Editing Harold Macmillan (section)

====1959 general election====
Macmillan led the Conservatives to victory in the [[1959 United Kingdom general election|1959 general election]], increasing his party's majority from 60 to 100 seats. The campaign was based on the economic improvements achieved as well as the low unemployment and improving standard of living; the slogan "Life's Better Under the Conservatives" was matched by Macmillan's own 1957 remark, "indeed let us be frank about it—most of our people have never had it so good,"<ref>{{citation |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/july/20/newsid_3728000/3728225.stm |title=Harold Macmillan, Speech in Bedford, 20 July 1957 |publisher=BBC News |date=20 July 1974 |access-date=31 January 2010 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101003131129/http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/july/20/newsid_3728000/3728225.stm |archive-date=3 October 2010 }}</ref> usually paraphrased as "You've never had it so good." Such rhetoric reflected a new reality of working-class affluence; it has been argued that "the key factor in the Conservative victory was that average real pay for industrial workers had risen since Churchill's 1951 victory by over 20 per cent".{{sfn|Lamb|1995|p=62}} The scale of the victory meant that not only had the Conservatives won three successive general elections, but they had also increased their majority each time. It sparked debate as to whether Labour (now led by [[Hugh Gaitskell]]) could win a general election again. The standard of living had risen enough that workers could participate in a consumer economy, shifting the working class concerns away from traditional Labour Party views.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/vote_2005/basics/4393287.stm|title=1959: Macmillan wins Tory hat trick|date=5 April 2005|via=news.bbc.co.uk|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090422144713/http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/vote_2005/basics/4393287.stm|archive-date=22 April 2009}}</ref>