Barber was appointed as Chancellor of the Exchequer by Edward Heath in 1970, and oversaw a major liberalisation of the banking system, replaced purchase tax and Selective Employment Tax with Value Added Tax, and also relaxed exchange controls. During his term the economy suffered due to stagflation and industrial unrest, including a miners strike which led to the Three-Day Week. In 1972 he delivered a budget which was designed to return the Conservatives to power in an election expected in 1974 or 1975. This budget led to a brief period of growth known as "The Barber Boom," followed by a wage-price spiral and high inflation, culminating in the 1976 sterling crisis.[1] He was forced to introduce anti-inflation measures, along with a Price Commission and a Pay Board. After the Conservatives lost the first general election of 1974, he did not stand in the second election of that year.
Birth and early life
Barber was born on 4 July 1920 in Kingston upon Hull.[2] He was the third son of John Barber and his Danish wife, Musse. Barber's unusual middle names arose from his mother, who contributed the "Lysberg", and French grandmother, who contributed the "Perrinott". His father was company secretary and director of a Doncaster confectionery works. He had two brothers: Noel, who became a journalist and novelist, and Kenneth, who became company secretary of Midland Bank.[3]
"Complete uniforms were rare in our party, the one outstanding exception belonging to Tony Barber, who was resplendent in an Army lieutenant's uniform, complete with Sam Browne."[4]
Barber is a prominent figure throughout Calnan's book:
"It was natural that Charles Hall, Tony Barber and I should plot escape together. We had known one another at Benson, before being shot down and we still felt that we all belonged to the same unit."[5]
Barber also wrote a brief foreword to this volume: "What has struck me most forcibly is how, after more than twenty years, he has recounted our adventures with such accuracy. He has managed to make a reality, once again, of the hopes and fears, the depression and the excitement which, for most of us who were there, now seems more like a dream."[6]
His absence from Parliament was short-lived, as four months later he won a 1965 by-election in Altrincham and Sale caused by the elevation to the peerage of Frederick Erroll.[3] In opposition, he led Ted Heath's campaign to become Conservative party leader in 1965, and became party chairman in 1967. The Conservatives won the general election in 1970, and Barber held his seat until the general election of October 1974, when he himself entered the House of Lords.[3]
Chancellor of the Exchequer
After winning the election in 1970, Edward Heath appointed Barber as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and gave him the responsibility for negotiating the entry of the UK into the European Economic Community.[3] However, following the sudden death of Iain Macleod on 20 July, only four weeks after the election, Barber became the new Chancellor of the Exchequer, although he was initially reluctant to take the job.[3] His appointment prompted Harold Wilson to remark that it was the first time that he had realised that Heath had a sense of humour. In line with the initial liberal instincts of Heath's 1970 government, he oversaw a major liberalisation of the banking system under the title of 'Competition and Credit Control', leading to a high level of lending, much of it to speculative property concerns. In his first Budget, in March 1971, he proposed to replace purchase tax and Selective Employment Tax with Value Added Tax, and also relaxed exchange controls; both were prerequisites to membership of the EEC. VAT came into force in 1973 at a standard rate of 10%. A year later, the rate was cut to 8%.
Barber also reduced direct taxes. High levels of economic growth followed, but the traditional capacity constraints of the British economy - especially currency and balance of trade concerns - quickly choked the economic boom. The banking system fell towards crisis as the bubble burst.
During his term the economy suffered due to stagflation and industrial unrest. In 1972 he delivered a budget which was designed to return the Conservative Party to power in an election expected in 1974 or 1975. This budget led to a period known as "The Barber Boom". The measures in the budget led to high inflation and wage demands from Public Sector workers. He was forced to introduce anti-inflation measures on the 6 November 1972, along with a Price Commission and a Pay Board.[7] The inflation of capital asset values was also followed by the 1973 oil crisis which followed the Yom Kippur War, adding to inflationary pressures in the economy and feeding industrial militancy (already at a high as a result of the struggle over the Industrial Relations Act 1971).
In 1972, having said a week earlier in the House of Commons that he had "no reason to believe that the pound was overvalued", he floated it (most of the world currencies were floated at that time) "as a temporary measure". The pound immediately plunged on the markets, and it was impossible during his time as Chancellor to impose a new parity. It has remained floating ever since.[3]
After a strike by the miners, and a Three-Day Week, Heath called for a general election on 28 February 1974 with the slogan "Who governs Britain?" The election returned a minority Labour government and Harold Wilson as Prime Minister.[3]
Later years
Barber did not seek re-election at the general election of October 1974, and left front-line politics.[3] He was made a life peer on 6 January 1975 as Baron Barber of Wentbridge in West Yorkshire,[8] and served as Chairman of Standard Chartered Bank from 1974 to 1987, where future Prime Minister John Major was his personal assistant. In 1987, he was appointed to be a Deputy Lieutenant of the County of West Yorkshire.[9] Barber was also a director of BP from 1979 to 1988. He visited Nelson Mandela in prison, and was a member of the Franks Committee that investigated the Falklands War. In 1991, he became chair of the RAF Benevolent Association's appeal for the 50th anniversary of the Battle of Britain, which raised £26 million.[3]
Personal life and death
In 1950, Barber married Jean Asquith, who was also a Conservative parliamentary candidate in that year's election.[3] They had two daughters and were married until her death in 1983.[10] In 1989, he married Rosemary Youens.[10]
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