The British Cartoon Archive

In 1906 the government had a surplus - in other words it had money to spend. This cartoon tries to show all the different groups and causes which felt that they should get money from the government.

1 What impression do you get about how important welfare measures were?

2 What impression do you get about how strong a voice welfare measures had, compared to some other groups?

National Insurance was introduced in 1911. Employers and workers had to pay contributions and the government argued that the worker got '9d for 4d'. There was some support and some opposition to the measure. One aspect which caused uproar was that domestic servants were covered by National Insurance. The servants themselves were unhappy at being forced to pay contributions out of their very low wages. Exmployers (usually the woman of the house, or the mistress) were also outraged and some were arrested for refusing to pay. 1 What does this cartoon tell us about the reasons for opposition to the National Insurance Act? 2 Does it reveal anything about the extent of the opposition?

As you have seen in the previous cartoon, there was a lot of opposition to National Insurance being applied to domestic servants. A lively campaign of opposition to this was launched.

1 This cartoon shows one of the arguments which was made against including servants in the National Insurance scheme. Can you work out what the argument was and how the cartoonist put this argument across?

This cartoon comments on the introduction of National Insurance to domestic servants (this is what is meant by 'The Servant Tax').

1 What does the cartoon reveal about attitudes towards Lloyd George and his National Insurance Act?

2 Does this source prove that Lloyd George was popular or unpopular?