Harold Wilson: The Winner

Product Information

Wilson was prime minister for eight years and won four general elections (in 1964, 1966 and October 1974, although he served as prime minister of a minority government from February 1974). Shortly after his election, Nick was named the Shadow Minister for Work and Pensions from September 2015 until June 2016.

Harold Wilson: The Winner by Nick Thomas-Symonds | WHSmith

It is hard to make it work, because the parallels are not exact, but they are close enough to make the publication this week of a new biography of Wilson, unsubtly subtitled The Winner, interesting.Again, the parallels with the present day are limited, except that the question of our relations with the EU has not been settled, and it will require considerable Wilsonian skills to manage it if Starmer does become prime minister. But the subtext of Thomas-Symonds’s book is that Starmer’s careful leadership style is similar to Wilson’s, in that he is pragmatic – often concealing his own view until it is too late for his opponents to mobilise – and a good judge of public opinion. When he stood down on 16 March 1976, the upwardly mobile Yorkshire lad was the 20th century’s longest-serving prime minister. He was, Thomas-Symonds concludes, one of our greatest prime ministers, who, given the political circumstances, had a remarkable record of solid achievement.

Harold Wilson: The Winner - Thomas-Symonds, Nick - AbeBooks Harold Wilson: The Winner - Thomas-Symonds, Nick - AbeBooks

Similarly, he refused President Johnson’s request to commit British soldiers to Vietnam, yet without damaging the Alliance.Wilson belonged to neither group, though he did have strong links to Bevan and Richard Crossman, another staunch Bevanite.

the winner’ Harold Wilson Keir Starmer is looking more like ‘the winner’ Harold Wilson

He is the author of two acclaimed political biographies: Attlee: A Life in Politics and Nye: The Political Life of Aneurin Bevan. Before being elected as an MP, Nick served as the Secretary of the Blaenavon Branch of the Labour Party and Secretary of the Torfaen Constituency Labour Party.

The scale of the energy crisis is now so great that market expectations are that Starmer will be prime minister after the next election. In common with all successful politicians, Harold Wilson knew how to lead, how to interact with people and who to talk to. Unemployment was rising, while inflation at 16 per cent was five times higher than in 1964, and held in check only by a dubious “social contract”, yielding extra privileges to the trade unions and culminating in the winter of public sector strikes in 1978-9.

Harold Wilson Does Keir Starmer want to win? He should learn from Harold Wilson

It celebrates the life and work of a politician who “made Britain a fairer place”, was “one of the 20th century’s great personalities” and whose perceived shortcomings were trivial compared with his achievements. Wilson] is the subject of a superb new biography by the distinguished historian and Labour frontbencher Nick Thomas-Symonds.Since Wilson had applied for entry on similar terms in 1967, his decision now to oppose it on the grounds that defeating the Tories was ‘the primary purpose of opposition’ caused outrage. For Wilson has already been memorialised in two doorstopper volumes by his official biographer, Philip Ziegler, and by the Labour historian, Ben Pimlott. Previously a barrister and academic, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society in 2012 and has been the Member of Parliament for Torfaen since 2015. Conciliating that unlovely assortment and preserving a balance of forces between Left and Right turned Wilson into a prisoner-leader.