This penetrating and detailed study of the policy issues involved in managing Britain's economy from 1974 to the 1976 crisis by Edmund Dell, Deputy to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and then Secretary of State for Trade throughout these years, is based on the diaries he kept at the time. This book tells the history of a new government, weak in the Commons, fiercely divided, and uncertainly led, caught unprepared by the economic hurricane following the breakdown of Bretton Woods and the oil price hike of 1973. Harold Wilson's last administration was in no trim for the extraordinary exertions required, nor was the Treasury. The crisis was eventually resolved in the encounter with the IMF in the autumn of 1976. Throughout these years, Edmund Dell was at the centre of affairs. This is a comprehensive insider account of the transition from a world of demand management in which full employment is the primary aim to a world in which domestic policy has to bow to external events. The book contains entirely new primary material - and covers years which were pivotal in post-war history in general and for Labour in particular.
The book makes lively reading for anyone interested in the politics of the 70s. It also provides a lot of information for the academic student of the period.
- ISBN10 0198283946
- ISBN13 9780198283942
- Publish Date 1 October 1991
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 4 June 1999
- Publish Country GB
- Imprint Oxford University Press
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 319
- Language English