How Did The Liberal Party Pass Social Reforms

‘The social reforms of the period 1868-1885 were undertaken reluctantly and had limited impact.’ Assess the validity of this view.

I would argue that this statement is valid. Generally, the social reforms made by both the Liberals and the Conservatives during this period were passed reluctantly, due to each parties desperation for votes, however this may have inspired the party to pass more reforms. The Liberal party were not always eager to pass the reforms as it would lose them votes, whereas the Conservative party only passed the social reforms to gain immediate votes from the working classes after the extension of the franchise in 1867. This lead to many of the reforms having limited impact as the party’s desperation to gain votes overshadowed

Many Conservative reforms were permissive, as the party was motivated by votes rather than by improving the standard of living for their people. An example of this is the Agricultural Holdings Act. This was made compulsory by the Liberals but introduced as a permissive act by the Conservatives, highlighting each party’s motives around social reform. The permissive acts emphasise the reluctance of the party to make social change, and supports the argument that they only make this change in order to gain popularity with the newly enfranchised working class and therefore win over the other party during this period of intense political competition. The reluctance to pass reforms is further intensified by the Liberal party, as many of the more traditional Whig members did not support Gladstone and Chamberlain in their attempts to pass more social reform during Gladstone’s second ministry. This is accentuated by their attempt to pass legislation to regulate shipping, however they could not pass it as a bill as they were opposed by members of their own party. This accents the reluctance within the Liberal Party, perhaps showing that the more traditional members do not want to forfeit their privileged status by passing social reform, despite the Liberal Party generally being the party for the lower classes. Within both parties we can see there is hesitation to pass strong social reform. This

With the new extension of the franchise, both the Liberal government and the Conservative government wanted to win more votes from the working class men. Although you could argue that the fact they are motivated by votes and popularity highlights their hesitation, I would argue that it made them want to pass reform, even if this reform was limited and low profile. We can see the Conservatives eagerness to pass reform and gain voters as they passed many social reform acts during Disraeli’s ministry, however mostly when they first got into power, in 1874. The majority of the Conservative reform acts were passed in 1875. In fact, only two were passed after 1875. Although this underlines the corrupt manner in which the reforms were passed; for popularity only, it also emphasises their readiness to pass reforms, rather than their reluctance. Arguably, their motives do not matter, they were, in my opinion, passing these reforms willingly. The Liberal party also passed many reforms, and we can see that although there was opposition within the party, Gladstone, their leader, was compliant to pass reforms and knew that it would benefit the party in this time of competition between him and Disraeli. Therefore, I would argue that despite the corrupt motives, neither party was overly reluctant to pass social