Brief Biography:

Harold Wilson was born near Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, and educated at Royds Hall Secondary School in Huddersfield, and Wirral Grammar School before going to attend Jesus College, Oxford. He graduated with a first-class honours degree in Politics, Philosophy and Economics, but then stayed on at Jesus College to lecture in Economics. At the outbreak of the Second World War Wilson was recruited into the Civil Service, going onto serve in a number of various departments. His work during this period was later recognised in 1945 when he received an OBE. At the 1945 British general election he was returned to Westminster as the Labour MP for the constituency of Ormskirk (1945-50) and in 1950 was elected for the new seat of Huyton (1950-83).

On his election in 1945 he was immediately appointed a junior minister and in 1947 became a member of the Cabinet as the President of the Board of Trade (1947-51). Following a dispute over government policy, Wilson resigned his position in 1951 and a few months later the Labour Party lost office following the 1951 general election. In opposition he went onto hold a number of important positions and in 1963, after an earlier failed attempt, became Labour leader (1963-76) and Leader of the Opposition (1963-64). Wilson was then later to go onto hold the office of Prime Minister on four separate occasions: from October 1964 - March 1966, April 1966 - June 1970, February 1974 - October 1974, and finally October 1974 - March 1976.

As Prime Minister, Wilson had to face many difficult domestic and foreign issues, but problems associated with Northern Ireland were also frequently to appear on his political agenda. This began soon after Labour returned to government in 1964, when the emerging civil rights movement in Northern Ireland, increasingly sought to interest Labour backbench MPs about its complaints of alleged discrimination by the Stormont authorities. Eventually this led to the formation of the Campaign for Democracy in Ulster (CDU), almost exclusively made up of Labour MPs, keen to monitor the situation in Northern Ireland. As a result the pressure grew on Wilson to take on a more active role and eventually he felt compelled to act. Initially however his reaction was to take a cautious approach and so through a series of meetings with Terence O'Neill, then Prime Minister of Northern Ireland, he sought to encourage O'Neill to fulfil the promises given that a programme of reforms would be carried through.

By the end of 1968 with growing civil unrest in the region, Wilson and James Callaghan, then British Home Secretary, found themselves having to consider direct intervention. This finally came after the decision to send British troops to Northern Ireland in August 1969, following a request for assistance from the Stormont government, who felt they could no longer adequately deal with the situation. In a series of discussions with representatives of the Northern Ireland government, Wilson and Callaghan came up with their own reform agenda, encompassing action in areas such as social, political and security issues. The opportunity to carry this through however was lost when Labour lost the 1970 general election. By the time the party was to return to government in 1974 Wilson was to face an entirely new set of challenges in Northern Ireland.

From the outgoing Conservative administration he had inherited the Sunningdale Agreement (1973) and in May 1974 unionist and loyalist opinion had combined to organise a general strike against it. His handling of this dispute was however to be condemned on all sides. For unionists and loyalists, a speech he gave on 25 May 1974 attacking the strike organisers and the particular accusation of "sponging on Westminster" provoked a great deal of resentment. As for nationalists, the failure of his government to confront the strike and the subsequent decision to seemingly give into its demands led to accusations of betrayal. Before resigning as Prime Minister in March 1976, he had overseen a final effort to achieve a political breakthrough in Northern Ireland with the establishment of the Constitutional Convention (1975-76). After his resignation he remained as an MP until retiring from active politics in 1983 and later in 1983 received a life peerage. He then took his seat in the House of Lords as Lord Wilson of Rievaulx but increasing ill-health led to him virtually withdrawing from public life.

Book References:

Elliott, Sydney. and Flackes, W.D. (1999), Northern Ireland: A Political Directory 1968-1999. Belfast: Blackstaff Press.
Hennessey, Thomas. (1997), A History of Northern Ireland 1920-1996. Dublin: Gill & Macmillan.
Ramsden, John (ed.) (2002), The Oxford Companion to Twentieth-Century British Politics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Pimlott, Ben. (1992), Harold Wilson. London: Harper Collins.
Wilson, Harold. (1971), The Labour Government, 1964-70: A Personal Record. London: Penguin,1974.
Ziegler, Philip (1993), Wilson: The Authorised Life of Lord Wilson of Rievaulx. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson.

Web Sources:

Britain, Labour Party, MP, Politician, Prime Minister

[Entry written by B.Lynn - 19 January 2003]