ABSTRACT
Underlying debates about different economy packages were alternative conceptions of the Labour party's fundamental purpose and the national interest' they were there to serve. Fundamentalist sentiments of this sort were scarcely surprising given the attitude of their leader. Despite the author's well-known aversion to coalitions, Baldwin embraced the National Government because it offered a uniquely favourable environment in which to promote his own brand of consensual liberal Toryism. After the failure of reconciliation talks with the National Liberals in January 1938, the party appeared to be irrevocably doomed. While the National Government is unlikely to have won an overwhelming majority in 1940, there is little evidence to suggest that Labour would have displaced it completely. As Labour's deputy leader reassured party delegates at Bournemouth, 'when we have played our part fully, the we shall have won in this country an even greater respect than we have today.
