Two cheers for a measure that, though mostly about managing, dividing and taming popular opinion, remains a reforming landmark.
As the Commons prepares to debates the effects of Brexit on these rights, here’s the story of how the Party has supplied them from Peel through to Cameron.
The key point at stake is not what Parliament has a right to do, but what it is wise to do – in the wake of the most emphatic popular vote in modern history.
Lloyd George introduced a non-contributory system – unlike the contributions-based proposal from Chamberlain – and its legacy endures today.
There may be a strange applicability for the future in the circumstances that led to the Liberals’ sweeping electoral triumph in 1906.
We cannot know yet whether 2015 was the start of a new ascendancy or whether, like 1900, it is an anomaly that posterity hardly notices.
Think of today’s two main parties led in 2015 by Nicholas Soames and Denis Healey and you are part of the way there.
My party seeks to build an economy which works for the many, not for the few.
We regularly describe ourselves as a broad church – and correctly so. Any alignment with the Brexit Party would see that width of appeal narrowed.