Page "William Ewart Gladstone" Paragraph 70

Gladstone's proposals went some way to meet working-class demands, such as the realisation of the free breakfast table through repealing the duties on tea and sugar, and reform of local taxation which was increasing for the poorer ratepayers.

According to the working-class financial reformer Thomas Briggs, writing in the trade unionist newspaper The Bee-Hive, the manifesto relied on " a much higher authority than Mr. Gladstone ... viz., the late Richard Cobden ".