Conservative Governments 1951-64 Flashcards
Winston Churchill 1951-55
🎉Good reputation for leading B to victory in WW2.
💪🏼Met world leaders abroad to keep peace☮️ + avoid nuclear war💣. Worked w/ Parliament + TUs to avoid social + industrial🏭 conflict⚔️.
🔻Rivalries within govt. Eden impatient for Churchill to step down. Cs critical of post-war consensus had limited roles. Butler did much of Churchill’s work when he went abroad. Churchill 77yrs (1951) + often ill. Mainly a figurehead.
Anthony Eden 1955-57
🎉Played key role in WW2 as Churchill’s Foreign Secretary. Occasionally acted as PM in Churchill’s absence.
💪🏼Aimed to prevent industrial conflict🏭. Living standards improving😎📈.
🔻Cs unhappy w/ Eden☹️: Lack of experience + interest in domestic affairs. Lack of knowledge on economic issues💰. Too conciliatory w/ TUs. Decision to take military action⚔️ in Suez (1956) ruined his reputation + exposed B’s financial weaknesses. 40 C MPs🔵 rebelled against him.
Harold Macmillan 1957-63
🎉Most of Eden’s cabinet preferred Macmillan as leader. Seen as safe choice🗝- had few enemies.
💪🏼Restored Party unity💞. Had media on his side🗞. Used new political opportunities provided by TV w/ flair📺. Economic prosperity💸 gained voters - ‘supermac’🦸🏼♂️.
🔻Described as ‘one-nation conservative’ which some Cs may have seen as too soft. Scandals made him seem out of touch near end of premiership. Unexpected successor Alec Douglas-Home defeated in 1964 election before could make mark in govt.
What was the post-war consensus?
Agreement w/ main parties on major issues🪢 - ‘Butskellism’:
- mixed economy, support for NHS + welfare state🩺
- aim to ensure full employment👷🏼
- work w/ both TUs + employers🦺
- independence for Empire’s colonies🇬🇧
- foreign policy supporting USA + opposing communism⚒
-Different opinions about policies to achieve this between Cs + L.
Internal Labour divisions💔🔴
💔1951 Aneurin Bevan resigned over prescription charges to finance Korean War (introduced by Hugh Gaitskell)🩺💰.
💔1955 Clement Attlee resigned➡️Gaitskell defeated Bevan as L leader🎉.
💔1956 Frank Cousins (TU leader) fierce opposition against Gaitskell in favour of CND.
💔Many L-left (initially inc. Bevan) supported UND. Link between L + CND may have lost voters💣🚫📉.
💔1960 Scarborough conference: Gaitskell speech rejected UND but lost vote (succeeded 1 year later🎉).
💔1959 Blackpool conference: Gaitskell wanted abolish Clause IV of Party constitution (committed L to nationalisation) - fierce opposition from left + TU leaders➡️G backed down w/o vote.
Domestic policies
🏘1951 Conservative Manifesto promised build 300,000 houses/year➡️rebuild housing stock destroyed in war💣+ replace pre-war slums. Oversaw by Macmillan (Minister of Housing).
👩🏻🏫Continued tripartite 2° education system. Financial restraints under Churchill💰❌➡️ mostly grammar or modern schools. Eden tried promote technical schools. 1960s people questioned fairness of 11+ test⚖️.
👷🏼1956 Clean Air Act (prevent smog 1950s) + Housing and Factory Act (improve living + working conditions). Oversaw by Macmillan.
⛓1957 Homicide Act (restricted death penalty☠️) + 1957 Wolfenden Commission (suggested homosexuality not crime👨❤️👨). Oversaw by Rab Butler (Home Secretary).
The post-war boom
🔹Swift acceleration birth rate➡️1951-61 pop ⬆️ by 5%📈👶🏼.
🔹Food rationing from war ended July 1954🥖- austerity from wartime over + B people enjoying higher standard of living than ever before.
🔹1955 full employment achieved👷🏼🎉 - less than 1% workforce unemployed.
🔹Economic growth + low unemployment➡️most people enjoyed ⬆️ income💸➡️growth in consumerism.
🔹1955 election - ‘give away’ budget provided mid-classes w/ £134mn in tax cuts➡️boosted C votes🎉.
🔹Service industries + sales ⬆️ ➡️1960 almost 5mn employed in service industries (roughly same no. as in all heavy industry).
🔹⬆️ in overseas trade🗺 ensured plentiful employment. Late 1950s improvement in world trade➡️B could import 29% more goods than in 1951.
Balance of payments deficit
🔻Growth in wages➡️large internal consumer demand but no ⬆️ in export trade➡️balance of trade deficit➡️overheating economy.
🔻Govt wanted maintain economic growth + employment at same time as keeping prices steady.
🔻Difficult for govt to persuade TUs against high wage increases.
🔻Govt controls used to deliberately slow down economy➡️high interest rates, spending cuts + taxation remained high to:
- control excessive spending to ⬇️ demand + curb excessive inflation.
- pay for ⬆️ costs in public services.
🔻When demand for imports ⬇️, controls removed + when demand ⬆️, controls came back = ‘stop-go’ economics.
🔻By 1961 balance of payments deficit at £95mn.
Economic policy (1958)
- Suez Crisis 1956 exposed B’s financial weakness➡️run of the £.
- 1958 Macmillan’s Chancellor, Peter Thorneycroft, proposed drastic spending cuts (limit wage ⬆️🚫 + cut money supply - ‘monetarist’).
- Strongly opposed by one-nation Cs (Iain McLeod) - would ⬆️ unemployment + cutbacks in housing🏘.
- Macmillan kept expansionist economic policy + overruled Thorneycroft➡️resignation of Thorneycroft, Enoch Powell + Nigel Birch.
Growth in economy and international competition🗺
- B economy continued to grow (as in western Europe due to Marshall Aid), reached peak between 1960-64.
- 1961 worries about overheating economy forced govt introduce ‘pay pause’ to hold down wage inflation + ask loan from IMF.
- Economic growth in Europe (especially W. Germany) overtaking B - trade w/ Empire + Commonwealth not sufficient to keep up.
- Macmillan reversed Party’s previous policy + decided essential for B’s economy to be joined with Europe’s (EEC).
- 1961 govt set up National Economic Development Council (long-term planning) + National Incomes Commission (regulate wage demands).
Societal changes✅
✅ ⬆️in living standards: men’s weekly wages⬆️from £8.30 (1951) to £15.35 (1961).
✅Pre-war slums cleared + new towns built🏘. End to rationing 1954🥖.
✅ ⬆️affluence + consumerism➡️blur in class distinction: ⬆️in car ownership by 25% (1957-59).
✅ ⬇️deference for class + establishment: CND 1958 encouraged challenge to authority.
✅Suez Crisis 1956 (exposed lying + manipulation by govt) + press coverage (Profumo affair)➡️ ⬇️in deference.
✅Position of women: 1960 1/3 women made up workforce👷🏽♀️.
✅ ⬆️availability of consumer goods (washing machine + fridges) gave housewives more leisure time.
✅ ⬆️rates of divorce.
✅Representation of the People Act 1928➡️women 21+ could vote.
✅Attitude to immigration + race: govt aimed to bring in more immigrants to fill job vacancies left by the war.
✅Salmon Report set up by Macmillan govt to enquire racism.
✅1963 Robbins Report argued for extending comprehensive principal into higher education (e.g. expansion of existing unis, emphasis on scientific education).
Continuation in society❌
❌Only richest could afford foreign holidays🛫.
❌Class attitudes reinforced by stereotypes in film + on radio📺.
❌Class loyalties very strong in general election (65% working-class voted L🔴 + 80% middle-class voted C🔵).
❌Within months of war’s end 3/4 female workers returned to traditional role at home.
❌Family allowance from govt so women didn’t have to work - women working seen as damaging to their children.
❌TUs unsupportive of women working (thought prevented wage ⬆️).
❌Poorer areas of London frequented by race riots - pattern of white youths endlessly harassing blacks until they retaliated, e.g. Notting Hill 1958.
❌Fear within black community as law would not really protect them.
❌Govt decided to stop racial tensions by controlling immigration - Commonwealth Immigrants Act 1962.
❌Grammar schools socially divisive - only the rich could afford tutors to pass 11+ exam.
❌Greater share of public money sent to top tier schools, leaving lower tier ones impoverished.
❌Children in lower tier schools regarded as failures.
❌Youth culture➡️ ⬆️in antisocial behaviour: Teddy Boys linked to juvenile delinquency + increased crime. Used violence against immigrants to become local heroes to whites.
Why did the Conservatives fall from power?💔🔵
💔1961 - George Blake convicted of being Soviet double agent🕵🏻♂️.
💔1962 - John Vassal discovered to have been blackmailed into passing info to SU on basis of his homosexuality👨❤️👨.
💔1962 - Macmillan radically reshuffled his cabinet➡️sacked 1/3 = ‘Night of Long Knives’🔪. Meant to strengthen his govt but weakened it + made him seem clumsy.
💔1963 - Macmillan’s Secretary of State for War, John Profumo had affair w/ Christine Keeler who was also sleeping with a SU spy (Profumo Affair)👙. Threat of Cold War leaks + Profumo lied about his actions to Parliament and Macmillan. Scandal on headlines for weeks.
💔1963 - Macmillan resigned (illness) - didn’t prepare for anyone to succeed him➡️power struggle w/ strong opposition to most obvious candidates (Rab Butler + Lord Hailsham)➡️compromise candidate who no one expected, Lord Alec-Douglas Home, emerged as leader🥇.
Why was Britain not initially involved with the EEC after its foundation in 1957🇪🇺?
- Few in favour of B taking leadership role in Europe.
- Left-wing suspicious of free-market principles behind common market.
- Right-wing saw preservation of traditional trade links w/ Australia, Canada + NZ (Commonwealth) as more important than Europe.
- G🇧🇪=wartime enemies + F🇫🇷=overrun + occupied➡️B felt they ‘won the war’.
Why did Britain apply to join the EEC in 1961🇪🇺?
- 1959 Britain took lead in forming EFTA (European Free Trade Association)❌not able to match economic growth of EEC.
- 1961 Macmillan’s govt submitted B’s application to join EEC to boost industrial pr🏭, ⬆️industrial efficiency with greater competition + stimulate economic growth with rapid expansion seen in EEC📈.
- US🇺🇸wanted B act as link for Europe + America.
