Intervention
So distasteful did Gladstone find the principle of direct taxation that he even promised to abolish income tax if he won the election of 1874. He lost, and income tax not only stayed but flourished to become the mainstay of government revenue for at least another century.
In 1869, though, only 2.1 per cent of all state expenditure went on government departments. The Victorian civil service was very small. Concerns about 'centralisation' and state power, which some critics voiced at the time, seemed ludicrously wide of the mark. One of our most distinguished historians, Eric Hobsbawm, has asserted that, 'By the middle of the 19th century government policy in Britain came as near laissez-faire as has ever been practicable in a modern state.'
'... against the general assumptions ... Victorian Britain was a country of growing state intervention.'
Mid-Victorian government, however, was much more interventionist in social and economic matters than it had been in the 18th, or indeed in any previous, century. The duties of 18th-century governments extended little beyond diplomacy, defence and warfare.
Taxes were raised to fight the frequent wars in which Britain was then engaged, but the welfare of its citizens was a local (and usually a parish) responsibility, if indeed there was any state involvement at all. By contrast, and against the general assumptions of laissez-faire ideology, Victorian Britain was a country of growing state intervention.
Published: 2004-11-04
