Liberal welfare reforms

David Lloyd George and Winston Churchill led in designing and passing the reforms, and building nationwide support.

Historian G. R. Searle argues that the reforms had multiple causes, including "the need to fend off the challenge of Labour; pure humanitarianism; the search for electoral popularity; considerations of National Efficiency; and a commitment to a modernised version of welfare capitalism."

By implementing the reforms outside the English Poor Laws, the stigma attached to a needy person obtaining relief was also removed.

The Liberals led first by Henry Campbell-Bannerman and later H. H. Asquith won a landslide victory and began introducing wide-ranging reforms as soon as they took office.

[3] In 1902 Conservatives passed the Education Act that provided funds for denominational religious instruction in Church of England and Roman Catholic schools.

[6] The brewers controlled the pubs and organised a stiff resistance, supported by the Conservatives, who repeatedly defeated the proposal in the House of Lords.

[7][8] In 1906 a major education bill failed to pass, to the annoyance of Nonconformists Protestants who were angry that since 1902 local rates were used to support Church of England schools.

But the bitter defeat of their highest priority now became a factor in their loss of enthusiasm for the Liberal Party, and played a key role in its decline.

Recruitment for the Second Boer War demonstrated the undernourishment and illness among the working classes, and there were fears over future generations being unable to maintain military control of Britain's empire.

To be eligible, they also had to have lived in the country for 20 years or more, so many immigrants could not claim a pension, or British people who had worked abroad and returned to Britain to retire.

[33] In 1908, a shipbuilding programme for that year was accelerated to boost labour demand, while loans sanctioned by the Local Government Board since the early summer for 'works of public utility' (such as street improvements, waterworks, and sewerage) had exceeded £700,000.

Regulations introduced that same year concerning the heading of yarn dyed by means of a lead compound prohibited the employment of young persons and prescribed the medical examination "of all workers in the process once every three months".

The Employers’ Liability (Insurance Companies) Act of 1907 provided extra safeguards to workmen entitled to compensation under various existing laws.

[36] Improvements in conditions for postal workers[37] and dockyard employees were made, while reductions in the standard working hours on certain railways were carried out following a 1907 agreement.

The town planning powers conferred have had far-reaching results in preventing congestion in un- built-on areas.”[41] In 1909 the construction of back-to-back houses was finally forbidden.

[14] The 1910 Census Bill sought to obtain more information "about both family structure and urban conditions in order for the government to develop policies to tackle problems such as infant mortality and slum housing", while administrative reforms were carried out that by 1913 "had resulted in a more effective deployment of medical staff in the infirmaries".

Although only a minority of workers were insured by this scheme, it nevertheless covered a number of trades and industries, such as shipbuilding, which were particularly vulnerable to fluctuations in employment.

The scheme safeguarded health and made Britain a fitter nation, while doing much to accustom wage earners to medical attention.

[50] Under the leadership of David Lloyd George Liberals extended minimum wages to farm workers starting in 1909 then succeeding in 1924.

[51] After the two general elections of January and December 1910, the Liberal Party did not have a majority in the House of Commons and was reliant on the support of the 80 or so Irish Nationalist MPs to remain in office.

[53] The Factory Workshop (Cotton Cloth Factories) Act 1911 provided the Secretary of State with the power to make regulations to improve conditions in cotton cloth factories in relation to ventilation and humidity, while the Labourers (Ireland) Act 1911 applied the dormant portion of the Irish Suitors' Fund to the purposes of the Labourer's Cottages' Fund, while bestowing authority upon the Irish Land Commission "to extend the limit of advances which may be made" for the provision of allotments and houses from £4.5 million to £5.5 million, while also providing further powers for the demolition of unhealthy cottages.

[57][58] The Public Health (Prevention and Treatment of Disease) Act 1913 empowered local authorities to formulate tuberculosis schemes,[59] while a Trade Union Act passed that same year clarified the legal position of trade unions while also restoring their political power, together with the financial position of the Labour Party.

[60] while the Criminal Justice Administration Act passed that same year compelled magistrates to allow for sufficient time to be made for paying fines.

In addition, new provisions for maternity centres, sanitoriums, and ancillary health services under the 1911 national insurance bill were introduced,[27] together with £4 million in loans for local authority housebuilding.

[61] The Liberal reforms were funded by David Lloyd George passing his Finance Bill (that he called "the People's Budget") which taxed the "rich" in order to subsidize "working" citizens and the ill and injured.

I cannot help hoping and believing that before this generation has passed away, we shall have advanced a great step towards that good time, when poverty, and the wretchedness and human degradation which always follows in its camp, will be as remote to the people of this country as the wolves which once infested its forests.

However, as a result of the dispute over the Budget, the new government introduced resolutions (that would later form the Parliament Bill) to limit the power of the Lords.

[65] The Prime Minister, H. H. Asquith, asked Edward VII to create sufficient new Liberal peers to pass the Bill if the Lords rejected it.

Edward VII had died in May 1910, but George V agreed that, if necessary, he would create 500 new Liberal peers to neutralise the Conservative majority in the Lords.

[70] The welfare measures introduced by the Liberal government concerning the sick, the elderly, and the children did, however, lead to a reduction in poverty, with the total number of paupers falling from 916,377 in 1910 to 748,019 by 1914.