reviews

misleading. Jo was as firmly Bloch also records correctly against propping up Heath as the that Jeremy hankered after a peer- rest of us, but he was perturbed age himself. Certainly Thorpe by some of the arguments against bombarded every successive leader coalition in principle which he on the subject, but the author is a said were nonsense. It was his stern bit unfair to describe Paddy Ash- warning on that issue which col- down’s refusal to nominate him as oured my own later judgments on the party being unwilling to for- the Lib–Lab pact and indeed the give him. There was rather more to formation of the Cameron–Clegg it than that. Following his acquittal coalition. It is doubtful whether at the famous trial for conspiracy Jeremy was ever offered any spe- to murder Norman Scott (which is cific cabinet post – certainly it was well covered in this volume), the not discussed. party executive was keen to pursue I question Bloch’s assertions on Jeremy for the return of £20,000, two other points. Firstly, he sug- which was part of the Hayward gests, as regards the speakership election donation which had been issue in the summer of 1965, that used in his attempts to suppress Jo Grimond may have fancied the Scott. I was appalled at this sugges- position himself at some time in the tion and argued that we had suf- future. I have never thought that fered quite enough bad publicity. was the case: the truth is that the The party president and the chair- matter was badly handled because man agreed the matter should be the MP for Cardigan, Roddy dropped on the clear understand- Bowen, did not come clean and say ing that Jeremy would play no fur- he would accept the deputy speaker- ther part in the party’s hierarchy: in ship. Had we known that, we might other words, no peerage. I and each as well have supported him for of my successors stuck to that. Speaker. Secondly, he claims that On the matter of Norman Scott, Jeremy offered Ludovic Kennedy a the author tells me that he never in that but I recall John Pardoe com- peerage in 1967 and that thereafter spoke to him in view of the many menting that, whilst Jeremy was Kennedy defected to the SNP. Both differing accounts he has given of endlessly briefing about the tour and are wrong. Ludo was a constituent his relationship with Jeremy. Bloch the wellingtons they should bring, of mine at the time; he never joined has however spoken to others of there was no mention of what they the SNP – merely supported their Jeremy’s liaisons leaving all of us were actually going to say, though winning candidate in the Hamilton who thought we knew him well John admired his impromptu by-election. Some years later I tried astonished at his recklessness. The speeches on the nation’s beaches. to persuade him to stand in West book – which is a rattling good read And that tended to characterise his Edinburgh with the promise that if – is indeed also an intriguing and whole approach to politics – it was a he failed to win I would nominate valuable study of the extraordinary series of fascinating dramas. him for the Lords. He declined, but high-wire behaviour of a public fig- One of those was the aftermath never suggested he had been offered ure; none of which should allow us of the February 1974 general elec- a peerage before. Of course when I to forget his charismatic leadership. tion. Jeremy without consulting became leader there was a queue of anybody dashed to London to meet people who thought they had been David Steel was a Liberal/Liberal the prime minister, who had just promised peerages by Jeremy, and Democrat Member of Parliament from lost the election. The first I (as chief some undoubtedly had been – that 1965 to 1997 and Leader of the Liberal whip) knew of this was a report on was part of his style. Party, 1976–88. the Saturday lunchtime car radio news whilst I was touring my con- stituency branches to thank them. Bloch says I drove to London – no I flew and got there by evening, Pioneering study of Welsh Liberals talked with Jeremy and in fact drove him to the back entrance of Russell Deacon, The Welsh Liberals: the History of the Liberal Number 10 on Sunday evening for a second meeting after our Sunday and Liberal Democratic Parties in Wales (Welsh Academic lunchtime meeting with Jo Gri- Press, 2014) mond and Frank Byers (leader in the Lords). We all raised objections Review by Dr J. Graham Jones but agreed he should probe Ted Heath further on electoral reform. his fine volume is the lat- run by Ashley Drake, ever since At the Monday meeting of the par- est in a spate of authori- 1994. For the first time ever, we liamentary party Bloch describes Ttative works regularly have a comprehensive, substantial Jo Grimond as ‘speaking in favour produced by the enterprising, Car- study of the Liberal Party (later of a coalition’. That is potentially diff-based Welsh Academic Press, the Liberal Democrats) in Wales

Journal of Liberal History 90 Spring 2016 35 reviews from the ground-breaking ‘crack- source materials – with the nota- the Carnarvon Boroughs in April ing of the ice’ general elections of ble exception of the extensive 1890. Due attention is devoted, too, 1859 and 1868 right through until records of the Welsh Liberal Party to a trenchant analysis of the key the fourth elections to the National set up, primarily by Emlyn Hoo- political themes of this period – the Assembly for Wales held in 2011. son, back in 1967. It is a shame that campaign for the disestablishment The author, Professor Russell much more extensive use was not and disendowment of the Welsh Deacon, an established academic made of the records of local and church, educational reforms, the teacher, has published widely on constituency Liberal associations land question, temperance, and an Welsh political and administrative in Wales (of which many exist) and element of administrative devolu- history in the twentieth century, the rich personal archives of politi- tion for Wales. is an expert on devolution, and is cians like Lloyd George, his politi- As Deacon clearly demonstrates, the author of the important, pio- cian children Gwilym and Megan, Liberal dominance of Welsh politi- neering volume The Governance of T. E. Ellis, D. A. Thomas, Clement cal life was nigh on monolithic by Wales: the Welsh Office and the Policy Davies, Roderic Bowen, Emlyn the time of the general election of Process, 1966–1999 (Welsh Academic Hooson and Alex Carlile. Their January 1906 when only one divi- Press, 2002). use would have enriched consider- sion in the whole of the principal- Russell Deacon has spent close ably the quality and depth of the ity – the second Merthyr Tydfil seat to a full decade immersed in this author’s analysis. captured by Keir Hardie for the major scholarly enterprise. He has The text is divided into eight Labour Representation Commit- certainly mastered the extensive discrete chapters. These are con- tee – was held by a non-Liberal MP. scholarly literature in the field. siderably fuller and more informa- There was not a single Conserva- He has also displayed considerable tive from 1945 onwards, a period tive MP in all of Wales, a result later initiative and tenacity by hold- in which, it is clear, the author feels repeated in the general election of ing some fifty personal interviews much more comfortable and in con- 1997. This overwhelming domi- with the party’s most prominent trol. (For the years up to 1922, we nance was also exercised over local leading lights in Wales, its local have, however, the still authorita- government in Wales. Of consid- activists and many of its organis- tive, major work by Kenneth O. erable interest, too, is the coverage ers over the last sixty years. The Morgan, Wales in British Politics, given to Welsh Liberal women dur- work is also much strengthened 1868–1922, first published in 1963, ing this period, among them Mar- by the author’s personal interest and now in its fourth edition [1991].) garet Haig Thomas (the daughter of and active involvement in Welsh A major asset of the present work is D. A. Thomas MP, and his successor Liberal politics over many years, a that the text is divided throughout as Lady Rhondda in 1918) and Wini- commitment which has informed into short, digestible sections, eas- fred Combe Tennant, a Neath-based and supported his scholarly work. ily read and appreciated by different party stalwart and one of many Lib- Somewhat disappointing, how- categories of readers, scholarly and eral women wholly entranced by ever, is the relative lack of use in the lay alike. The study excels when the slavish devotion to Lloyd George. study of archival and documentary author analyses different elections This pattern had been wholly in Wales and their campaigns. Espe- transformed by the time of the cially gripping are the large num- general election of 1924 when no ber of lively, well-researched pen more than forty Liberal MPs were portraits of so many Liberal politi- returned in the whole of the UK, cians and local party activists which and in Wales the party had dra- appear throughout the volume. matically very quickly retreated to Their contribution and influence its rural bastions in the north and throughout the years are thus easily west. No Liberal MPs remained appreciated by the readership. in the industrial and mercantile A major theme of the early chap- south of the country. But Wales ters is the formation of the South still remained a Liberal strong- Wales Liberal Federation and the hold especially post-1945 when, of North Wales Liberal Federation, the twelve party MPs re-elected, and the (ultimately futile) attempt seven represented Welsh constitu- to merge them together, primarily encies. The Welsh Liberal casual- by the stalwarts of the enterprising ties in the general election of 1951 Cymru Fydd movement from 1886. were the left-wing, near Socialistic There is much valuable material radicals Lady Megan Lloyd George here on the leading Welsh Liberal (Anglesey) and Emrys O. Rob- politicians of this period, among erts (Merioneth). Just three Liberal them T. E. Ellis, D. A. Thomas, MPs remained in Wales – the party Stuart Rendel, A. C. Hum- leader Clement Davies (Mont- phreys-Owen, Samuel T. Evans, gomeryshire), Roderic Bowen J. Herbert Lewis and the youth- (Cardiganshire) and Sir Rhys Hop- ful David Lloyd George, the last- kin Morris (Carmarthenshire) named elected to parliament (by a – all with marked right-wing, wafer-thin eighteen votes) at just middle-of-the-road tendencies. 27 years of age following a hotly Russell Deacon evaluates compe- contested by-election campaign in tently the political leanings and

36 Journal of Liberal History 90 Spring 2016 reviews the contributions of each of these But, somehow, the over-arching This article argues that the Liberal important political figures. key question – why the Liberal Party’s poor performance in the Seminal themes analysed in the Party so dramatically lost ground 1945 election, and the low incidence later chapters of the book include in Wales, as elsewhere, after the of tactical voting against Con- the formation of the Welsh Liberal First World War – is not really servative candidates, suggest that Party in 1966, the marked revival tackled head-on, and the various 1945 was more than just a reaction of party fortunes in the 1980s in contributing factors have, in conse- against Conservative rule. Instead, the wake of the ‘Alliance’ and sub- quence, to be teased out of a largely many voters appear to have been sequent merger in 1987 with the factual and descriptive account. positively attracted to the identity SDP. The author rightly focuses The book contains a large num- which the Labour Party projected, on the performances of Gwynoro ber of well-chosen photographs as the only party which grounded Jones for the SDP at the Gower by- which complement admirably the its promises of social reform in a election of 1982 and Felix Aubel main text, and the volume has, as vision of a planned economy. Dr for the Liberals in the Cynon Val- ever, been produced to the highest Sloman is also the author of ‘Can ley by-election of 1984. In the new standards by the Welsh Academic we conquer unemployment?: the dawn of devolution, the party won Press (although, unfortunately, Liberal Party, public works, and six seats in the first elections to there are rather too many print- the 1931 political crisis’, Historical the National Assembly for Wales ing errors). But it is undoubtedly Research, vol. 88, issue 239 (Febru- in 1999. Among the victors were a major contribution to the his- ary 2015), pp. 161–84. Jenny Randerson (now a distin- tory of the Liberal Party dur- Dr Sloman’s impeccably schol- guished Liberal peer), Peter Black ing the modern period and will arly and lucid study in the present and Mike German. The party was complement several other recent volume considers the formulation given the groundbreaking oppor- works in the same field of study. and application of economic policy tunity to participate in a coalition It is also highly likely to encour- within the British Liberal Party government with the Labour Party age and stimulate further academic from the all-important ‘We Can at Cardiff Bay in October 2000. research in this area for which it Conquer Unemployment’ gen- When Jenny Willot rather sensa- will serve as a solid and durable eral election of 30 May 1929 until tionally captured Cardiff Central foundation. This book will surely the party’s steady revival under by a wide margin in the general stand the test of time for a long Jo Grimond in the mid-1960s. As election of 2005, it gave the party while. One can but, however, befits a study which began its life an opportunity to extend its influ- quibble, as so often, at the substan- as a groundbreaking University of ence outside its key rural core areas tial cover price of £60. Is a more Oxford DPhil thesis, it is certainly of Ceredigion, Montgomeryshire reasonable paperback edition in exhaustive, encompassing full use and Brecon and Radnor. prospect? I do hope so, and soon. of Liberal Party records and pub- All of these themes are well lications, the personal papers of a analysed by Professor Deacon in a Dr J. Graham Jones was formerly Sen- large number of Liberal politicians, composite volume which will cer- ior Archivist and Head of the Welsh newspapers and journals, parlia- tainly prove of great interest to a Political Archive at the National mentary papers, and the vast sec- wide range of disparate readers. Library of Wales, Aberystwyth. ondary literature on the subject. All these highly disparate sources have been welded into a coherent, highly stimulating analysis. This volume analyses with much compe- tence the diverse intellectual influ- The economic policies and initiatives of the ences which shaped British Liberals’ economic thought up to the mid- Liberal Party twentieth century, and highlights the ways in which the party sought Peter Sloman, The Liberal Party and the Economy, 1929–1964, to reconcile its progressive identity Oxford Historical Monographs (Oxford University Press, with its long-standing commit- ment to free trade and competitive 2014) markets. Review by Dr J. Graham Jones From about 1990 onwards, the Liberal Party has attracted a con- ollowing a positively to the teaching of the first-year siderable scholarly literature, both brilliant carer as an under- ‘Approaches to History’ and sec- substantial published monographs Fgraduate and postgraduate ond- and third-year ‘Disciplines and unpublished dissertations, after student at Oxford University, Dr of History’ papers. His other main its sad relegation to third-party sta- Peter Sloman is currently Herbert research interests include electoral tus, really since the general election Nicholas Junior Research Fellow sociology and the politics of the of October 1924. Dr Sloman’s mon- in Modern British History at New welfare state. ograph is a major contribution to College, Oxford where he teaches His journal publications include the literature because of its focus on British history since 1815 and super- ‘Rethinking a progressive moment: the response of Liberal politicians vises numerous undergraduate the Liberal and Labour parties in to economic questions and their dissertations in this field of study. the 1945 general election’, Histori- policy making. The attention is He also contributes extensively cal Research, 84 (2011), pp. 722–44. unquestionably valid. Although the

Journal of Liberal History 90 Spring 2016 37