- guardian.co.uk, Tuesday November 9 1999 18.33 GMT
Labour had three chancellors during the post-war Attlee administration: Hugh Dalton , who was forced to resign in November 1947 after leaking details of his budget to a lobby journalist on the way to the chamber; Sir Stafford Cripps, who laid the foundations of demand management of the economy as well as continuing with Dalton's austerity measures; and Hugh Gaitskell, whose demand for cuts in the NHS budget at the time of the Korean war prompted the resignation of Nye Bevan.
In 1964-1970, James Callaghan faced an uphill struggle from the outset once Harold Wilson resisted devaluation of the pound. Mounting economic problems eventually forced a devaluation in November 1967, with Callaghan replaced by Roy Jenkins. Jenkins, in turn, was blamed for Labour losing the election of June 1970 because of his tight budget earlier that year, a charge he has always denied.
Denis Healey had an even tougher job from 1974 to 1979, coping with the impact of the inflationary boom bequeathed by the Conservatives compounded by the five-fold increase in oil prices. Inflation peaked at 27% in 1975: the International Monetary Fund was called in the following year.
