BRITAIN IN 1977

Evening Sentinel, Wednesday, June 8, 1977

‘The world seemed to move faster in the Sixties, and with it the “Swinging Britain” of the great flowering of fashion, of the media (including the new generation of bright young satirists), of the arts, of the youth cult (and predominance of pop music) an affluent, enterprising, Americanised Britain where mass tastes created a new life style in which already the modes and outlooks which prevailed in the year of the Queen’s accession [1952] seemed quite dated.

‘Great events followed one another the first man in space (the Russian Gagarin), the launching of Telstar, the assassination of President Kennedy, Churchill’s retirement from politics, the return of two Labour Governments, Israel triumphant over the Arabs, the forging of the European Economic Community, the rise of new states in Africa, the virtual end of the old British Empire.

‘In a rapidly evolving Britain and a world moving towards greater instability the Queen and her family came to be regarded as embodiments of threatened traditions, even as symbols of order and continuity.

There came to be a deepening identification between Queen and people though with increasing freedom of criticism (little of the Queen, much more of the Royal “Establishment”). . . .

Opinions were put to the test in Britain in a poll, which showed that 84 per cent. thought the Queen was needed and 16 per cent. thought not.’

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