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Joseph Chamberlain and Workmen's Compensation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 February 2011

W. C. Mallalieu
Affiliation:
University of Louisville

Extract

The British Workmen's Compensation Acts of 1897 and 1899 were “astonishing” to contemporaries and have not been adequately explained by historians. Although passed under a Conservative-Liberal Unionist Cabinet, these acts put heavy burdens upon industry and agriculture, interests that were very influential in both of these parties. “It was no wonder that Tories asked themselves what they were coming to, nor that the usual answer to the question was that they were being swallowed by Mr. Chamberlain.”

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 1950

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References

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23 Broadhurst, Broadhurst; Story of His Life, p. 214.

24 The Times, September 5, November 25, 1888; Davis, British Trades Union Congress, II. 2.

25 The Times, November 25 and 27, 1888.

26 Hansard, Parliamentary Debates, CCCXXXI (3d Ser.), 1426–83; CCCXXXIII, Index.

27 T. U. C., Proceedings, 1890, pp. 21, 34.

28 Hansard, Parliamentary Debates, I (4th Ser.), 1, 122, 153; II, 630.

29 The Times, December 8, 1888.

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36 Hansard, Parliamentary Debates, XX (4th Ser.), 3–57, 1639 ff.

37 Garvin, Joseph Chamberlain, II, 586–87.

38 The Times, February 14, 1894.

39 Hansard, Parliamentary Debates, XXI (4th Ser.), 396 ff., 693, 851 ff.; The Times, February 20 and 21, 1894.

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47 Hansard, Parliamentary Debates. XLVIII (4th Ser.), 1433–41; XLIX, 636, 689 ff., 1664, 1678. The act was extended to agriculture by the Unionists in 1899. Other trades were to be included by a Unionist bill of 1905, cut off by Parliament's dissolution. The Liberals included all trades in their Act of 1907.—Ibid., passim.

48 The Times, July 3 and 21, 1897; Hansard, Parliamentary Debates, XLIX (4th Ser.), 1641–53; LI, 529 ff., 995,1428; Garvin, Joseph Chamberlain, III, 157–58.

49 T.U.C., Proceedings, 1897, 1898, et passim.