Every time this film is on the BBC somebody in the Radio Times says how it is a satire against the post war world of rationing and the welfare state. I do not think this is the point of the film at all. The film parodies the spivs(small time criminals who ran the blackmarket) and the housewives league who campaigned against government restrictions but were really a Tory front organisation.<br /><br />Yes of course the film sends up the political/social situation but in the end the people realise that they need all the controls to ensure a fair society,they want to be British and muddle through rather than foreign.<br /><br />But I don't think they go back to being exactly like they were before.