London Photo Tours for Visitors
Parliament Square statues (1)
Sir Robert Peel - By Matthew Noble - bronze 1876
Robert Peel (1788 - 1850) was Prime Minister twice and is best remembered for social reform like the Factory Act limiting the working hours for women and choldren in factories and especially for repealing the protectionist corn laws which had artificially raised the price of bread etc by making imports impossible.
The police force know as 'bobbies' or 'peelers' were named after him when Home Secretary in 1829.
Peel never had much of a majority in parliament and resigned ostensibly over a lost Ireland vote the same day the corn laws were repealed. He died in a riding accident a few years later.
Disraeli (1st Earl of Beaconsfield) - bronze by Mario Raggi 1883
Disraeli (1804 - 1881) is shown robed, as an Earl: the red granite plinthe just says Beaconsfield - the Earldom being created by Queen Victoria.
Benjamin Disraeli was Prime Minister twice the longer term from 1874 - 1880. He remained Prime Minister even when an Earl by explaining government policy from the House of Lords.
His ideas are almost incomprehensible today - advocating an alliance of Aristocracy and Working Classes againgst the Middle classes, being a social reformer but also against the repeal of the Corn Laws by Peel which had caused so much hardship to the poor by artificially rasing the price of bread.
Disraeli was also a well-known novelist.
Nearest Tube: Westminster exit 6
