Explain 2 reasons for the Liberal electoral victory of 1906.

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Explain 2 reasons for the Liberal electoral victory of 1906.

The Liberals won the 1906 election with a landslide victory over the Conservatives. This was due to, amongst other reasons; the impact of Joseph Chamberlain's Tariff Reform and the amount of things that went wrong under Balfour's eye that were blamed on him and the Conservative Party.

The Conservatives made it relatively easy for the Liberals to win. There were a number of reasons that voters deferred to the Liberals party from the Conservatives. After Salisbury retired as Prime Minister in 1902, the Conservatives decided to run a coalition government. This was led by Balfour. He was only appointed as Prime Minister because all of the other candidates were worse. He was the best that the Unionists could produce. "I saw that Balfour was not a great man. He had charm and wit; he could be energetic when he chose, but he chose very seldom; he had a marvellously acute mind, but he feared the logic of its conclusions." The parliament went to pieces around him; many MP's didn't turn up to parliament and he only appointed rich lords into his cabinet.
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The party was further disjointed by the Boer war. The war was hard and it showed up how bad the state of England was. Not enough soldiers in a fit enough condition to fight could be found. The Public blamed the government for the losses and poor state of the army. The Conservative Party was split over policy by the Liberals were united by their hate of the war.

The 1902 Education Act was passed by the Conservative government. Balfour was blamed for this policy because he closely supported it. This didn't make him any more popular ...

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