Page 30 - History 2020

from drowning by one of Grey’s men. Grey never set foot in China, and in any case Bergamot oil
was not used there to flavour tea. The Twinings story is on their website, which amusingly asks you
to “accept essential cookies”.

th
The time was ripe for a reform of parliament. Since the late 18 century British
society had been changing. Agriculture was becoming more commercial and
enclosure acts were dispossessing small famers. Manufacturing was producing for
national and international markets and new technology was displacing hand-loom
weavers. By 1830 a new industrial and urban society was clearly in the making.
Britain was not yet modern, but it was modernizing. The aristocratic and commercial

classes who dominated parliament were not averse to this, on condition that they
maintained their political supremacy.

The problem with parliament was that the system for electing MP’s was a complex
web of historic custom, clearly designed for an earlier age. It was based on owning
property. The new and growing industrial towns of the North and Midlands were
unrepresented. Many ancient towns (boroughs) which were represented had
relatively tiny numbers qualified to vote, so they could be readily bribed (rotten

boroughs) or coerced by a single landlord who virtually nominated the MP (pocket
boroughs). Their aristocratic patrons regarded these parliamentary seats as their own
personal property. As the Duke of Newcastle asked indignantly when reform was
proposed, “May I not do what I like with my own?”

So, as industrialisation was gathering pace, the voting system remained skewed
towards the landed classes. Tory Prime Minister Pitt had favoured parliamentary

reform as long ago as 1782, until the French Revolution put paid to it and all
movements agitating for it were repressed. Another spur for reform was the July
Revolution in France in 1830, which overthrow the Bourbon King Charles X – he fled
to Britain and took up residence in Lulworth Castle.

What was the response to reform?
On 1 March 1831 Lord John Russell, Whig leader in the Commons, introduced the
Reform Bill. Russell had a brilliant mind and great determination, and had earned the

respect of the House of Commons from his intellect rather than his physique. He had
a large head, broad shoulders and a small body; he was said to cause astonishment
when he stood up. He also spoke in a high, stammering voice with a very posh Whig
drawl. Russell’s announcement of the details of the Bill stunned MP’s, not least
because many hearing it would find their seats done away with. Others saw it as a
threat to the whole constitution and vowed to oppose it. So began the greatest

political drama in modern parliamentary history.