1989/10/01 by Rodney Lowe
Social Sciences · #Political and Economic history of UK and US #Social Policy and Reform Studies
paper · doi:10.1017/s0047279400001835
openalex publication_date 1989/10/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/21
ABSTRACT Between 1955–7 welfare expenditure in Britain came under serious attack. The main protagonist was the Treasury and its chosen implement a five-year review of the social services, to be presided over by a ministerial Social Services Committee. The attack rebounded, for the Committee provided the opportunity for the consolidation of the defence of welfare expenditure and for a frontal attack on Treasury assumptions. This neglected episode in Conservative government social policy places in historical context the early defeat of monetarism (with Thorneycroft's resignation in 1958) and provides the background to the establishment of the Plowden Committee and of the Public Expenditure Survey Committee. It also raises questions about the degree of post-war consensus and the failure to make the constructive development of the welfare state an objective of ‘conviction’ politics.