LLOYD GEORGE COALTION
Reconstruction, which had begun during the war, was continued under Lloyd George into the post-war period. A massive demobilisation programme was set in motion under Winston Churchill’s direction. Ambitious proposals were drawn up for improved health facilities, unemployment pay and pensions. However, the grim economic circumstances in post-war Britain, caused by high inflation and declining orders for British goods, largely thwarted these schemes, although there was notable success in regard to housing. Over 200,000 council dwellings were built between 1919 and 1922. Throughout the Lloyd George continued with his aim of creating greater cooperation in industrial relations. He maintained links with both employers and trade unions and encouraged them to think in terms of conciliation rather than confrontation.
It was Britain’s inability to cope with the effects of the worldwide industrial slump that undermined Lloyd George’s promise that the post-war nation would be ‘a fit country for heroes to live in’. By 1922, unemployment had risen to over million. Yet the government judged the economic situation to be so bad that it chose to restrict rather than expand social welfare provision. In a series of cuts known as the ‘Geddes Axe’, after Sir Eric Geddes, Chairman of the special government appointed committee which recommended them, revenue previously allocated to education, hospitals and housing was withdrawn. All governments tend to be judged primarily in relation to their economic record. The failure of the social and economic policies tended to dwarf its other activities.
After four years, the commonly held view of the Coalition was of a tired administration, led by an individual who was past his best and who was sustained in office by a combination of his own love of power and a Conservative party that lacked courage to attempt to take on the full responsibility of government. Commentators spoke increasingly of the low tone of the Coalition, a reference to the unattractive mixture of economic incompetence, political expediency and financial corruption that had come to characterise it. The existence of the so-called ‘Lloyd George Fund’ provided an easy target for those wanting to blacken his name.
Lloyd George used his power of patronage as Prime Minister to employ agents to organise the sale of honours and titles on a commission basis. It was said that the asking rate during the Coalition years was between £10,000 and £12,000 for a knighthood, and between £35,000 and £40,000 for a baronetcy. During this period some 90 peerages and 20,000 OBE’s were purchased by well-heeled, if not always well born, social aspirants. Lloyd George argued unashamedly that it was justifiable means of raising political funds, given that he did not have access to the donations that the Conservatives received from the business world or to the funds that came from the Labour Party and the trade unions.
The belief that Lloyd George was dishonest provided a powerful argument for those Conservatives who had begun to question their party’s continued support for him. They pointed out that their support had always been conditional and suggested that the corruption of the Coalition, added to its failure in domestic, economic and foreign policy, was now beginning to taint the Conservative Party itself. Their chance to undermine him came shortly after when Lloyd George announced his intention of calling a general election. This was the moment for the Conservative Party to reconsider their relationship with Lloyd George. Should they, in the light of the obvious unpopularity of the Coalition, continue to support it? In a dramatic and decisive meeting of the Party, held at the Carlton Club in October 1922, the Conservative MPs voted by 187 to 87 to abandon Lloyd George and the Coalition by standing for election as a party in their own right.
The Carlton Club was the unofficial headquarters of the Conservative Party. At a meeting, Stanley Baldwin, soon to be leader of the party, joined Bonar Law in persuading their colleagues to disassociate themselves from a Prime Minister no longer worthy of their trust. IN an influential speech, Baldwin spoke of Lloyd George as ‘a dynamic force which had already shattered the Liberal Party and which was well on its way to doing the same thing for the Conservative Party.’ This meeting marked the critical moment when the Conservative Party guaranteed its survival as an independent force.
The unpopularity of the Coalition and the wisdom of the Conservatives in abandoning it were shown in the results of the 1922 election. These were devastating for Liberals, and revealed how badly damaged the party was by the divisions between supporters of Lloyd George and the Asquithians. Lloyd George resigned following this overwhelming rejection. He was to never hold office again.
The Coalition of 1918-22 has not had a good press. Emphasis has traditionally been laid on its apparent failures. It has been seen as an oddity in that it did not conform to the normal pattern of party politics. It is often suggested that by governing in peacetime without a genuine party majority, Lloyd George was doomed to eventual failure as ‘the prisoner of the Tories.’ His final defeat in 1922, following the withdrawal of Conservative support, is thus interpreted as in some way marking a return to normal two-party politics which had been disrupted by the war and Lloyd George’s wish to perpetuate his own authority.
The objection to this line of argument is that it assumes that the two-party system is normal and necessary to British politics. What brought Lloyd George down was not his defiance of two party politics, but the decision of the Conservatives to abandon him. Had it served their purpose to remain with him they would have done so. They were looking after their own interests, not defending some abstract political principle. It is in that sense that Lloyd George had been their prisoner throughout the years of the Coalition. Since his own group of Liberal supporters were not enough to keep him in office he had always been dependent on the Conservatives. What blurred the historical picture was that the Conservatives after 1922 were at pains to portray Lloyd George as having been not their prisoner but a dictator over them. This was their way of absolving themselves from the mistakes of the Coalition years.