James Callaghan Articles

One of the (few) positives of the leadership election and the Liverpool conference is that they forced Jeremy Corbyn to make speeches about policy. Up to then Corbyn had behaved like an Old Testament prophet who rails against austerity, inequality and social...

I had not known that Bernard Donoughue was a junior minister in the opening period of Tony Blair’s premiership. The affable peer will always be best known for the part he played in the turbulent Wilson and Callaghan years, as the head of the No 10 policy unit – the...

We must not let history repeat itself In May 1979 the defeated prime minister, James Callaghan, said to me that he felt sorry for new members of parliament like myself as we would be in opposition for 10 years. He was wrong. It was 18 years. Callaghan thought the...

As I read this collection of essays on the life of Harold Wilson I became acutely aware of the particular influence Harold had had on the whole of my life, from the time I was born. Starting with his key wartime role as a civil servant and moving on to his close...