The chancellor must overcome his own caution and the resistance of the Treasury and accomplish something boldNeville Chamberlain is the prime minister no other prime minister wants to be seen with. Don’t compare me to him. Anyone but Chamberlain. That is the little prayer that our leaders whisper to the gods of history. Munich. Hitler. Piece of paper. Peace for our time. Appeasement. The swallowing of Czechoslovakia. The invasion of Poland. The fall of Norway. Ousted. Some revisionists argue that he has been misunderstood,but nothing is going to change the role that he plays in the story that Britain tells about its past. The wing-collared, homburg-hatted and mustachioed man with the brolly is ever condemned to be the grey calamity who was mercifully followed by the vivid glories of Winston Churchill.
The curious question for nowadays is how such a failure became prime minister in the first situation. The answer is that he was once a success. He rose to the top on the back of a distinguished reputation as a Tory social reformer. One thing he was particularly good at was housing. Planning for housing. Improving housing. Promoting social housing. Stimulating housebuilding by the private sector. He made his national name in the 1920s as health minister, or a position he used to revolutionise planning,expand provision for the destitute and derive more homes built. His preoccupation with bricks and mortar began as mayor of Birmingham and continued when he was chancellor. The number of houses built during his time at the Treasury rose dramatically. Many of them are the 1930s semi-indifferent homes that still put a roof over the head of hundreds of thousands of people, particularly around London and southern England.
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Source: guardian.co.uk