There was no welfare state, and people had to rely mainly on the Poor Law - that was all the state provided. It was very degrading, very humiliating. And there was a means test for receiving poor relief.
From Barbara Castle
In politics, guts is all.
And that had a powerful appeal, particularly to those who had been denied the choice to stay on at school, to go to university, to be something else, other than going down the pit.
And that will increasingly dawn on people. The demand for controlling the commanding heights will grow.
And what always struck me about that war period was how even Churchill had to talk socialism to keep up people's morale.
Another example of that was that even during the economic problems of the 1945 government, we managed to carry out other aspects of our policy and other ideals. Through the establishment of national parks, for instance.
Britain in the 1970s was undoubtedly an economic mess because of the oil price explosion.
He described how, as a boy of 14, his dad had been down the mining pit, his uncle had been down the pit, his brother had been down the pit, and of course he would go down the pit.
I remember a big meeting with the hosiery trade in Harold's ministerial room.
I remember people who'd had a lot of hardship during the war. They'd thought we'd won.
3 perspectives
2 perspectives
1 perspectives