Read Online Family Britain, 1951-1957 by David Kynaston - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: David Kynaston
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Churchill was Prime Minister, having driven to the Palace in a car flying the flag of the Warden of the Cinque Ports. The eventual Tory overall majority was 17 – a majority achieved despite the somewhat startling fact that, on an impressively civic 82.5 per cent turnout, they had received almost a quarter of a million fewer votes than Labour. Among the youthful losers were Margaret Roberts in Dartford and Peter Parker in Bedford; Willie Hamilton won comfortably in West Fife; Charles Hill in Luton and John Freeman in Watford were re-elected, the latter narrowly; and W. J. Brown lost in Fulham West. If for some Tory supporters there was a sense of disappointment, even anti-climax – ‘Conservatives are “in”, but alas! only just,’ reflected Florence Speed at 6.30 that evening – for others there was an irresistible feeling that the natural order of things had been restored. ‘I can date my political awakening,’ the theatre critic Michael Billington would recall, ‘from the moment a peculiarly detested fellow pupil burst into my public school classroom the day after the 1951 general election shouting: “We’re in” – meaning, of course, the Tories. His arrogant assumption that we were all of the same persuasion meant I became a lifelong Labourite on the spot.’ Or as Vere Hodgson put it less rebarbatively next day in her West London diary: ‘At last I can write it. MR CHURCHILL IS AGAIN PRIME MINISTER. How wonderful!’26
During the Cabinet-making that ensued over the weekend, two appointments particularly reflected the less than commanding mandate that Churchill had received. One was for No. 11, where almost everyone had expected Churchill to put in the strongly free-market Oliver Lyttelton, a prominent City figure. Instead, he gave the job to the younger Rab Butler – ‘the architect’, in his biographer’s just words, ‘behind the rebuilding of the Tory Party’s entire post-war fortunes’. The other crucial appointment, especially in terms of seeking to create the right climate for the new government, was the Minister of Labour. Again, everyone expected a hardliner, Sir David Maxwell Fyfe, but instead Churchill turned to the more emollient Sir Walter Monckton, rather cruelly nicknamed ‘the oil-can’ and now given express orders not to upset the unions. Churchill also offered a position (Minister of Education) to Clement Davies, the Liberal leader whose party had won only six seats. Davies, at the age of 67, was sorely tempted, but, after referring the question to his executive, he regretfully turned it down. ‘Had Davies surrendered to Churchill’s blandishments,’ Anthony Howard plausibly claims, ‘the Liberal Party as an independent entity would have ceased to exist.’27
In fact, the Tories would almost certainly not have won the election if the Liberals had not fielded such a puny number (109) of candidates. It was a shortfall largely caused by financial constraints, and the majority of disenfranchised Liberal supporters plumped for the Tories as second-best. Even so, it had needed a makeover for Churchill and his party to return to power. ‘I have not given my vote to Die Hard Tories, but to Progressive Conservatives,’ Hodgson reflected after her jubilant declaration. ‘I don’t like profiteers and huge dividends.’ Her sentiments perhaps accurately reflected the sentiments of much middle-ground opinion – people who may or may not have actually voted Labour in 1945, but who in that unique context had not been too unhappy about a Labour victory. More generally, it seems that whereas the working class stayed broadly loyal to Labour – though no more than broadly, given that 44 per cent of it voted Conservative – the middle class continued, following on from the February 1950 election, its rightwards drift, especially in suburban seats. As for gender, the Conservatives had a 4 per cent lead among women, in part reflecting the party’s sustained emphasis on the whole area
During the Cabinet-making that ensued over the weekend, two appointments particularly reflected the less than commanding mandate that Churchill had received. One was for No. 11, where almost everyone had expected Churchill to put in the strongly free-market Oliver Lyttelton, a prominent City figure. Instead, he gave the job to the younger Rab Butler – ‘the architect’, in his biographer’s just words, ‘behind the rebuilding of the Tory Party’s entire post-war fortunes’. The other crucial appointment, especially in terms of seeking to create the right climate for the new government, was the Minister of Labour. Again, everyone expected a hardliner, Sir David Maxwell Fyfe, but instead Churchill turned to the more emollient Sir Walter Monckton, rather cruelly nicknamed ‘the oil-can’ and now given express orders not to upset the unions. Churchill also offered a position (Minister of Education) to Clement Davies, the Liberal leader whose party had won only six seats. Davies, at the age of 67, was sorely tempted, but, after referring the question to his executive, he regretfully turned it down. ‘Had Davies surrendered to Churchill’s blandishments,’ Anthony Howard plausibly claims, ‘the Liberal Party as an independent entity would have ceased to exist.’27
In fact, the Tories would almost certainly not have won the election if the Liberals had not fielded such a puny number (109) of candidates. It was a shortfall largely caused by financial constraints, and the majority of disenfranchised Liberal supporters plumped for the Tories as second-best. Even so, it had needed a makeover for Churchill and his party to return to power. ‘I have not given my vote to Die Hard Tories, but to Progressive Conservatives,’ Hodgson reflected after her jubilant declaration. ‘I don’t like profiteers and huge dividends.’ Her sentiments perhaps accurately reflected the sentiments of much middle-ground opinion – people who may or may not have actually voted Labour in 1945, but who in that unique context had not been too unhappy about a Labour victory. More generally, it seems that whereas the working class stayed broadly loyal to Labour – though no more than broadly, given that 44 per cent of it voted Conservative – the middle class continued, following on from the February 1950 election, its rightwards drift, especially in suburban seats. As for gender, the Conservatives had a 4 per cent lead among women, in part reflecting the party’s sustained emphasis on the whole area
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