom because the history of property rights is one of property owners acquiring more property by force.
Allotments are very much not property rights (or at least, they're a much more limited form of ownership than land titles); they harken back to the tradition of common land. Property rights advocates argue that enclosure and sale of land (that could be used freely by its owner) is a better model. So I don't follow your point at all here.
The point is that property owners (the ones granting the allotments to keep the poor quiet) are the ones forbidding the use of the allotments for commercial gain.
Again, allotment holding is distinctly not property ownership. So it's strange to hold this up as an example of property ownership causing oppression when it's the opposite (unless you consider e.g. a feudal lord's position as being "property ownership", which it really wasn't). The point of the claim that property rights create freedom is that a model in which even the poor get to own land outright is far better than the model of sharecroppers/tenant farmers/serfs.
Re:Winning a London Garden Allotment
by Doctor_Fegg on Saturday July 30, 2022 @07:37PM
(#32291474)
It's certainly not a universal rule. I used to chair our town council, we had two sets of allotments, and we were very happy for people to sell their produce if they wanted to.
Note the strict bar on using the allotment to improve your economic situation. I laugh at the idea that property rights create freedom because the history of property rights is one of property owners acquiring more property by force.