Radicalism

Abstract

The Liberals who had just won such a spectacular victory were a very different party from the one that had departed miserably from office in 1895. Social issues were vastly more important in the minds of the politicians than they had been a decade earlier. Deep poverty was perceived not as an inevitable feature of society, but as an avoidable evil. Many Liberals — indeed, some people in all parties — were keen supporters of the idea of introducing old age pensions. Such policies presupposed substantial increases in taxation. There was also a growing concern among the younger Liberals to bring about a much more equitable taxation system. The idea that Income Tax should be graduated — from which idea Harcourt had shied away in 1894 — was now almost axiomatic. Many Liberals gave eager support to the much more radical principle of land value taxation.