Welcome to the web site of the Lloyd George Society

The Lloyd George Society is a loose combination of like minds that meets in Wales for a weekend school on topical subjects, historical issues (particularly those relating to David Lloyd George) or interesting questions affecting Welsh life and culture, all from a liberal perspective. The Society usually meets once a year in February, avoiding the dates of rugby football internationals.

The schools have been taking place for over 50 years. Originally designed for Welsh Liberal parliamentary candidates to debate policy and topical questions, to help them prepare for the election trail, the schools have developed away from this specific purpose and now provide an informal forum for participants to hear interesting talks, take part in discussions and meet friends, old and new.

The schools have always tried to attract speakers expert in their field to provide plenty of food for thought and a leavening of controversy but the schools are best enjoyed for their good fellowship with many members who have attended regularly for decades.

Despite the origins of the Society, we are not formally affiliated to the Liberal Democrats. We welcome supporters and speakers at the weekend school who belong to other political parties or anyone who has an interest in Wales, history or current affairs. Obviously however, our liberal history strongly informs the range of topics on the school's agenda. In addition our Vice Presidents are Liberal Democrat parliamentarians.

Ffion Hague talks about her Lloyd George book Sun 20th Jul 2008 Ffion Hague has been talking about her book on David Lloyd George and the women in his life, The Pain and the Privilege, at the Buxton Festival in Derbyshire.

2009 Weekend School - date and venue set Thu 17th Jul 2008 The Society's next weekend school will be held at the Hotel Commodore in Llandrindod Wells from the evening of Friday 20 February 2009 until lunchtime on Sunday 22nd. No details as to cost or of guest speakers are yet available.

Celebrating 50 years of Independent Television in Wales - with a mention of Lloyd George, of course Sat 12th Jul 2008 Actor Jonathan Owen is making a series of four programmes for ITV1 Wales, based on the years 1958, 1948, 1928 and 1918 - to mark fifty years of independent television broadcasting in Wales.

Working with Others: the Lib-Lab Pact revisited - would LG have approved? Fri 4th Jul 2008 Of all politicians, apart perhaps from Winston Churchill, surely Lloyd George was one who most understood that you could only achieve things in politics from a position of power. Lloyd George shared power with the Conservatives and Labour during his First World War coalition. He considered the idea of 'fusion' between Coalition Liberals and Conservatives into a new Centre Party, with the hope of attracting Independent Liberals to join. He continued his coalition with the Conservatives into post-war government from 1918-1922. As a younger politician in north Wales, he sought to build a coalition of radical Liberals, labour and Welsh nationalists in a re-launched Cymru Fydd. LG was so much a collaborationist in politics that some critical commentators used this to predict he would be the British Petain in the event of a successful invasion of Britain by Hitler.

Peek at the Times archive Thu 19th Jun 2008 Yesterday's (18 June) online edition of the Times newspaper contains extracts from the speeches of a number of past Chancellors of the Exchequer - to complement the contribution to be made by Alistair Darling at the Mansion House.

Goats and Donkeys Fri 13th Jun 2008 You'll have to read the entire review of Ffion's Hague's new book about the women in Lloyd George's life; The Pain and The Privilege (HarperPress, 2008) by Sam Leith in the Spectator magazine if you want to understand the headline.

More about the new LG book Mon 9th Jun 2008 There is a review of Ffion Hague's new book about the women in the life of David Lloyd George, The Pain and The Privilege - entitled "the women behind the wizard" - in last Friday's (6 June) Independent newspaper. The review is the work of biographer John Campbell, himself the author of books about Lloyd George including If Love Were All... which tells the story of LG and Frances Stevenson.

New book about Lloyd George launched Wed 4th Jun 2008 As reported earlier on the website, Ffion Hague has been planning a book about Lloyd George and his women. The book has now been published and Mrs Hague launched it at the recent Hay Festival. It is called The Pain and the Privilege: The Women in Lloyd George's Life and is published by HarperPress for a cover price of £25.

The Caseg Press Tue 20th May 2008 In an article for the Liverpool Echo published on 3 May, Dawn Collinson reviewed the value of certain forms of prime ministerial memorabilia. Included in this was mention of a Margaret Thatcher teapot fetching the sum of £70, a ceramic bust of William Gladstone fetching about £100 but noting (lamentably it seems to me) that a corkscrew with a composition handle in the form of [Earl] Lloyd George of Dwyfor - regarded by many in Llanystumdwy, his home village, as a saint - only made £22.

Lloyd George and Lawrence of Arabia Sat 10th May 2008 In an article today in the Western Mail, under the headline 'Welsh hands that shaped the Middle East conflict', Rhodri Clark explores the contributions of T E Lawrence and David Lloyd George to the downfall of the Ottoman Empire in the First World War and the post-war settlement covering Palestine and its legacy for the modern world, the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Archive of earlier news stories.