ABSTRACT
Liverpool was prime minister for almost fifteen years. Liverpool’s father, Charles Jenkinson, was from a well-established but unremarkable gentry family and enjoyed a considerable political career. It cannot be argued that Liverpool's tenure of the office was an unequivocal success, despite his grip on the administrative responsibilities it entailed. By 1821, when the Grenvillites finally ended their always fragile alliance with the Whigs and their leader in the Commons, Charles Williams-Wynn, accepted minor office, Liverpool's parliamentary position was impregnable and Whig hopes of a return to office, which had flickered on frequent occasions since 1812, were finally extinguished. Liverpool’s main economic objectives were reduction of debt and trade liberalization. Government economic policy was frequently blown off course in the early years. Liverpool’s was the first ministry since the Hanoverian succession to acknowledge the label ‘Tory’.
