Bevan, who had just challenged Morrison unsuccessfully for the Deputy Leadership, scraped on in twelfth and last place with 108 votes.

Most students supported the government and many volunteered for civil defence duties, or helped to run essential services. In the fuel crisis of February 1947 Shinwell, who had ignored Gaitskell's warnings, had to ask the Cabinet for permission to shut down power stations; Gaitskell was put on and ran the key committee which decided where coal should be sent. The election had also seen the election of the first three female Labour MPs: Margaret Bondfield, Dorothy Jewson and Susan Lawrence. At Newcastle, with a general election clearly imminent, Gaitskell pledged that Labour's spending plans would not require him to raise income tax, for which he was attacked by the Tories for supposed irresponsibility. Upon Ramsay MacDonald's appointment as Prime Minister in January 1924, Snowden was appointed as the Labour Party's first ever Chancellor of the Exchequer [7] and sworn of the Privy Council.Frank Cousins became General Secretary of the TGWU in 1956, beginning the process whereby the unions began to shift left. According to Michael Bloch, Gaitskell enjoyed a number of same-sex relationships while at Oxford, including with John Betjeman, and in the 1930s in Vienna, with John Gunther. However, Dell argues that all chancellors have to make sticking points or they would have to give in to everybody. Gaitskell appears to have largely ignored this sum of capital, and his wife had no idea of his wealth. g. Hugh Dalton, of whom he became a protégé, Douglas Jay and Evan Durbin) and City people such as the economist Nicholas Davenport.

However, Dell comments that he often went into excessive detail, including personally overseeing economic forecasts, and held excessively long meetings. However, Bevan soon rejected Gaitskell's proposed compromise that it be announced that the health charges were not to be permanent as "a bromide". Despite this setback, Gaitskell reversed an attempt to adopt unilateral nuclear disarmament as Labour Party policy, and opposed Prime Minister Harold Macmillan's attempt to lead the UK into the European Common Market.Many, including Tony Benn – a Labour centrist at the time – simply thought him a divisive figure and initially welcomed Wilson as a fresh start who could unite the party.