On This Day

05 March 1879

Birth of William Beveridge, 1st Baron Beveridge, economist, social reformer and Liberal MP

Regarded as one of the key architects of the post war welfare state through his 1942 report Social Insurance and Allied Services popularly known as the Beveridge Report. Adopted by Clement Attlee’s post war Labour government it informed much of that government’s social legislation including the creation of the National Health Service. Before the first World War Beveridge worked with Winston Churchill at the Board of Trade where he organised the implementation of the national system of labour exchanges. Between the wars Beveridge held a number of academic posts including Director of the LSE and Master of University College Oxford. He was briefly Liberal MP for Berwick-upon-Tweed, being elected MP at a by election in 1944 but losing the seat to the Conservatives at the 1945 general election.