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We're Backing Britain

Duration: 45 minutes

First broadcast: on BBC Radio 4 FMLatest broadcast: on BBC Radio 4 Extra

Available for years

Based on the true story of the 1968 'I'm Backing Britain' campaign.

Britain's economy is teetering on the brink. Strikes, devaluation and rejection from the Common Market are making Prime Minister Harold Wilson's life a misery.

The Labour government has been fighting budget deficits with austerity measures, while struggling with a small Commons majority and attempting to change Britain's relationship with Europe. A cloud of doom and gloom seems to be descending over the country after the heady days of the Swinging Sixties.

What the country needs is some Dunkirk spirit - to wave the Union Jack from the White Cliffs and fight back.

When the typists of Colt Ventilation decide to work half an hour a day for free to help the country fight economic hard times, they are championed by the great and good. But they have unwittingly put their local shop steward on a collision course with the union big boys.

Initially encouraged by Wilson, the idea of working for free is loved by the right and quickly hated by the left. Labour is put under pressure by the TUC to quash this "economic illiteracy".

David Morley's satirical play takes us back to the doom and gloom of Great Britain in the late 1960s, and shines a light on the industrial strife of the 70s.

Valerie White …… Felicity Duncan
Brenda Mumford …… Catherine Lamb
Joan Southwel …… Alana Ramsey
Fred Price …… Nicholas Boulton
Jack O’Hea …… Duncan Wisbey
Harry Tyler …… Geoffrey McGivern
Rory McCarthy …… Wilf Scolding

Other parts played by members of the cast.

Director: Sean Grundy

Producer: Richard Clemmow

A Perfectly Normal production for BBC Radio 4, first broadcast in September 2018. Show less

Contributors

Fred Price:
Nicholas Boulton
Brenda Mumford:
Felicity Duncan
Marcia Williams:
Felicity Duncan
Joan Southwell:
Catherine Lamb
Harry Tyler:
Geoff McGivern
Valerie White:
Alana Ramsey
Richard Seller:
Wilf Scolding
Rory McCarthy:
Wilf Scolding
Jack O'Hea:
Duncan Wisbey
Harold Wilson:
Duncan Wisbey
Mike Best:
Duncan Wisbey
Director:
Sean Grundy

Genres

About this data

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