Barbara Castle
Barbara Castle
Barbara Anne Castle, Baroness Castle of Blackburn, PC, GCOTwas a British Labour Party politician who was the Member of Parliament for Blackburn from 1945 to 1979, making her the longest-serving female MP in the history of the House of Commons, until that record was broken in 2007 by Gwyneth Dunwoody. She later became the Member of the European Parliament for Greater Manchester from 1979 to 1989. One of the most significant Labour Party politicians of the 20th century, she served...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionPolitician
Date of Birth6 October 1910
I think we're going to get a lot of unrest showing itself in all sorts of demonstrations, and you never quite know what would come out of it.
There was no welfare state, and people had to rely mainly on the Poor Law - that was all the state provided. It was very degrading, very humiliating. And there was a means test for receiving poor relief.
And that will increasingly dawn on people. The demand for controlling the commanding heights will grow.
And what always struck me about that war period was how even Churchill had to talk socialism to keep up people's morale.
It is true that they paid much more attention to the trade unions because the trade unions were after all speaking for the rights and conditions of working men and women in their employment.
What we set out to do was to ensure that this system of fair shares and the planning and controls continued after the war, and when we won, that's what we did.