 They returned home with no arguments to restrain unfettered commercial competition with the Dutch, and relations quickly deteriorated into the First Anglo-Dutch War.Strickland had been elected to Parliament as member for Minehead in 1645, and from his final return from Holland in 1651 began to play an active role.He was elected to the third (1651) and fifth (1652) councils of state of the Commonwealth, and after the expulsion of the Rump was one of four civilians on the council of thirteen elected by the army to rule in Parliament's stead.