Atlee's Economics

Labours economic plan for post war reconstruction.

Atlee’s election promise

“Let us face the future”

What financial status was Britain essentially in post-war?

Bankrupcy

Britain’s post war debt figure.

£4,198,000,000 (4 Billion).

Term for US loans to UK during war.

Lend Lease

Financial problems caused Britain to pull troops from which three countries?

Turkey, Greece and Palestine.

Who was the chancellor of exchequer for Labour 1947-1950?

Stafford Cripps

Evidence of “Age of Austerity” Post-War

• Return of the black market (Cripps)

• Intensified food rationing until 1950

• Clothing Rationed

• Consumer essentials rationed (Soap)

Term for export drive to bridge gap between imports and exports

“Export or die”

Exchange Controls

Prevent foreign investors pulling out and limit dollars spent abroad.

What three things would labour nationalize to support export drive long term?

• Railways

• Coal

• Bank Of England

Group made to avoid another internation depression globally?

General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT)

Loan figure that Keynes negotiated in 1947.

£3.7 Billion, to be paid over 50 years.

What was the downside to the US-Keynes loan?

The value of the pound plummeted as there was a promise to make the pound fully convertible.

Loan figure given from Canada to Britain?

£1.5 Billion

Which Labour Foreign Secretary was able to claim DANGEROUS amounts of Marshall Aid.

Ernest Bevin

Labour success in economic recovery

• “Export or die” was a success, exports increased 80% under labour.

• Motor car production doubled its pre-war peak.

• 20% of industry Nationalised, creating a mixed economy

• Interest, Wage rates and inflation were low. This allowed enterprise to expand.

• Agriculture helped balance payments.

• Festival of Britain 1951, economic progression.

Chancellor before Cripps under the “Annus Horribilis”

Hugh Dalton

The Annus Horribilis fuel crisis (1947)

• Transport came to a standstill

• Shinwell (Fuel Minister) had not stockpiled enough coal

• Electric fires had to be used instead, pressure put on national grid.

• Overall caused industry shutdowns, unemployment rose to 2 million.

• Coal exports dropped by 20%

Devaluation of the pound (1949)

US loans had ran out in one year, Bank of England had no dollars so there was a run on the pound. Cripps had to act to boost dollar reserves.

What did US rearmament cause?

Balance of payments deficit.

What caused a balance of payments crisis at the turn of the 1950s?

Atlees rearmament program for the Korean War, necessitating raw materials.

Evidence of public becoming fed up of Labour’s economic controls

British Housewives League campaign against rationing.

Improvement for depressed areas.

Labour encouraged factories to open here, leading to heightened prosperity.

How many homes had been destroyed in the war?

750,000 homes