ABSTRACT
It was the Second World War that demonstrated the inability of this system, which had served Gladstone and Baldwin alike, to cope with the prodigious effort required by total national mobilisation. War, peacetime reconstruction and commitment to economic management and the welfare state markedly changed the character of government. Departments increased in number and size. The volume of work grew enormously in complexity and detail, and the work of individual departments grew more closely interrelated, particularly in the economic and social fields. Ministerial life became frantic and highpressured: several of Attlee’s colleagues literally worked themselves to death. Ministers had less time to study each other’s policy proposals, especially since these grew ever more complex. The size of the Cabinet, which had grown slowly since the turn of the century, reached two dozen: too many to allow a thorough discussion of more than a few subjects at any meeting.
