4. The Elderly

About this Lecture

Lecture

In this module, we think about the introduction of the state pension in 1908, focusing in particular on: (i) the provisions for the elderly before the introduction of the state pension: commercial insurance organisations, friendly societies (also known as mutual societies, benevolent societies, etc.), the Poor Law, etc.; (ii) the extent to which the state pension was more radical than the other Liberal reforms of the period; (iii) the limitations of the state pension: means-testing, age-limits, other restrictions; (iv) the opposition to the state pension, and the means by which Lloyd George overcame this opposition; (v) the number of people who claimed the state pension; (vi) the reasons that the state pension was introduced; (vii) the centrality of state pensions to the welfare state today.

Course

In this course, Professor Matthew Cole (University of Birmingham) thinks about the series of acts of social legislation passed by the Liberal government between 1906-14, known collectively as the Liberal reforms. In the first module, we think about the aims of the reforms and their impact. In the second and third modules, we think about the reforms aims at children and people of working age, respectively, before turning in the fourth module to the introduction of the state pension in 1908.

Lecturer

Matthew Cole is Teaching Fellow in the Department of History at the University of Birmingham. He is a historian of modern Britain with a particular interest in twentieth century constitutional and party politics, and local history.