The Wild Men: The Remarkable Story of Britain's First Labour Government

About

This talk is based on the Waterstones Book of the Year and is highly recommended by The Economist, Simon Heffer, Andrew Marr (who described it as meticulously researched) and Chris Mullin. It considered superb by The New Statesman.

In 1923, five short years since the end of the First World War, and after the passing of the Act which gave all men the vote, an inconclusive election result and the prospect of a constitutional crisis opened the door for a radically different sort of government: men from working-class backgrounds who had never before occupied the corridors of power at Westminster. Who were these 'wild men'? Ramsay MacDonald, their leader and Labour's first Prime Minster, was the illegitimate son of a Scottish farm labourer; Arthur Henderson was a Scottish iron moulder; J. H. Thomas, a Welsh railwayman; John Wheatley, an Irish-born miner and publican; and William Adamson, a Fife coal miner. Never before had men from such backgrounds occupied the corridors of power in Westminster.

This presentation tells the story of that first Labour administration - its unexpected birth, fraught existence, and controversial downfall - through the eyes of those who found themselves in the House of Commons, running the country for the people. Blending biography and history into a compelling narrative, David Torrance reassesses the UK's first Labour government a century after it shook up a British establishment still reeling from the War - and how the establishment eventually fought back.

This is an extraordinary period in British political history which echoes down the years to our current politics and laid the foundations for the Britain of today.

David Torrance is a constitutional specialist at the House of Commons Library and a widely published historian of Scottish and UK politics. A former journalist, he has written biographies of the SNP politicians Alex Salmond and Nicola Sturgeon, as well as a semi-authorized biography of the former Liberal leader David Steel. Like all good Scotsmen, he lives and works in London!

He specialises in the topic of Scottish independence and the constitutional debate more generally. He is also the author of a number of well-received books on Scottish politics including 'We in Scotland' - Thatcherism in a Cold Climate (2009), Salmond: Against the Odds (2010 & 2011) and his most recent, The Battle for Britain - Scotland and the Independence Referendum (2013).