The Relugas Compact - Policy or Personal Ambition?

Policy or Personal Ambition?

While it is true that the Relugas plotters, especially Haldane, had reservations about the suitability of Campbell-Bannerman as the right man to lead the Liberal Party in a programme of social, welfare and administrative reforms, there remains a doubt whether the Relugas Compact was really about the primacy of policy or whether it was more about the personal ambitions of the players. While the decline of the Conservative government in 1905 certainly gave the conspirators some added impetus, it is clear there had been a degree of forward planning by Asquith and Grey – although how much is difficult to disentangle from the normal intrigue and jostling for place that is inherent in politics. In January 1904, David Lloyd George had a meeting with Grey at his home at Fallodon in Northumberland to talk about prospects for a forthcoming Liberal government. At that time Grey proposed Rosebery or Earl Spencer for Prime Minister with Asquith Leader in the Commons. It seemed to Lloyd George however that what was important to Grey was that the Prime Minister, whether Rosebery or Spencer, should be a member of the House of Lords, ensuring that Asquith could have a free hand leading the party from the House of Commons. Anticipating the details of the Relugas Compact, Grey told Lloyd George that did not even mind if Campbell-Bannerman were to be Prime Minister so long as he could be persuaded to go to the Lords. As Lloyd George’s biographer points out, the agreement at Relugas accorded almost exactly with what LG had picked up at the beginning of the year before. Rosebery’s claim to the leadership could be ditched so long as Campbell-Bannerman would agree to go to the Lords and the Liberal Imperialists and Liberal Leaguers would have secured three great offices of state for Asquith, Grey and Haldane with Asquith firmly in control in the Commons.