Liberal Welfare Reforms - Contemporary Criticism

Contemporary Criticism

The Liberal reforms received criticism from those who saw this level of government action to mitigate social evils as interfering with market forces and thus being antithetical to the operations of a free market. One political cartoon of the time criticised the reforms as socialist in nature. The cost of the reforms was also criticised and there were also critics who suggested that the reforms would not work in practice.

There were classical liberals who opposed these reforms; this included Harold Cox, elected as a Liberal in 1906, and who was almost alone among Liberal MPs in his opposition. He considered them to be "eroding freedom" and "undermining individual responsibility". The Liberal journalist and editor of The Economist (1907–1916), F. W. Hirst, also opposed the reforms and the welfare state in general.

Some workers objected to paying 4d per week to the National Insurance contributions. The chant "Taffy was a Welshman, Taffy was a thief" was chanted at Lloyd George by workers and referred to the suggestion that Welshman Lloyd George was taking their wages away from them. However, Lloyd George responded with his famous phrase "Nine pence for four pence" which referenced to that fact that employers and the government were topping up the workers' contributions.