1945–1951 Following the Second World War, the landslide 1945 election returned the Labour Party to power and Clement Attlee became Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. The party quickly nationalised critical sectors of the economy, especially declining industries. The Bank of England was nationalised along with railways (see Transport Act 1947), coal mining, public utilities and heavy industry. The most controversial case was the takeover of the highly profitable iron and steel industry, which was opposed and finally reversed by the Conservatives. Welfare state A comprehensive welfare state was created with the National Insurance Act 1946, in which people in work paid a flat rate of National Insurance. In return, they (and the wives of male contributors) were eligible for flat-rate pensions, sickness benefit, unemployment benefit, and funeral benefit. Various other pieces of legislation provided for child benefit and support for people with no other source of income. In the estimation of historians, and later politicians of the major parties, the most successful and permanent program was the creation of a National Health Service which started operations in 1947. It entitled all citizens to healthcare, which, funded by taxation, was free at the point of delivery. The opposition from physicians was bought off by allowing them to keep lucrative private practices on the side. All hospitals were nationalized and brought into the system. John Carrier and Ian Kendall find that the mission for Minister of Health Aneurin Bevan was resolving "The potential conflict between the aim of providing a universalist, comprehensive health service of a good standard and that of containing health costs to a reasonable level, and how to finance the system in such a way that certainty and sufficiency of funds could be guaranteed." Michael Foot adds that Bevan had to persuade "the most conservative and respected profession in the country to accept and operate the Labour government's most intrinsically socialist proposition." In the end historians give Bevan the major credit for the success. One of the main achievements of Attlee's government was the maintenance of near full employment. The government maintained most of the wartime controls over the economy, including control over the allocation of materials and manpower, and unemployment rarely rose above 500,000, or 3% of the total workforce. In fact labour shortages proved to be more of a problem. One area where the government was not quite as successful was in housing, which was also