1929-1931 жылдардағы Ұлыбритания үкіметі

Government of the United Kingdom from 1929 to 1931

The second MacDonald ministry was formed by Ramsay MacDonald on his reappointment as prime minister of the United Kingdom by King George V on 5 June 1929. It was only the second time the Labour Party had formed a government; the first MacDonald ministry held office in 1924.

The government formed lacked a parliamentary majority, its total of 288 seats (arising from 8,300,000 votes) compared to the Conservatives' 255 seats with 8,560,000 votes. Most remaining seats were those of 58 Liberal MPs. The disparity in seats versus votes cast was created by the outcome on boundaries at the time under the first past the post electoral system and the last boundary change under the Representation of the People Act 1918. MacDonald thus had a minority government that needed the support of Lloyd George's MPs to pass legislation. His ministers rapidly faced the problems stemming from the impact of the Great Depression. On the one hand, international bankers insisted that strict budget limits be kept; on the other, trade unions and, particularly, unemployed workers' organisations carried on regular and massive protest actions, including a series of hunger marches.

The government faced practical enforcement difficulties with its legislation, such as the Coal Mines Act 1930 (20 & 21 Geo. 5. c. 34), which provided for a 71/2 hour daily shift in mines. Owners were guaranteed minimum coal prices through compulsory production quotas among collieries, thus doing away with cut throat competition. This solution was introduced to prevent a fall in miners' wages. The act introduced a philanthropic cartel replacing the coal merchants' oligopoly to allocate production quotas by control of a central council, while a Mines Reorganisation Commission was established to encourage efficiency through amalgamations. Many mine owners variously offended these provisions due to Labour's lack of enforcement powers. The Land Utilisation Bill of 1931 would have given ministers sweeping powers to purchase land nationwide (to be run by local authorities and other such bodies). It was mauled by the House of Lords and had no backing from the Treasury so reduced to limited powers to improve agricultural productivity and provide and subsidise smallholdings to the unemployed and agricultural workers, as the Agricultural Land (Utilisation) Act 1931 (21 & 22 Geo. 5. c. 41).) and the London Transport Bill 1931 — this was passed by a subsequent Conservative government as the London Passenger Transport Act 1933 (23 & 24 Geo. 5. c. 14). The Housing Act 1930 resulted in the demolition of 245,000 slums by 1939, and the construction of 700,000 new homes. The Housing Act 1930 also allowed local authorities to set up differential rent schemes, with rents related to the incomes of the tenants concerned. Immediate measures carried out by the government upon taking office included the Unemployment Insurance Act 1929 (20 & 21 Geo. 5. c. 3), which made temporary amendment of the Unemployment Insurance Acts, increasing the state contribution to the fund, the Development (Loan Guarantees and Grants) Act 1929 (20 & 21 Geo. 5. c. 7) authorising grants up to £25 million and a further £25 million in guarantees for public works schemes designed to reduce unemployment, the parallel Colonial Development Act 1929 (20 & 21 Geo. 5. c. 5) authorising grants up to £1 million a year for schemes in the colonies, a measure continuing at the existing levels the subsidies under the Housing Acts, which the Conservatives had threatened to reduce, and a removal of the appointed Guardians whom the Conservatives had put in office in place of the elected Boards in Bedwellty, Chester le Street, and Westham. Changes were also made to the taxation system that resulted in the poor paying less tax and the rich paying more. Expenditure on the insurance fund was raised as a means of ensuring that unemployed persons would not be reduced so quickly to poor relief. The Unemployment Insurance Act 1930 (20 & 21 Geo. 5. c. 16) increased insurance benefits for certain classes of unemployed who had been on a very low scale, and included a provision that (except in trade disputes) claims for benefits could no longer be disallowed except on the authority of a Court of Referees. Altogether, an estimated 170,000 people were brought into benefit by the combined exchanges in the act. A scheme for training unemployed workers who had little chance of being reabsorbed into their previous occupations was extended, while arrangements were made whereby youths who were helping to support their families out of unemployment pay could live at either the training centres (or lodgings in the vicinity) and have a special remittance of 9 shillings a week made to their homes. In addition, the provision of instruction for unemployed boys and girls between the ages of 14 and 18 was extended. The Widows', Orphans' and Old Age Contributory Pensions Act 1925 (15 & 16 Geo. 5. c. 70) was amended to cover some hundreds of thousands of additional pensioners, under improved conditions, Other measures carried out in 1929–30 included the Road Traffic Act 1930 (20 & 21 Geo. 5. c. 43) (which introduced third party insurance to compensate for property damage and personal injury, made better provisions for road safety, provided greater freedom to municipalities to run omnibus services, the principle of the Fair Wage Clause was applied to all employees on road passenger services, and placed a statutory limit on the working hours of drivers), the Public Works Facilities Act 1930 (20 & 21 Geo. 5. c. 50) (conferring easier borrowing powers), the Workmen's Compensation (Silicosis and Asbestosis) Act 1930 (20 & 21 Geo. 5. c. 29) (which established disability compensation for asbestos) and the Mental Treatment Act 1930 (20 & 21 Geo. 5. c. 23). The 1930 Labour budget provided for largely increased expenditure, contained measures to prevent tax evasion, raised the standard rate of income tax as well as the surtax while making concessions to the smaller taxpayer. In education, various measures were introduced to promote equality and opportunity. More generous standards of school planning were secured, while special attention was given to the provision of adequate accommodation for practical work. The number of “black listed” schools was reduced from about 2,000 to about 1,500. From 1929 to 1931, the number of certified teachers in service was increased by about 3,000, while the number of classes with more than 50 children was reduced by about 2,000. Capital expenditure on elementary school building approved by the Board of Education during 1930–1931 stood at over £9 million, more than double the amount approved during 1928–29, the Conservative government's last year in office. A circular was issued that urged the need for an expansion of provisions for the health and welfare of children under the compulsory school age by the development of nursery schools and other services, and by April 1931, the amount of accommodation available in nursery schools was doubled. The number of staff in the school medical services was increased, while about 3,000 new places were provided in day and residential special schools for crippled or blind children and in open air schools for delicate children. There was also a large increase in the number of meals supplied to school children, while support given by the government to the National Milk Publicity Council's scheme for supplying milk to children resulted in 600,000 children benefiting daily from this service. Technical education was developed and arrangements were made for co operation between technical colleges and industry, while new regulations facilitated an expansion of adult education. To improve safety standards at sea, an international conference was convened by the Labour President of the Board of Trade, which led to 27 governments signing a convention establishing for the first time uniform safety rules for all the cargo ships throughout the world. Conditions for soldiers were improved, while the death penalty for certain offences was abolished. A seven year limit in connection with war pensions was also removed, while a programme for afforestation was increased. rose from 120,000 in 1929 to more than 500,000 in 1931. The National Health Insurance (Prolongation of Insurance) Act 1930 (21 & 22 Geo. 5. c. 5) extended provision of health insurance to unemployed males whose entitlement had run out, while the Poor Prisoners' Defence Act 1930 (20 & 21 Geo. 5. c. 32) introduced criminal legal aid for appearances in magistrates' courts. The Housing (Scotland) Act 1930 (20 & 21 Geo. 5. c. 40) and the Housing Act 1930 (20 & 21 Geo. 5. c. 39) provided local authorities with additional central government subsidies to construct new homes for people who had been moved out of slum clearance areas. The Hairdressers' and Barbers' Shops (Sunday Closing) Act 1930 (20 & 21 Geo. 5. c. 35) (which came into force in January 1931) provided for the compulsory closing of hairdressers and barbers shops on Sundays and with certain exceptions provided that "no person may carry on the work of a hairdresser on Sunday." An order of February 1930 prescribed protective measures for cement workers, while an order of May 1930 contained provisions concerning the protection of workers in tanneries. The Local Government Act 1929 (19 & 20 Geo. 5. c. 17) abolished the workhouse test and replaced the Poor Law with public bodies known as public assistance committees for the relief of the poor and destitute, while Poor Law hospitals came under the control of local authorities. The Poor Law Act 1930 (20 & 21 Geo. 5. c. 17) also encouraged local authorities (in the words of one study) "to work with a local voluntary group to find suitable employment for deaf people." The lid was kept on the (then) ever present risk of a naval arms race, while the system of naval officer recruitment was reformed to make it less difficult for working class sailors to secure promotion from the ranks. George Lansbury, the First Commissioner of Works, sponsored a "Brighter Britain" campaign and introduced a number of facilities in London parks such as mixed bathing, boating ponds, and swings and sandpits for children. A number of other initiatives were undertaken by the Office of Works during Labour's time in office, including extensions in the amenities of the parks and palaces under its charge, and the spending of thousands of pounds on various improvements for the preservation of memorials across the country, as characterised by the restoration of a castle at Porchester near Portsmouth. The Lord Privy Seal J. H. Thomas, who was put in charge of the problem of unemployment, was unable to offer a solution, while Margaret Bondfield also failed to come up with an imaginative response. Other members of the cabinet, however, put forward their own proposals for dealing with the Depression. George Lansbury proposed land reclamation in Great Britain, a colonising scheme in Western Australia, and pensions for people at the age of sixty, while Tom Johnston pushed for national relief schemes such as the construction of a road round Loch Lomond (Johnston was successful in getting a coach road from Aberfoyle to the Trossachs rebuilt). These and similar schemes, however, failed in the Unemployment Committee (a group composed of Thomas and his assistants Johnston, Lansbury, and Oswald Mosley to develop a solution to the unemployment problem), where the four ministers received negative responses to their proposals from the top civil servants from the various government departments. The one minister whose proposals may have helped Britain to recover quickly from the worst effects of the Great Depression was Oswald Mosley, a former member of the Conservative Party. Frustrated by the government's economic orthodoxy (a controversial policy upheld by the fiscally conservative Chancellor, Philip Snowden), Mosley submitted an ambitious set of proposals for dealing with the crisis to the Labour Cabinet in what became known as "Mosley's Memorandum". These included much greater use of credit to finance development through the public control of banking, rationalisation of industry under public ownership, British agricultural development, import restrictions and bulk purchase agreements with foreign (particularly Imperial) producers, protection of the home market by tariffs, and higher pensions and allowances to encourage earlier retirement from industry and to increase purchasing power. Bondfield was caught between the financial orthodoxy of Snowden, the critics of cuts on Labour's backbenches and the baying for even more cuts on the Opposition benches, and in the end she ended up satisfying none of them.

In the summer of 1931, the government was gripped by a political and financial crisis as the value of the pound and its place on the Gold Standard came under threat over fears that the budget was unbalanced. A run on gold began when a report by the May Committee estimated that there would be a deficit of £120 million by April 1932, and recommended reductions in government expenditure and higher taxes to prevent this. MacDonald's cabinet met repeatedly to work out the necessary cutbacks and tax rises, while at the same time seeking loans from overseas. It later became clear that the bankers in New York would only provide loans if the government carried out significant austerity measures, such as a 10% reduction in the dole. During August 1931, the Cabinet struggled to produce budget amendments that were politically acceptable but proved unable to do so without causing mass resignations and a full scale split in the party. The particular issue on which the split occurred was the vote of the cabinet after much discussion to reduce benefit paid to unemployed people under the National Assistance scheme. The Cabinet was unable to reach an agreement on this controversial issue, with nine members opposing the reduction in the dole and eleven supporting it, and on 24 August 1931 the government formally resigned. The Second Labour Government was succeeded by the First National Ministry, also headed by Ramsay MacDonald and made up of members of Labour, the Conservatives and Liberals, calling itself a National Government. Viewed by many Labour supporters as a traitor, Macdonald was subsequently expelled from the Labour Party, and remained a hated figure within the Labour Party for many years thereafter, despite his great services to his party earlier in his life. The circumstances surrounding the downfall of the Second Labour Government, together with its replacement by the National Government and its failure to develop a coherent economic strategy for dealing with the effects of the Great Depression, remained controversial amongst historians for many years.