Part of Oral Answers to Questions — Environment – in the House of Commons am 12:00 am ar 4 Ebrill 1979.
Mr Jeff Rooker
, Birmingham, Perry Barr
12:00,
4 Ebrill 1979
Is my right hon. Friend aware that in Birmingham his policy of allowing tenants of two-years' standing to buy their council homes and preventing the sale of empty and void property is welcomed? Is he further aware that the Tory council is crookedly getting round that policy by leasing and licensing empty, void properties so that people can jump the queue and be allowed to buy the property after two years? Surely that is not the intention of his policy.
The political party system in the English-speaking world evolved in the 17th century, during the fight over the ascension of James the Second to the Throne. James was a Catholic and a Stuart. Those who argued for Parliamentary supremacy were called Whigs, after a Scottish word whiggamore, meaning "horse-driver," applied to Protestant rebels. It was meant as an insult.
They were opposed by Tories, from the Irish word toraidhe (literally, "pursuer," but commonly applied to highwaymen and cow thieves). It was used — obviously derisively — to refer to those who supported the Crown.
By the mid 1700s, the words Tory and Whig were commonly used to describe two political groupings. Tories supported the Church of England, the Crown, and the country gentry, while Whigs supported the rights of religious dissent and the rising industrial bourgeoisie. In the 19th century, Whigs became Liberals; Tories became Conservatives.
