Alan Johnson on Harold Wilson

Harold Wilson was one of the most successful politicians of the 20th century.  
 
Prime Minister from 1964-70, and again from 1974-76, he won four elections as well as a referendum on UK membership of the European Community. The achievements of the Wilson Era – from legalising homosexuality to protecting ethnic minorities, from women’s rights to the Open University – radically improved ordinary people’s lives for the better. 
 
In Harold Wilson, former Labour cabinet minister and bestselling author Alan Johnson presents a portrait of a truly 20th-century man, whose ‘white heat’ speech proclaimed a scientific and technological revolution – and who was as much a part of the Sixties as the Beatles and the Profumo scandal. 
 
Alan Johnson served in the Blair and Brown governments as Work and Pensions Secretary, Trade and Industry Secretary, Education Secretary, Health Secretary and Home Secretary. Having left school aged 15 and failed in his attempts to become a rock star, he joined the Post Office and rose through the ranks to become became the youngest ever General Secretary of the Union Of Post Office Workers. He was MP for Hull West and Hessle through five general elections, standing down at the 2017 election. 
 
He is the author of three novels and four multi-award-winning memoirs: This Boy, Please Mr Postman, The Long and Winding Road and In My Life – A Music Memoir. He and his wife Carolyn live in East Yorkshire. 
 
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ACCESSIBILITY – This event will have live subtitling by Stagetext to make it more accessible to those who are deaf, deafened or hard of hearing. If you are attending with a carer, please book an additional free ticket for them.  
 
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