MODERN WORLD HISTORY PAPER2 BRITISH DEPTH STUDY THERE ARE THREE TOPICS TO REVISE ALTHOUGH IN THE FINAL EXAM YOU WILL ONLY BE TESTED ON ONE. THIS IS RANDOMN SO YOU HAVE TO KNOW THEM ALL! The Liberal Government & Reforms
Britain in 1906
• Most powerful country in the world
• Ruled one quarter of the people in the world
• USA & Germany had overtaken it industrially
• Most British houses did not have electricity
• 3% of the population were ‘rich’ (£700 per year or more)
• Middle Classes (£150-£700 per year)
• Working Classes (in industry £1.50 per week)
• A family with 3 children needed £1.00 per week
• This did not take into account medicine or luxuries
Voting in 1906
All male house holders could vote
5 million men
33% of males
No women
Two main parties were the Conservatives and the Liberals
Conservatives believed that the rich should be left to make
Britain richer. The Government should not interfere with the
economy.
• Liberals believed individuals should be allowed to work hard and
the government should rarely get involved
• In 1906 the Labour Party changed its name from the Labour
Representative Committee
• Labour would try to represent the Working Class
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•
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•
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Problems for the Liberal Government of 1906
1.
2.
3.
4.
Poor living conditions/health standards
Poor education
Industrial decline
Growth of Socialism
What did the Liberal Government try to do?
For Children
• Scholarships for poor children
• 1908 Children and Young persons Act – Parents could be
prosecuted for neglect.
• Introduced special child prisons.
• Free school meals for poor children
• Free medical care and treatment (although not always
provided)
For the Old
1908 Old Age Pensions (70 years old minimum)
The Old did not have to contribute to it
Had to prove they had worked hard all their life
Only British citizens could get it who had been living in Britain
for the last 20 years
• If you had an income of £31 per year or more you did not get
it
For the Unemployed
•
•
•
•
• 1909 introduced Labour Exchanges to help people get a job
• Employers did not have to tell them they had openings though
• 1911 National Insurance Act - unemployment benefit for up to
15 weeks
• Not enough money for a man with a family
For the Ill
• 1906 Compensation Act which gave workers half their wages if
they earned under £250 per year and were badly injured at
work
• 1911 National Insurance Act provided up to 26 weeks of sick
pay
• Free medical care for the insured
• Medical care was not given to the man’s family
• Widows did not get a pension
Liberal Reforms Test
1. Which political party won the 1906 election?
2. Who was the Prime Minister?
3. What reasons were given for people being poor, which
obviously were stereotypical?
4. Which reformer did a study on the town of York?
5. What did he say caused poverty?
6. What is a Social Reformer?
7. What war suggested that reforms needed to happen?
8. Why?
9. Which two countries had passed Britain as industrial
powers?
10.
What two reasons were given?
11.
Who was Chancellor of the Exchequer?
12.
Who was the President of the Board of Trade?
13.
What political party had started doing reforms
when they were in charge before 1906?
14.
What new ideology seemed to be favouring the
working man?
15.
Name one thing the Liberals did for children?
16.
Name one failing?
17.
What did they do for the old?
18.
Name a condition of this?
19.
How did sick pay and unemployment benefit work?
20.
What was a criticism of it?
What is the message? Cartoon/poster
The message is…
I know this because in the cartoon/poster it shows me…
At the time I know that things were happening such as…
What is the message of the cartoon? 7 Marks
Why was it published? 8 Marks
It was published
because... (what does the poster want you to think or do?)
At the time...
(what is going on that means the poster needs to be made?)
actually shows...(what information does the poster show you?)
The poster
Votes for Women
By 1911 only 60% of adult males could vote. Even so many women were demanding the
vote. As far back as 1867 Parliament had discussed given women the vote but the male
M.P.s decided to not treat women equally with men. This trend continued.
Arguments for female suffrage (the right to vote)
•
•
•
•
It is happening in other countries i.e. New Zealand
Some women owned property and taxes
Some women were more educated than some men who could vote
Without it Britain could not be a true democracy
(There are more – see your class notes – Walsh )
Arguments against
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•
•
•
Women are represented by their husbands
Most women do not want the vote
Women do not fight to defend their country
It is dangerous to change a system that works
(There are more – see your class notes –Walsh )
The Suffragists
Name:
National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies
Leader:
Millicent Fawcett
Membership: By 1914 over 50.000 members
Many middle class women
Some were men
Some working class women
Methods:
Propaganda – leaflets
Public Meetings
Petitions
Mass demonstrations with banners etc
The Suffragettes
Name:
Women’s Social and Political Union
Leader:
Emmeline Pankhurst
Membership Mainly middle and upper class women
No men
Methods
More than 40,000 (debatable figure)
Newspaper ‘Votes for Women’
Slogans on everyday items
Posters, postcards and leaflets
Public meetings
Civil disobedience (including not paying taxes)
Window smashing
Destroying letter boxes (and the letters)
Attacking people
Shouting at politicians
Hunger strikes
How did the Government react?
The Liberal Government under Asquith did not seem to have a strong opinion or clear
position on female suffrage. The P.M. Asquith was definitely against it but most Liberal
M.P.s were probably in favour but did not feel strongly about it.
The Government was not happy with protests. Women were banned from Liberal
Meetings. The police brutally dealt with female protesters trying to enter Parliament.
Once the protesters were in prison they were treated like ordinary criminals. Those
that went on hunger strike were force fed. The Prisoner’s Temporary Discharge for
Health Act (Cat and Mouse Act 1913) meant that hunger strikers were released when
they became ill and then imprisoned again once they had recovered.
How did the Newspapers react?
The majority of newspapers probably supported female suffrage. Newspapers such as
The Times were totally against it often referring to Suffragettes as lunatics. The
newspapers supported peaceful actions but were unsympathetic when violence was used.
The Times was unsympathetic towards Emily Davison’s death.
How did the Public react?
It did not seem that the Suffragettes were winning over the men. There were even
incidents of men physically attacking Suffragettes. With the death of Emily Davison at
The Derby there was huge publicity and her funeral was attended by thousands.
With the outbreak of World War 1 in 1914 both groups pledge to call off their
protests and aid the war effort.
How useful is this source to a historian studying ‘Female Suffrage’ (trying to get
women the vote) in Britain? Use details of the source and your knowledge to
explain your answer. 7 marks
How useful..? 7 Marks
The source is useful because it shows me... (content)
It is reliable because... (consider what makes you trust the source ie is the
content typical? Is the person responsible reliable? What type of source is it?
Why was it made etc?)
It is not reliable because... (consider reasons for distrust – see ideas above)
Overall, it is fair to say...(explain whether your judgement is that the source is
useful or not)
Suffragette test
1. Give two reasons used at the time to why women should
get the vote.
2. Give two reasons used at the time to why women should
not get the vote.
3. Who was the leader of the Suffragists?
4. What methods did they use to try to get the vote?
5. Who was the leader of the Suffragettes?
6. What methods did they use to try to get the vote?
7. Why were some Liberals against giving women the
vote?
8. Why were some Conservatives against giving women the
vote?
9. What was the Cat & Mouse Act?
10.
Who died in 1913 and was considered a martyr?
11.
What event got both groups to call off their
campaigns?
Source A
SUPPOSED SUFFRAGETTE OUTRAGE
An explosive machine was found near the Bishop’s Throne in the chancel of St. Paul’s
Cathedral yesterday morning a few minutes prior to the celebration of early
Communion, and there is no doubt in the minds of the authorities that the contrivance
was designed and placed there by someone associated with the militant Suffragist
movement. The “bomb,” as it is described by the police, was carefully wrapped in brown
paper and in part of a recent issue of the militant newspaper The Suffragette.
An expert stated that while such a bomb as that found at St.Paul’s would have done
relatively little damage to that building because of the great air spaces which exist
within it, a similar machine in Westminster Abbey, owing to the crowded condition
there, due to the many memorials and the form of the interior, might result in
irreparable injury to an historic structure.
Source B
Which source would have influenced the Government more? 8 marks.
Source A would influence the government for a number of reasons.
Firstly, the source shows...
The tone it uses would also influence because...
It would also influence because at the time...
The source would also influence because it was made...
These sentences are suggestions. They will not apply to all
sources.
With this question to gain top marks you have to write about
both sources.
You will not necessarily prove one source would have more
influence than another.
The Home Front
People in Britain were affected by WW1 in six main ways:
1. Recruitment - there was a huge poster campaign to get
people to join up, and the government had to introduce
conscription in 1916. Conscientious objectors could be
imprisoned. Women were recruited into the armed forces as
nurses, drivers, cooks and telephonists.
2. The Defence of the Realm Act (DORA) - this was passed in
August 1914. DORA allowed the government to take over the
coal mines, railways and shipping. Lloyd George became
Minister of Munitions and set up state-run munitions
factories. The government worked with the trade unions to
prevent strikes.
3. Reduced workforce - there were fewer workers because so
many men left to join the army.
4. Rationing - a fixed allowance for sugar, meat, butter, jam
and tea was introduced in 1918. British Summer Time was
also introduced to give more daylight working hours.
5. Propaganda - newspaper and soldiers' letters were censored.
"The Tribunal" (a pacifist newspaper) was shut down, and lies
were made up about German atrocities. Posters encouraged
morale. The film "The Somme" was a semi-successful attempt
at using film for propaganda because the graphic nature of
actually seeing the men die upset many viewers.
6. Civilian casualties 57 zeppelin bombing raids after 1915, and
the German navy shelled Hartlepool, Whitby and Scarborough
World War One (the Great War) is usually remembered as mainly a soldiers'
conflict - with six million men mobilised to fight overseas, and the number of
military casualties very high compared to those of civilians - but nevertheless
the Zeppelin raids on London in April 1915 did have the effect of drawing
everybody into the war. And as it progressed, the entire nation’s population and
resources were harnessed to the war effort in one way or another, so most
people came to feel involved in the conflict.
Wearing a uniform of some kind (whether in the forces or as a male or female
police officer, postal worker or bus conductor) was an obvious way of
contributing, but civilians working in a factory making uniforms, guns,
ammunition, tanks or ships had every right to feel they were contributing as
much to the war effort as a man with a gun. So, too, had dockers and miners.
Families with men at the front certainly felt part of the war, whilst clergymen
who comforted the bereaved, or journalists who wrote stirring patriotic
editorials, likewise had a key role as opinion formers.
Then, when food rationing was introduced in January 1918, following the
German submarine blockade of 1917, previously uninvolved housewives, as they
eked out their modest supplies of sugar and meat (the first two items to be
rationed), could also feel they had a part to play. By this time the whole of
Britain, effectively, was the Home Front, and the citizens collectively were
the soldiers on that front.
How did women help the war effort?
1. Recruitment - women were recruited as nurses into the
Voluntary Aid Detachments (VADs) or First Aid Nursing
Yeomanry (FANY), and as drivers, cooks and telephonists into
the WAAC, WRNS and WRAF.
2. DORA - many women 'munitionettes' worked in the
government's munitions factories.
3. Reduced workforce - women took on traditional men's jobs
and became firemen, coalmen and bus conductors.
4. Rationing - the main burden of coping fell on mothers. The
Women's Land Army helped with agricultural production.
After the war, men took back their jobs and most women
returned to the family. However, the War did bring about
political and social changes:
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•
Political - women over 30 years old got the vote in 1918. Women
over 21 years old got the vote in 1928. Women were also
allowed to stand for election as MPs, but there were only eight
women MPs in 1923.
Social - women became more liberated. Short skirts and short
hair became fashionable and many women smoked in public.
Home Front Test
1. What is Dora?
2. What did it allow the government to take over?
3. Why did they do this?
4. Who was minister of munitions?
5. Women were brought in to the factories. What did the unions
force the government to do regarding their pay?
6. What would happen to those women at the end of the war?
7. In 1918 what did the government introduce to help with
shortages?
8. Why did poor people benefit?
9. What is propaganda?
10.
What is conscription?
11. What were those who refused to join called if they used the
reason that killing another person is wrong?
12.
Which battle changed the mood of people in Britain?
13.
What is censorship?
14.
Give me an example.
15.
What jobs did women take on?
16.
Why did women eventually get the vote?
Source A The Battle of the Somme 1916
Source B An enlistment poster How far does Source A explain why source B was produced?
Level 2 - Simply summarises the two sources 2 marks
Level 3 – Basic argument that it helps or doesn’t 3-4 marks
Level 4 – Uses both of the sources to argue that B happens because of A 5 marks
Level 5 - Uses developed comments on content of A or cross reference to knowledge
or other sources to argue A influenced B 6-7 marks
Or
Argues that Source A and other factors (based on own knowledge or cross-reference
to other sources) explain why B was made
Level 6 - Detailed explanation of purpose of Source B and its audience 8 marks
It is fair to say that that Source A does help someone to understand
why Source B was produced. This is because Source A shows me…
and Source B shows me… (what do the sources show? Content)
These
two sources can be linked together because… (what do they
have in common?)
Source B was obviously produced so that… and this would have been
influenced by Source A because…
Source
A is not the only reason for Source B being produced. For
example
another reason would be…