ABSTRACT
Labour's defeat in 1970 came as a surprise, a fact surprising enough to require an explanation. The simplest explanation is that the government was misled by data. 1 The numbers were better in the run-up to the election than they had been since 1966. The figures on the state of the economy were much improved, and polls purporting to read the mind of the electorate were also better. Wilson was buoyed in particular by better returns on trade, balance of payments, inflation and economic growth and was convinced, along with his fellow Cabinet members, that the difficult medicine administered in successive tight budgets and the hard but necessary choices – especially the devaluation of 1967 – had finally begun to pay off. The government was also cheered by its recovery in the opinion polls: Wilson was preferred over Heath as prime minister by fully 20 points early in the campaign. The party also took comfort from recent successes in local government elections.
