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Was the extension of the franchise the main reason for changing party…
Was the extension of the franchise the main reason for changing party fortunes in the years 1918–31?
Representation of the People Act 1918 & Equal Franchise Act 1928
Representation of the People Act (1918) - Gave women over 30 who had land the right to vote & all men over the age of 21 the right to vote
Equal Franchise Act (1928) - Gave women over the age of 21 the right to vote
Electorate grows from 5 million people to around 20 million by the end of the 1920s
Why did the Liberal Party Decine?
Theory 2: New Voting Habits
The Liberal Party was unable to adapt to more class based voting habits. The rise of ‘Labourism’ meant that the Labour Party was always likely to grow in popularity.
Working class made up 80% of the voting electorate in 1918 - more inclined to vote for Labour
The Representation of the People act (1918) Labour Party than to the Liberal Party. Whereas just 4.9 million voted in 1910, 10.4 million voted in 1918 and 21.7 million voted in 1929. The new voters were mostly working class.
Theory 3: The 'rampant' omnibus
World War I caused the Liberal Party to have to adopt more ‘interventionist’ policies. This caused a split in the Liberal Party, which weakened them significantly after WW1.
WW1 forced the Liberal Party to drop it's 'traditional policies and forced them to adopt unpopular ones like
conscription, rationing and economic controls
causing them to lose popularity
David Lloyd George
was seen as a class traitor for forming a coalition with the Conservatives. These Liberals supported
Herbert Asquith
who was the Liberal leader before WW1. - this lead to a split in the Liberal Party
'
Maurice Debate
' (1918) - Asquith attacked Lloyd George claiming that Lloyd George lied to Parliament about the number of troops on the Western Front
'
Coupon Election
(1918) - Lloyd George sent '
Coaliation Coupons
' to parliamentary candidates endorsing the Coalition Government in order to keep Lloyd George in power - Liberal (
127 seats
) Conservative (
332 seats
) Coalition formed as a result of these elections
Theory 1: The Pre-War Legacy
The Liberal Party failed to cope with pre-war problems like the
suffragettes
,
trade unions
and
Ireland
. The Liberal Party was blamed for pre-war problems because they were in government between 1906 and 1914.
Failure to deal with the suffragette protests - e.g. force feeding controversy, Cat and Mouse Act 1913 (allowed for the early release of prisoners who were so weakened by hunger striking that they were at risk of death).
Liberals lost control of the Trade Unions -
41 million days were lost to strikes during 1911-1912
. This period is known as the ‘
Great Unrest
’. The number of trade union members grew from 2.5 million in 1910 to 4.1 million in 1914.
The Liberals failed to solve the ‘Irish problem
’, which was that many Irish Catholics wanted to become independent, but Irish Protestants wanted to remain part of Britain. There was lots of violence and this eventually led to two civil wars (1919-1921 and 1922-1923).
Theory 4: Post-1918 Errors
Mistakes made after WW1 made the split in the Liberal Party permanent and damaging.
Rivalry between Lloyd George and Asquith wasn't resoved
Supporters of Lloyd George ejected from the Liberal Party in
March 1920
- Lloyd George had wanted to create an anti-Labour ‘Centre Party’ with Coalition Liberals and Coalition Conservatives - failed because most Liberals didn't want a permanent alliance with the Tories
Conservatives were reunited under Bonar Law while the Liberals were still divided - Controversy around Lloyd George prevented the reunification of the Liberal Party
In 1922, Lloyd George was accused of offering
'Cash of Honors
', which basically meant that he would offer knighthoods or seats in the House of Lords to people who offered money to him or his political group
'
Chanak Incident
' - Lloyd George was accused of being too confrontational with
Turkey
at a time when no one in Britain wanted another war.
Failed to share money with all members of the Liberal Party
-refused to use money to support the political campaigns of MPs who were supporters of
Asquith
.
Liberal Party was very short of money for campaigning and could not afford to offer candidates in all constituencies during the elections of
1922
,
1923
and
1924
- by the 1929 Elections the Liberal Party was united but it was too late as the Labour Party was not the most popular
The Key Politial Figures
Stanley Baldwin (Conservative)
Bonar Law (Conservative)
Herbert Asquith (Liberal)
David Lloyd George (Liberal)
Prime minister between 1916 - 1922
Ramsay MacDonald (Labour)
What was the Labour Party split on in 1931?
Ramsay MacDonald and his closest supporters could not agree on making cuts on spending for unemployment benefits - this division lead to MacDonald forming a '
National Government
with support from the Conservatives (as they could blame all the unpopular economic measures on MacDonald).
In the election of October 1931, MacDonald and his closest supporters ran as a ‘National Labour’ group. Meanwhile, the majority of the Labour Party ran as an opposition party under the leadership of Arthur Henderson.
Non-coalition Labour was not very successfully only winning
52 of the seats as the only got 30.6% of the votes
while the Coalition Government gained
554 of the seats which was 67% of the votes
1)The Labour Government which had run the country since May 1929 was put under
severe pressure by the economic downturn
(caused by the Wall Street Crash)
This 'betrayal' of the Labour Party by MacDonald led to him being expelled from the party along with his supporting ministers
Election timeline 1918-31
December 1918 - The 'Coupon Election'
November 1922
December 1923
October 1924
May 1929 - 'Flapper Election'
October 1931
Reason for election
: Labour Government unable to agree on how to deal with economic problems
Outcome
: National government coalition (Conservative-dominated)
Prime Minister
: Ramsay MacDonald (Labour) [replaced by Stanley Baldwin (Conservative) in June 1935]
Reason for election
: 5 year rule
Outcome
: Labour minority government (with Liberal support)
Prime Minister
: Ramsay MacDonald (Labour)
Reason for election
: Liberal Party refused to support MacDonald as Prime Minister and the Labour Government lost a ‘vote of no confidence’
Outcome
: Conservative majority government
Prime Minister
: Stanley Baldwin (Conservative)
Reason for election
: New Prime Minister Baldwin sought public support for his policy of
tariff reform
-
preferential taxation
on foreign goods to protect domestic interests - Liberals did not like this, believed in
Free Trade
Outcome
: Labour minority government (with Liberal support)
Prime Minister
: Ramsay MacDonald (Labour)
Outcome
: Conservative majority government
Prime Minister
: Andrew Bonar Law (Conservative) [died in 1923, was replaced by Stanley Baldwin (Conservative)]
Reason for election
: Conservatives refused to support Lloyd George’s Government after the Carlton Club meeting
Reason for election
: End of WW1 + 5 year rule [Parliament Act 1911]
Outcome
: Coalition between Coalition Liberal Party (127 seats) & Coalition Conservative Party (332 seats)
Prime Minister
: David Lloyd George (Coalition Liberal)
The Zinoviev letter (1924)
Published in the British Daily Mail 4 days before the October 1924 General Election
Was Written by Gregory Zinoviev who was a leading Soviet politician
It stated that the Labour Party helped promote Communism by recognising the Soviet Union.
It boosted Conservative votes in 1924
J.R. Campbells letter(1924)
Tells working class soldiers to not shoot opposing working class soldiers in any future war.
Campbell was threatened with prosecution because he wrote an article that incited mutiny
Articles in the Communist newspaper Workers’ Weekly
MacDonald used his political influence to have the case dropped.