Ernest Bevin - Wartime Minister of Labour

Wartime Minister of Labour

In 1940 Winston Churchill formed an all-party coalition government to run the country during the crisis of World War II. He, being impressed by Bevin's opposition to trade-union pacifism and his work ethic (according to Churchill, Bevin was by 'far the most distinguished man that the Labour Party have thrown up in my time'), appointed Bevin to the position of Minister for Labour and National Service. As Bevin was not actually an MP at the time, to remove the resulting constitutional anomaly, a parliamentary position was hurriedly found for him and Bevin was elected unopposed to the House of Commons as Member of Parliament (MP) for the London constituency of Wandsworth Central.

The Emergency Powers (Defence) Act gave Bevin complete control over the labour force and the allocation of manpower, and he was determined to use this unprecedented authority not just to help win the war but also to strengthen the bargaining position of trade unions in the postwar future. Bevin once quipped: "They say Gladstone was at the Treasury from 1860 until 1930. I'm going to be at the Ministry of Labour from 1940 until 1990." Given that the industrial settlement he introduced remained largely unaltered by successive postwar administrations until the reforms of Margaret Thatcher's government in the mid-1980s, this was a prescient remark.

During the war Bevin was responsible for diverting nearly 48,000 military conscripts to work in the coal industry (these workers became known as the Bevin Boys) while using his position to secure significant improvements in wages and working conditions for working-class people. He also drew up the demobilisation scheme that ultimately returned millions of military personnel and civilian war workers back into the peacetime economy. Bevin remained Minister of Labour until 1945 when Labour left the Coalition government. On V-E Day he stood next to Churchill looking down on the crowd on Whitehall.