One of Lord Melbourne's first acts is…

One of Lord Melbourne's first acts is to insist on harsh punishments for the impoverished agricultural laborers involved in the machine-breaking Swing Riots.

These include sentences of hanging, transportation, and imprisonment.

William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne, though a Whig, had accepted the post of Irish Secretary (1827) in the moderate Tory governments of George Canning and Lord Goderich.

Upon the death of his father in 1828 and his becoming Viscount Melbourne, he had moved to the House of Lords, but when the Whigs come to power under Lord Grey in November 1830, he had become Home Secretary in the new government.