Building the Welfare State
Britain since 1945
In 1948, Aneurin (Nye) Bevan led the establishment of the National Health Service, giving free treatment to everyone in the country. The same Labour government introduced a system of social security, protecting people from cradle to grave, and took public ownership of the railways and the coal mines, along with gas, water and electricity.
Britain also joined NATO, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, formed to resist the threat of invasion from the Soviet Union and its allies. The Conservative governments that followed kept steering where Britain stood abroad: Prime Minister Harold Macmillan became known for his wind of change speech, on ending colonial rule across the Empire.
Away from politics, the poet Dylan Thomas is remembered at the Dylan Thomas Centre in Swansea, the city of his birth, a name from the same years as the new welfare state.
What to remember
| The establishment of the National Health Service | Aneurin (Nye) Bevan 1948 Bevan, as Minister for Health, drove the NHS into being as a free, universal service. |
|---|
 The Dylan Thomas Centre | Swansea The centre in Swansea, Dylan Thomas's birthplace, is one of several memorials to the poet. |
|---|
| The national system of benefits introduced after the Second World War | providing 'social security', so that the population would be protected 'from the cradle to the grave' Introduced alongside the NHS by the Labour government elected in 1945. |
|---|---|
| Harold Macmillan | his 'wind of change' speech about decolonisation and independence for the countries of the Empire Prime Minister at the time. |
| The industries the 1945 Labour government nationalised | the railways, coal mines, and gas, water and electricity supplies Taken into public ownership. |
|---|
| NATO | the North Atlantic Treaty Organization An alliance set up to resist the perceived threat of invasion by the Soviet Union and its allies; the UK joined. |
|---|
Everything in Britain since 1945or the whole course, from the beginning