Postwar: 4. Public Opinion

David Runciman tells the story of the 1945 election and the dawn of a new age.

The 1945 general election was one of the biggest shocks in British parliamentary history: a decisive rejection of Winston Churchill and his leadership. The election of Clement Attlee's Labour government in a landslide marked a break with the past and signalled a strong desire on the part of the British people for something new. But it was also a product of Britain's wartime experiences and revealed the many ways in which the country had already changed.

The years that followed -- the postwar years -- would bring about bold and radical reform, the building of a new nation, a 'New Jerusalem'. The Britain of the National Health Service and the welfare state, of nationalised industry and the so-called 'postwar consensus' -- all were ushered into place with this election. This is the Britain that most have us have grown up in and which still shapes an idea of who we think we are.

On the eve of polling day in 1945, Winston Churchill told a private gathering that he was certain his party would win. "I feel it in my bones," he said. Few would have disagreed. At that time the British public hadn't been asked for their opinion in a general election for nearly ten years. Opinion polls were in their infancy. How could political parties know what voters were thinking?

Featuring historian Lucy Delap.