Significance of the Whig Reforms

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Significance of the Whig Reforms

• www.educationforum.co.uk

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Factory Act 1833

• The 10 Hours Movement of working men and women
  had campaigned hard for factory reform they
  were disappointed by the Act which focussed only
  on children
• Working people lost faith in the Whigs turning
  more to the Chartist Movement
• Inspector system set up by the Act (all four of
  them!) wasnt very effective in the short term,
  but in the long term had set a precedent and a
  structure for later factory reform.

3
Poor Law Amendment Act 1834

• Reinforced the Elizabethan view that poverty and
  unemployment was down to personal choice and
  personal shortcomings.
• Conditions in the Union workhouses were dreadful
  segregation, families split up, prison
  uniforms and regulations, dreadful food and hard
  labour.
• Fear of the workhouse became a feature of
  working class culture for 100 years
• Widespread resistance to the PLAA in industrial
  north with the industrial working class again
  losing faith with the Whigs and turning more and
  more to radical movements like Chartism

4
Municipal Corporations Act 1835

• Consolidated new found middle class political
  power with the extension of local votes to the
  middle class
• New councils dominated by businessmen,
  shopkeepers and professionals
• Law and order and the protection of property
  improved with policing
• Local government still unwilling to tackle the
  problems with affected the working class most
  housing, clean water, sewers

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Other Changes

• The Education grant can be seen as a tentative
  first step towards state education.
• More rights for religious minorities
• 1836 Marriage Act gave Nonconformists and
  Catholics the right to marry in their own
  churches
• London University (who admitted non C of E
  students) given right to confer degrees

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Summary

• Some influence of Benthamite idea of utility
  evident
• Some influence of humanitarianism
• Middle class ideas of economic laissez faire
  however still a powerful influence
• Very little for the poor in fact emerge from
  the Whig years in a worse position than before
  working class turn political attention to Chartism

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1834 Interruption

• In July 1834 Grey resigned to be succeeded by
  Melbourne. Melbourne didnt really want the job
  and by November had resigned.
• King William then asks Robert Peel to form a
  minority Tory Government. The Tories are defeated
  6 times in 6 weeks in the Commons and by 1835 the
  Whigs are back in office.

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Tamworth Manifesto and the birth of Conservatism

• The only act of any significance during peels
  very brief premiership was the Tamworth
  Manifesto an address Peel made to the votes of
  Tamworth (his constituency) in 1835.
• Peel redefined Toryism as Conservatism
  accepting the changes of the Great Reform Bill
  and ending the Tory resistance to all change.
• From this point on the Conservatives believe in
  conserving was is good but also to redress for
  proven grievances