7 DECEMBER 1923
Polling continued in the General Election, with the first results being expected in the evening.
Calvin Coolidge, the President of the United States, in his Message to the American Congress, indicated adhesion to the principle of a Permanent Court of International Justice, and indicated his attitude to a proposal in the Senate to accord support for such a body. With regard to the United States tariff law, he stated that it had secured the prosperity of the country.
6 DECEMBER 1923
Polling took place in the General Election.
Stanley Baldwin, the Prime Minister, speaking in Bewdley, said that his policy was devised to help unemployment. He sincerely believed in the instruments he proposed to use. He said if he failed, his reputation would be gone; but he was going to have a jolly good try.
David Lloyd George, the former Prime Minister, addressed Liberal rallies at Camberwell and Brighton.
Herbert Asquith, assisted by Lord Buckmaster and Lady Bonham Carter, wound up his campaign in Paisley.
5 DECEMBER 1923
Speaking at Great Malvern, Stanley Baldwin, assured pensioners that the policy of the Government would involve no peril to their interests, as had been insinuated in Liberal quarters. He characterised it as a discreditable insinuation, which showed the bankruptcy of the party that made it.
Austen Chamberlain was prevented from addressing a meeting at West Bromwich being shouted down by Socialists.
David Lloyd George, the former Prime Minister, spoke in Cardiff.
4 DECEMBER 1923
The Prime Minister delivered the last national speech of his election campaign at Liverpool, emphasising the country’s grave situation, and the momentous nature of the electors’ choice.
Viscount Younger defended the fiscal policy of the Government in a speech at Balfron in support of the candidature of Sir Harry Hope.
Election speeches on the Liberal side were made by Herbert Asquith, David Lloyd George and Winston Churchill.
3 DECEMBER 1923
Over 700 lives were reported to have been lost in the Val Camonica as a result of the bursting of a dam on Lake Gleno, an artificial lake in the province of Bergamo, in Northern Italy.
Stanley Baldwin, the Prime Minister, made a special appeal to female voters for support of the Government’s fiscal policy in a letter which he sent to Mrs Bridgeman, the chairman of the Women’s Unionist Organisation.
2 DECEMBER 1923
Lord Kilmarnock, the British High Commissioner in the Rhineland, has received instructions from London to show a conciliatory spirit in the application of the Dusseldorf Agreement arrived at by the Franco-Belgian authorities and the Ruhr magnates regarding the resumption of work and the payment of reparations.
A fine of £5,000 and costs were imposed on Thomas James Priestman, a metal merchant, who was charged here to-day in connection with income tax frauds. The judge said that Priestman had pleaded guilty to serious frauds on the income tax authorities.
1 DECEMBER 1923
Herbert Asquith, the former Prime Minister, said that unless Britain had the folly to adopt Sir Robert Horne’s suggestion of an import duty on steel plates, the country would continue to retain by far the most profitable share of the carrying trade of the world.
The Reparation Commission decided to appoint two Committees of experts, one to consider the means of balancing Germany’s Budget and the other to investigate a method of valuing German capital in foreign countries.
29 NOVEMBER 1923
Stanley Baldwin, the Prime Minister, addressed a large Unionist gathering at Glasgow and dealt at length with what he described as the grave position of British shipbuilding in the face of foreign competition.
Viscount Novar, the Secretary of State for Scotland, said that he was so convinced that another David Lloyd George Government would be a disaster, so he would be standing by Stanley Baldwin.
Winston Churchill, speaking in the West Leicester Division, defended his action in regards to the Dardanelles.
28 NOVEMBER 1923
David Lloyd George, the former Prime Minister, speaking to a meeting of Liberals in Leeds expressed apprehension that the Government might secure a majority of Parliamentary seats and carry its tariff proposals, notwithstanding that Liberals and Socialists who were both hostile to tariffs might together secure a majority of votes.
It was announced that Dr Albert has failed to form a majority Cabinet in Germany.
Viscount Goschen was appointed as the Governor of Madras.
27 NOVEMBER 1923
There were 1,440 parliamentary candidates contesting the 1923 General Election.
The Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin, speaking in Bristol, said that until the leak in the prosperity of the country had been stopped then social reform would be more or less paralysed. He said that the Government’s main energies should be devoted to combating unemployment and that would be the paramount issue of the General Election.
David Lloyd George, the former Prime Minister, visited Edinburgh, Newcastle and Sunderland.