By 1943 Allied victory soon or late seemed certain, and Mr Churchill’s broadcast of March 21st gave answer to a widespread feeling that attention should be given to post war conditions.
Mr Bevin;s decision to direct men between 18-25 into mining , and to register women up to 50, indicated clearly ,however that the stringencies of war were by no means at an end, a fact emphasized in the Premier’s Mansion House speech.
Mr Churchill, in a Broadcast on March 21st, 1943, speaks of Post War Policy.
It is our duty to peer through the mists of the future to the end of war, and to try our utmost to be prepared by ceaseless effort and forethought for the kind of situations which are likely to occur…
It would be our hope that the United Nations, headed by the three great victorious Powers, the British Commonwealth the United States and Soviet Russia, should immediately begin to confer upon the future world organization which is to be our safeguard against further wars….
It is my earnest hope ,though I can hardly expect to see it fulfilled in my life time, that we shall achieve the largest common measure of the integrated life of Europe that is possible without destroying the individual characteristics and traditions of it many ancient and historic races…
We must remember, however that … it will not be given to any one nation to achieve the full satisfaction of its wishes…
Coming nearer home… I am very much attracted to the idea that we should make and proclaim what might be called a Four Years Plan….
We have a five year parliaments, and a Four Year Plan would give time for the preparation would give time for the preparation of a second plan….
A scheme for the amalgamation and extension of our present incomparable insurance system should have a leading place in our Four Year Plan.
I have been prominently connected with all these schemes of national compulsory thrift from the time when I brought my friend Sir William Beveridge into the public service 35 years ago…
The time is now ripe for another great advance….
We must establish on broad and solid foundations a National Health Service.
Here let me say that there is no finer investment for any community than putting milk into babies….
The care of the young and the establishment of sound, hygienic conditions of motherhood have a bearing upon the whole future of the race which is absolutely vital.
Side by side with that is the war upon disease, which so far as it is successful, will directly aid the national insurance scheme….
The future of the world is to the highly educated races who alone can handle the scientific apparatus necessary for pre eminence in peace or survival in war….
The facilities for advanced education must be evened out and multiplied.
No one who can take advantage of a higher education should be denied this chance.
You cannot conduct a modern community except with an adequate supply of persons upon whose education, whether humanitarian, technical or scientific, much time and money have been spent…
We have one large and immediate task in the replanning and rebuilding for our cities and towns….
In the far reaching scheme for reorganizing the building industry, prepared by the Minister of Labour and the Minister of Works, will be found another means of protecting our insurance fund from the drain of unemployment relief…..
It is necessary to make sure that we have projects for the future employment of the people and the forward movement of our industries carefully foreseen, and secondly, that private enterprise and State enterprise are both able to play their parts to the utmost.
A number of measures are being and will be prepared which will enable the Government to exercise a balancing influence upon development….
Our own efforts must be supported by international arrangements and agreements more neighbour like and more sensible then before…
My solemn belief is that if we act with comradeship and loyalty to our country and to one another, and if we can make State enterprise and free enterprise both side, then there is no need for us to run into that horrible, devastating slump or into that squalid epoch of bickering and confusion which mocked and squandered the hard won victory which we gained a quarter of a century ago.
Mr Ernest Bevin, Minister of Labour, Announces New Measures for Using Man Power to the Full, House of Common, July 29th 1943.
Great though the expansion of the aircraft industry has been already, we must add still more to its labour force.
This can only be done by the further recruitment of women, who will therefore not be available for the Woman’s Auxiliary Services, The Women Land Army, and other services…..
In addition…. It has been decided to extend the age of registration of women for employment up to the age of 50….
The man power of the mining industry must be reinforced…. At the beginning of July the labour force in the coal mining industry stood at 706,000.
The net wastage is 20,000 a year, and the average man power for the year up to next April, unless we change matters, will not exceed 700,000.
An average labour force at this level will not be sufficient to meet our probable requirements…
I intend immediately to remove the age limit from the option to enter the mines which is given to men called up for the forces, at present this is limited to men under 25, if a sufficient number do not exercise this option my first line of approach will be called up for the forces, to enter mining instead.
Volunteers will also be accepted from among any suitable men who are not engaged on high priority work.
But if these measures prove inadequate, I shall have no choice but to reduce the age for direction below 18….
Mr Churchill Speaks on War Duties at the Mansion House, November 9th 1943.
We and our Allies have had a year of almost unbroken victory on every front.
British, Dominion, and U.S. armies have cleared Africa of the enemy.
Together the British and U.S. forces have conquered Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, and one third of Italy.
We have broken the back of the U-Boat war, which at one time had seemed our greatest peril.
We have inflicted and are inflicting, shattering damage upon the German cities which are the centres of munitions production…
In the Pacific….. Many brilliant actions have been recorded…..
But I gladly admit, and indeed proclaim, that the outstanding event of this famous year has been the victorious advance of the Russian armies….
A great many people speak as if the end of the war in Europe were near.
I hope they may prove right…. We should, however, be foolish and blameworthy if we allowed our plans and actions to be based on the prospect of an early collapse of Germany….
We must not lose for a moment the sense and consciousness of urgency and crisis which must continue to drive us, even though we are in the fifth year of war….
Another tremendous and practical duty is involved in what is called winning the war…
I regard it as a definite part of the duty of this National Government to have its plans perfected in a vast and practical scheme to make sure that in the years immediately following the war food, work and homes are found for all ….
On this far reaching work H.M. Government are now concentrating all their energies that can be spared from the actual struggle with the enemy…
It is a reasonable assumption that, unless we make some grave mistakes in strategy, 1944 will see the climax of the European war.
Unless some happy events occurs, on which we have no right to count, and the hand of Providence is stretched forth in some crowning mercy,1944 will see the greatest sacrifice of life by the British and American armies..….
Sorrow will come to many homes in the United Kingdom and throughout the great Republic….
The supreme duty of all of us, British and Americans alike, is to preserve that good will that now exists throughout the English speaking world and thus aid our armies in their grim and heavy task……
