'It was not the liberals who won but the conservatives who lost' discuss

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Beatrice Meecham

 

A general election was held in 1906 which led to a complete ‘landslide’ victory for the liberals, winning 400 seats over the conservatives 157. Many of the conservative members lost their seats leaving the majority of members, liberal in the House of Commons - showing that the widely held view throughout the country was that they wanted Conservative out and Liberals to be their new government, but what made them make this decision?  

The conservative party had been in power for about 10 years in 1906 and its voters had become desperate for change, whether brought by their own party or another, they knew it was needed. A. J. Balfour was the new conservative leader after his uncle; Lord Salisbury died and handed the title over to him. He was described by Lloyd George as being ‘No more than a scent on a pocket handkerchief’ this meant he was there but never really did anything to help situations. Balfour was a clever man however he just wasn’t a political one, unable to understand what the consequences of his actions could do to the public. The conservatives did have some good ideas but many of them did not fall through because the people either did not understand them or believed there was a better way. The Liberals were able to use the mistakes made by the conservatives as part of their campaign in the general elections 1906, therefore people may not have been voting for the Liberals because of their party ideas but because they did not want the Conservatives to win. The impact of many of the recent events also had an effect on political developments not just the party campaigns themselves, for example the Boer war.

The Boer war was an event that originally gained many Conservatives the vote in 1900, however this was only short term, and eventually it may have been a factor that contributed to their final defeat in the 1906 election. At the beginning of the war people voted Conservative because they believed they were patriotic and would win them their victory. The war had split the Liberal party and they were unable to agree, so therefore the best option at that time was the Conservatives. As the war went on it became costly both in lives and money, the war eventually cost Britain £200 million and over 20,000 British lives were lost. Although we won an eventual victory, it had taken three years to defeat a small tribe – this led to the belief that it was the Conservatives fault and many were angry at them for the incompetence of the men, it highlighted to the people and the government that social reforms needed to be made. The weakness of new recruits showed the level of poverty in Britain at the time; as two- thirds of recruits volunteering to join the army failed their health examination and the government took the blame for this as they had done nothing in the way of social reforms.

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Although the war had split the Liberals in 1902 - the end of the war meant that they could come back together and form a stronger and more powerful party, which was able to compete against the Conservatives. As people started to see the mistakes the Conservatives were making the Liberals became a real alternative, they believed that maybe the Liberals would be able to do a better job; getting the economy and wealth of the country back. The war also led to moral outrage when it was found out that many of the prisoners of war were being ...

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