Back to the dark age
Channel 5, 9pm
SOARING food bills, fuel shortages and public sector workers on strike.
It could be today’s news, but it’s actually a throwback to the winter of 1974.
Britain in the early 1970s seemed to be lurching from one economic crisis to another – prices were rising, there were food shortages and panic buying. Shipbuilders, dockers and miners found themselves with frozen wages in declining industries and the unions grew increasingly loud and frustrated.
It culminated in the first miners’ strike since the 1930s and with the 1973 oil crisis, Britain found itself running out of power.
The only way the Government believed the country could cope was by imposing a three-day working week, where factories, shops and businesses were supplied power for three days. The Government also imposed nationwide household blackouts from January 1, 1974, as electricity was rationed.
The lights literally had to go off as the Government launched an “SOS” Switch Off Something information campaign.
British workers were worse off and left literally in the dark.
In this fascinating documentary, celebrities including Billy Bragg, Janey Godley, Michael Heseltine, Neil Kinnock, John Craven, Toyah Willcox, Diane Jordan and Fern Britton all recall their memories of living through the blackouts, and there’s wonderful archive footage from the time.
Sir Trevor Mcdonald says: “Nobody contemplated having to live in a time of blackouts and looking for candles. We all thought this age had passed.”
And Pete Waterman recalls: “Everybody was going to France to buy candles, for God’s sake, but it was exciting.”