In
1946 the Clement Attlee and his Labour
Government passed the revolutionary National
Insurance Act that created
the structure of the Welfare State. The
legislation instituted a comprehensive state health service, effective
from 5th July 1948. The Act provided for compulsory contributions
for unemployment, sickness, maternity and widows' benefits and old
age pensions from employers and employees, with the government funding
the balance.
People in work, except married women, paid 4s 11d a week in National
Insurance contributions. For the average worker, this amounted to
nearly 5 per cent of their income. James
Griffiths, the new Minister of National Insurance, claimed that it
was "the best and cheapest insurance policy offered to the British
people, of any people anywhere."
David Low,
The Good Old Days, Evening Standard
(October, 1943)
(1)
Labour Party Manifesto (1945)
What
will the Labour Party do? First, the whole of the national resources,
in land, material and labour must be fully employed. Secondly, a high
and constant purchasing power can be maintained through good wages,
social services and insurance, and taxation which bears less heavily
on the lower-income groups.
(2)
Winston Churchill, election broadcast
(1945)
I
must tell you that a socialist policy is abhorrent to British ideas
on freedom. There is to be one State, to which all are to be obedient
in every act of their lives. This State, once in power, will prescribe
for everyone: where they are to work, what they are to work at, where
they may go and what they may say, what views they are to hold, where
their wives are to queue up for the State ration, and what education
their children are to receive. A socialist state could not afford
to suffer opposition - no socialist system can be established without
a political police. They (the Labour government) would have to fall
back on some form of Gestapo.
(3)
Clement Attlee, As It Happened (1954)
It
was clear that there could be no return to past conditions. The old
pattern was worn out and it was for us to weave the new. We had not
been elected to try to patch up an old system but to make something
new. Our policy was not a reformed capitalism but progress towards
a democratic socialism.
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