Why did The Labour Party win the General Election in 1945?

by jamielfc (student)

Jamie Greer

The 1945 British General Election was held just after the Allied victory in Europe and the result was a huge shock to wartime leader, Winston Churchill. For this general election, the Conservatives, led by Churchill, had played on his inspirational wartime leadership skills – the man who had taken the country to victory over the Germans. Winston Churchill had world-wide fame and respect. The Conservative's major opponent, the Labour Party, was led by Clement Attlee – reasonably well known in this country but not outside of it. The election date was set for July 5th 1945 and campaigning started on June 4th. However, The result was not known until July 26th as there were many servicemen stationed abroad still fighting against Japan who had the right to vote but the getting their results back to London took a long time, thus holding the election up. One reason that Labour won the General Election in 1945 is that they fully expected to win the election just because of Winston Churchill. Churchill was the Prime Minister and Leader of the Conservative/ Labour Coalition during the war. Many believe that if Churchill wasn’t in charge, Britain would be speaking German today. Due to this, the Conservatives fully expected the British public to vote for their war time hero. However, Conservatives announced no plans to sort out the problems that the country was in, such as poverty and unemployment, including the Great Depression. Obviously because of this, people wanted change but the Conservatives were happy and fully prepared to carry on running the country the way they did before the Second World War began. While they were relying on Churchill, Atlee campaigned across the whole country, being driven in a Standard motor car by his wife Violet, going door to door.

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Another factor that was somewhat deciding in the final vote was Churchill’s radio speech in June 1945. Churchill was quoted to have said “Socialism is in its essence an attack not only upon British enterprise, but upon the right of the ordinary man or woman to breathe freely without having a harsh, clumsy tyrannical hand clasped across their mouth and nostrils. (Labour) would have to fall back on some form of Gestapo, no doubt very humanely directed in the first instance” Calling his opposition Nazi’s was never going to fare well with the public, especially as he was in a coalition with them for the 5 previous years. Clement Atlee’s response was short but sweet; “How great was the difference between Winston Churchill the great leader in war of a united nation, and Mr. Churchill the party leader of the Conservatives." This fitted well with the opinion of many people at the time that Churchill was only “a great war time leader”

The Beveridge report was also something that contributed to Labour’s landslide victory in 1945. Even though it was written in 1942, The Labour Party was very much associated with the report with it, with their slogan "Freedom From Want". The Conservatives were less associated with the report and by 1945, were still associated with those who did well out of society. It was chaired by , an economist, who identified five "Giant Evils" in society: squalor, ignorance, want, idleness and disease. The main change that was promised in this report was the Welfare State, which made sure there was a commitment to health, education, employment and in the United Kingdom. This undertook policy measures to provide for the people of the United Kingdom "from the cradle to the grave." They also planned the introduction of the NHS (National Health Service), which provided free healthcare for everyone in the country, regardless of social class. As this would no doubt improve the state that the country was in, many people voted for Labour because of this. Also the fact that the Conservatives were publically against the report would not have helped their campaign.

Even though Labour was ‘classed’ as a ‘working class party’, many of the middle class population were prepared to vote for them in 1945. This was because the country was in decline and the Conservatives were doing nothing about it.

Another reason was the fact that the conservatives dealings with Hitler before the war at Munich (Munich Agreement, country being led my Neville Chamberlain at the time) and the policy of appeasement were now looked on in shame and blamed on the Conservatives, going as far as saying that they caused the war.

Why did The Labour Party win the General Election in 1945?

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