Resource Type: LDHG Meeting Recordings
Lloyd George, Herbert Samuel and Palestine: background and legacy: 25th July 2024
What role did Liberals play in the Middle East settlement after the First World War? In 1917, the Lloyd George Coalition Government announced its support for the establishment of a ‘national home for the Jewish people’ in Palestine, then an Ottoman region with a small minority Jewish population. This was the ‘Balfour Declaration’, named after…
The 1847 Financial Crisis and the Irish Famine : 15th March 2024
The Irish famine of the 1840s remains the worst humanitarian crisis in the United Kingdom’s history. Within six years of the arrival of the potato blight in Ireland in 1845, more than a quarter of its people had died or emigrated. Despite this, Lord John Russell’s Whig government decided in spring 1847 – long before…
What Have the Liberals Ever Done For Us?: 23rd September 2023
Launch of the Liberal Democrat History Group’s new concise guide to the greatest Liberal achievements, from the seventeenth to the twenty-first centuries. Speakers: Layla Moran MP, Sarah Olney MP, Wendy Chamberlain MP, Baroness Barker. Chair: Lord Wallace of Saltaire.
The Strange Death of Liberal England Revisited: 10th July 2023
George Dangerfield’s The Strange Death of Liberal England, published in 1935, became one of the most influential accounts of the Liberal Party’s demise as a party of government. Dangerfield claimed that by ‘the end of 1913 Liberal England was reduced to ashes’ by three forms of political turbulence and upheaval: the threat of civil…
Shirley Williams: Liberal Lion and Trailblazer Friday 17th March 2023
Shirley Williams, part of the ‘Gang of Four’ who founded the SDP and former leader of the Liberal Democrats in the House of Lords, was one of the UK’s best-loved politicians. She championed numerous progressive causes and for decades was an inspiration to millions of liberals. Mark Peel (author, Shirley Williams: The Biography), Lord Tom…
Forgotten Liberal Heroes: Sir Edward Grey and Richard Haldane 30th January 2023
The Liberal governments of Henry Campbell-Bannerman and H.H. Asquith included many ‘big beasts’. Sir Edward Grey served as Foreign Secretary and remains the longest-serving holder of the office. He maintained good relations with France and Russia at a time of great instability in Europe. When his efforts to avert conflict failed, in 1914, Grey…
Was the Coalition a mistake? Why did we fail to stop Brexit? 7th October 2022
Launch of Partnership & Politics in a Divided Decade, by husband-and-wife team Vince Cable and Rachel Smith. This new book tells the inside story of Vince Cable’s political career during the turbulent decade of the 2010s. The book covers Vince’s time as Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills in the Liberal Democrat –…
The fall of the Lloyd George coalition
2022 marks the centenary of the departure from office of the last Liberal to hold the post of Prime Minister; on 19 October 1922 David Lloyd George resigned after six years as premier. His fall followed the decision of Conservative MPs, meeting in the Carlton Club earlier that day, to end the post-war coalition.
Working with Labour: The Liberal Party & the Balance of Power. 11 March 2022
The 1920s were a challenging decade for the Liberal Party. With the advance of Labour, the Liberals were now the third force in British politics. The Asquith and Lloyd George factions united to contest the 1923 general election as one party, but tensions remained. The election resulted in a hung parliament, with the Liberals holding…
The 1992 General Election. 31 January 2022
The 1992 General Election. 31 January 2022. The general election of 1992 was the first contested by the Liberal Democrats, who had been formed from the merger of the Liberal Party and the SDP just four years before. The new party entered the contest buoyed by parliamentary by-election victories, impressive local election results in 1991,…