Abstract
It is not an exaggeration to claim that no post-war Prime Minister took office in more difficult circumstances than Harold Wilson on 4 March 1974. Apart from heading the first minority Labour Government since 1931 — with the consequent necessity of another general election in a short period of time — Wilson’s inheritance was a dual one. Firstly, he inherited an appalling economic situation partly created by the policies of the 1970–41 Heath Government and partly inflicted externally by the world oil crisis. Secondly he inherited a Labour Party which in opposition had moved further leftwards than Wilson had hoped, and which, now in office, expected immediate radical socialist solutions. Put bluntly Wilson had to keep his party together as party leader as well as attending to prime ministerial policy determination in relation to the economic situation.
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Notes and References
For a comprehensive analysis of the Heath Government see M. Holmes, Political Pressure and Economic Policy: British Government, 1970–4 (London: Butterworths, 1982).
Harold Wilson, Final Term: the Labour Government, 1974–6 (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, Michael Joseph, 1979).
Barbara Castle, The Castle Diaries, 1974–6 (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1980).
See M. Hatfield, The House the Left Built (London: Gollancz, 1978) for a full account.
Geoff Hodgson, Labour at the Crossroads (Oxford: Martin Robertson, 1981) p. 96.
Quoted in David Coates, Labour in Power? A Study of the Labour Government, 1974–9 (London: Longmans, 1980) p. 4.
W. Keegan and R. Pennant-Rae, Who Runs the Economy? Control and Influence in British Economic Policy (London: Temple-Smith, 1979) p. 31.
Joel Barnett, Inside the Treasury (London: Andre Deutsch, 1982) p. 23.
Samuel Brittan, The Economic Consequences of Democracy (London: Temple-Smith, 1977) p. 80.
Interview, Robert Sheldon. For a useful view of union-government relations in this period see Robert Taylor, The Fifth Estate: Britain’s Unions in the Modern World (London: Pan, 1980) ch. 4.
Denis Barnes and Eileen Reid, Government and Trade Unions: The British Experience, 1964–79 (London: Heinemann, 1980) pp. 199–200.
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© 1985 Dr. Martin Holmes
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Holmes, M. (1985). The Short Parliament. In: The Labour Government, 1974–79. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-09102-7_1
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