ABSTRACT
The quality and nature of welfare provision is a central test of the morality of a society. Lady Thatcher was, of course, recovering an understanding of the necessity of conviction politics which had often been widespread in Britain; most recently, perhaps, as something which undergirded the establishment of the welfare state in the 1940s. Frank Field, Labour MP, Anglo-Catholic Christian Socialist, has recently affirmed the need for an adequate and truthful account of human nature to undergird policy. Frank Field affirms the central importance of a true account of human nature: The simple point so long ignored, that human nature underpins all political activities, must become, he argues, a central determining force in the political debate on welfare's reconstruction. It is good that Frank Field and others are recognizing that the welfare settlement of 1945 is no longer working well and demands radical reform.
