The party’s new program, “ Labour and the New Social Order,” drafted by Fabian Society leaders Sidney and Beatrice Webb, committed Labour to the pursuit of full employment with a minimum wage and a maximum workweek, democratic control and public ownership of industry, progressive taxation, and the expansion of educational and social services. After World War I the party made great strides, owing to a number of factors: first, the Liberal Party tore itself apart in a series of factional disputes second, the 1918 Representation of the People Act extended the electoral franchise to all males aged 21 or older and to women aged 30 or older and third, in 1918 Labour reconstituted itself as a formally socialist party with a democratic constitution and a national structure. The early Labour Party lacked a nationwide mass membership or organization up to 1914 it made progress chiefly through an informal agreement with the Liberals not to run candidates against each other wherever possible. In 1900 the Trades Union Congress (the national federation of British trade unions) cooperated with the Independent Labour Party (founded in 1893) to establish a Labour Representation Committee, which took the name Labour Party in 1906. The Labour Party was born at the turn of the 20th century out of the frustration of working-class people at their inability to field parliamentary candidates through the Liberal Party, which at that time was the dominant social-reform party in Britain. In opposition to the Conservative Party, it has been the major democratic socialist party in Britain since the early 20th century. Labour Party, British political party whose historic links with trade unions have led it to promote an active role for the state in the creation of economic prosperity and in the provision of social services.
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