From the NS archive: What remains of Aneurin Bevan

26 October 1962: Prompted by Michael Foot's biography of Aneurin Bevan, John Freeman gathers his thoughts about the father of the NHS.

By John Freeman

British politician and Labor party leader Aneurin Bevan sitting at his desk in the Trubune offices where he is co-editor of the paper. (Photo by Ian Smith/The LIFE Picture Collection via Getty Images)

In 1962, John Freeman – a former Labour MP and editor of the New Statesman – used the publication of the first volume of Michael Foot’s biography of Aneurin Bevan as an excuse for his own assessment of the man he knew. Bevan, Freeman thought, may have been “the greatest figure the British Labour movement has produced” but he was also “a failure” who served “lesser men”. Freeman seems to have had little inkling of the importance of the NHS to the British people and dismissed Bevan’s legacy as “the enduring (if slightly chipped) memorial of the Health Service”.