In May 1903, when Chamberlain returned from a trip to South Africa, he made a speech in Birmingham introducing his ideas of ‘tariff reform,’ the speech not only shocked many of the British people, but also united the Liberal party further, and they exploited Chamberlain’s campaign by enhancing the people’s fears as to what no Free Trade could mean.
The people of Britain were horrified at Chamberlain’s proposition of tariff reforms, as they immediately associated the idea of import taxes, with high food prices. The theory that Free Trade kept food in Britain reasonable cheap was popular, as because of a result of Britain’s Free Trade policy, other countries such as France and Germany reversed their ‘protectionism’ tariffs on Britain.
Apart from these issues another immediate impact of his speech was to divide the Conservative party as what to do, ‘Joseph Chamberlain produced a sweeping panacea [cure-all], a radical bombshell which was to split the Tory Party’ (Pearce and Stewart 1992). Although Balfour tried to find a middle route to appease all members of the party, he did not manage to find one.
Some historians argue that it was the Boer war that transformed the political climate in Britain, ‘the Boer war proved the principle catalyst for change,’ (Lee 1994), as the Conservative part was becoming more unpopular due to several reasons as a result to it.
At the end of the nineteenth century, Britain was involved in the Boer war; this was when some of her colonies in South Africa began rebelling against British rule, this dragged Britain into a war that they were not prepared for. The armed forces began recruiting men for the army, however they soon realised that ‘almost a third of those who volunteered to fight in the conflict had to be turned away on the grounds of physical unfitness.’ (Potter 2000). The working class’ poor health was due to malnutrition, cramped living conditions and poor working conditions. It made underlying problems of British society come to the surface, and they were problems that the Conservative party didn’t offer solutions to.
After the Boer war ended, the people were blaming the government for military incompetence, as the war had gone on a lot longer then was expected and the British army had met a lot more resistance then they thought they would. This created a hostile atmosphere towards the government by the people that would only increase later, when Chamberlain began campaigning for the Tariff Reforms, which split the party. It also stimulated the re-grouping of the Liberal Party after their division of the issue of Ireland. They suddenly became conscious of the problems that were faced at home in Britain and decided international issues and those that were not crucial at the time could be put aside.
Many people believe that the decline of the Conservative Party in the early twentieth century, was because Arthur Balfour was a bad choice for a Prime Minister to replace Lord Salisbury after his death in August 1903. Balfour made many mistakes that caused the party to suffer terribly such as resigning the party from Parliament in 1905. However this alone is not what causes many Historians to think that Balfour was a bad choice for Prime Ministers, other factors, such as his education act, the Taff Vale judgement and the issue of Chinese slavery also contributes to this.
In 1902 Balfour introduced the education act, which allowed voluntary school, which were usually religious schools such as Church of England to be funded by local taxes. It abolished school boards and introduced Local Council Education Committees that were to run schools instead. The problem with this, was that the non-conformists, found the idea that religious schools could be run out of the taxes that they paid offensive. Non-conformists always objected to special privileges of the Church of England. This was supported by the Liberal party, which created more support for the Conservatives opposition.
During the Boer war, the Taff Vale railway company in South Wales refused to grant wage increases to its workers despite the increased profit due to the war. It was asked for theses wage increases by the ASRS trade union, however the Taff Vale Company refused to recognise their right to bargain for a pay rise and the union called a strike. The Taff Vale Company called in ‘blackleg’ labour and took out an injunction preventing the union from picketing. The company then sued the union for damages and compensation and the ASRS were ordered to pay £23,000.
The Taff Vale case annoyed many working class people as their right to strike was undermined as companies could sue for the loss of revenue during the strike. It took away the only power the people had to bargain with and effectively made them slaves
to the companies they worked for, as they could no longer bargain for working rights or wages. It also convinced many trade unionists that they needed a political party to represent the working people, which again drew away support from the conservative party as they lost more votes.
As a result of the Boer war, there was a severe labour shortage in South Africa, due to so many men being killed. As a result of this, the high commissioner agreed to allow 50,000 Chinese people work for the mine owners on low wages. They were housed in camps and suffered desolate living and working conditions. This caused humanitarian concerns as the British people thought it was morally wrong to treat any race differently, especially since slavery had fairly recently been abolished so the issue of inequality was still fresh in people’s minds. Trade unionists also objected to it, as they reasoned that if the British Government let it happen in one of Britain’s colonies, they might quite easily extend the practice to Britain in times of labour shortages and therefore undermine trade unions once again.
The Chinese Slavery issue, enhanced the idea to many people that Balfour was a bad choice as Prime Minister as he ‘ought to have seen its implications, but Balfour was singularly insensitive to any save the most predictable reactions of the working class. (Blake 1985). Balfour did not approve of what the high commissioner had agreed to, yet he still allowed it to go ahead, which was a big mistake as it caused widespread discontent and lost more support for the Conservative party.
The issues of Taff Vale and Chinese Slavery alienated the working class as at the time the support for trade unions was growing, and both issues undermined the power of trade unions. It made the working class loose faith in the Conservative party’s ability to protect their rights as workers and they lost more votes to the Liberal party who promised to reserve the Taff Vale judgement.
The idea that the people of Britain had a choice as who to vote for, is why the Liberal party won the 1906 elections as if they hadn’t been there the people of Britain would have had to have voted for the Conservative party. Previously, the Liberal party had been split over the issue of ‘Ireland,’ which made them weak and defiantly not appealing to the people of Britain. However issues such as the Boer war made them re-group and become a strong party once again and they also had a strong leader. However the party was not exactly the same as they had changed some of their ideas and ‘New Liberalism’ was now what the majority of the party believed in.
‘New Liberalism,’ was the belief that the state had a duty to be actively involved in the lives of its citizens, to intervene to be able to protect the vulnerable in a society and to be were prepared to use taxes to fund social reform. Ideas such as self-help were a thing of the pat for many and the ‘New Liberals’ believed that the way forward was to help the poor and to be more pro-active.
The Conservative party lost the 1906 because of a number of reasons, Chamberlain dividing the party on the issue of ‘Tariff Reforms,’ was only part of the reason, even though it made the part weak and Balfour’s leadership look pathetic. Their decline in popularity began before Chamberlain brought up the issue of ‘Tariff Reforms,’ and was as a result of issues such as ‘Chinese Slavery’ and ‘Taff Vale.’ These two issues lost a lot of their support from the working class as it undermined the authority of trade unions and made workers feel helpless as to what the companies they worked for could do. The education act also lost the support of the non-conformists as it felt
as if the Conservative party were favouring Church of England believers over other people, an issue which they felt strongly about as they objected to privileges granted to Church of England supporters, an idea that the Liberal party supported.
Although all these issues were key to the downfall of the Conservative party, I think that it was ‘the Boer war (1899-1902) proved to be the catalyst for change’ (Lee 1994). The Boer war caused many of the issues that combined made the Conservatives loose the 1906 election. If it wasn’t for the Boer war, the ‘Taff Vale’ incident would never have happened as there would not have been the demand for the increase in the railway industry that made the ASRS want a wage increase for it’s members. It also would not have resulted in a shortage of workers in South Africa, causing the ‘Chinese Slavery’ incident, or the after-effects of the Boer War, such as the Liberal Part re-grouping would not have happened. Finally, Chamberlain’s ideas of ‘Tariff Reforms,’ only came into play because of the sense of unity he thought that the British Empire should contain to be strong. If the Boer war had not happened, the emotional bonds fostered by it would not have been there to convince Chamberlain that the opportunity to strengthen links within the Empire were there to be seized.