Arthur Greenwood was born in Leeds
in 1880. After lecturing in economics at Leeds University, Greenwood
became Secretary of Research and Information Department of the Labour
Party (1920-22). In 1922 Greenwood was elected to represent Nelson
and Colne in the House
of Commons.
In the
1929 General Election the Labour Party won
288 seats, making it the largest party in Parliament. Ramsay
MacDonald became
Prime Minister and
appointed Greenwood as Minister of Health.
The election
of the Labour Government in 1929 coincided
with an economic depression and Ramsay
MacDonald was
faced with the problem of growing unemployment. MacDonald asked Sir
George May, to form a committee to look into Britain's economic problem.
When the May Committee produced its report in July, 1931, it suggested
that the government should reduce its expenditure by £97,000,000,
including a £67,000,000 cut in unemployment benefits. MacDonald,
and his Chancellor of the Exchequer, Philip
Snowden, accepted the report but when the matter was discussed
by the Cabinet, the majority voted against the measures suggested
by Sir George May.
Ramsay
MacDonald was
angry that his Cabinet had voted against him and decided to resign.
When he saw George V that night, he was
persuaded to head a new coalition government that would include Conservative
and Liberal leaders as well as Labour
ministers. Most of the Labour Cabinet totally rejected the idea and
only three, Philip Snowden, Jimmy
Thomas and John Sankey agreed to join
the new government.
Greenwood lost his seat at Nelson and Colne but was elected to represent
Wakefield in April 1932. Three years later he was elected deputy leader
and served under Clement Attlee
for the next ten years. In the late 1930s Greenwood was an outspoken
critic of Neville Chamberlain
and his government's appeasement
Foreign policy.
In May
1940 Winston Churchill appointed Greenwood
to the War Cabinet as Minister without Portfolio. He left office in
February 1943 and for the rest of the war was acting leader of the
Labour
Party in
the House of Commons.
In
the 1945 General Election the Labour
Party had its largest victory at the polls. In Attlee's government
Greenwood served as Lord Privy Seal (July 1945 - April 1947), Paymaster
General (July 1946 - March 1947) and Minister without Portfolio (April
1947 - September 1947). Arthur Greenwood died on 9th June 1954.
(1)
Herbert
Morrison, An
Autobiography (1960)
Arthur Greenwood, as deputy leader of the opposition, was
made a member of Churchill's War Cabinet as Minister without Portfolio.
This meant that tnere were no defined duties but he could become a
co-ordinating minister.
In his earlier days Greenwood
had done much able work for the Labour Party on research and policy.
Arthur Henderson had made him chief of the research department. But
by 1940 his grip was failing and for this reason he did not play a
great part in the wartime administration. He resigned in February,
1943.
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