Aneurin Bevan spied on by MI5 for over two decades according to newly-released files

Nation Cymru staff

Newly-released files have revealed that Aneurin Bevan, who spearheaded the creation of the NHS, had been spied on by MI5 for over two decades.

Bevan first came to the attention of the security service in the 1930s due to his left-wing politics which were thought to be tied to prominent communists, according to papers which have been given to the National Archives.

The files which have been shared by the National Archives show that monitoring continued after Bevan became a Labour minister, when the newly-founded NHS began to take shape.

Aneurin “Nye” Bevan is credited with being the driving force behind the creation of the British National Health Service during his tenure as Minister of Health in Clement Attlee’s government.

He is also known for his wider contribution to the founding of the British welfare state. He was first elected as MP for Ebbw Vale in 1929, and used his Parliamentary platform to make a number of influential criticisms of Winston Churchill and his government during the Second World War.

Before entering Parliament, Bevan was involved in miners’ union politics and was a leading figure in the 1926 general strike. Bevan is widely regarded as one of the most influential left-wing politicians in British history.

According to a report from James McCarthy for BBC Wales: “At one stage the then MI5 director general became so concerned about his links to a Russian spy that he went to see Prime Minister Clement Attlee in No 10 to warn him.
But some in the service questioned why it was taking an interest in him, given everything he did was in the open.

The files had been dismissed by one MI5 officer as “remarkably tame”, but raise concerns over the scrutiny faced by the iconic politician who hailed from Tredegar, which was in those days in Monmouthshire.

In 1943, one officer wrote: “I do not think that Bevan’s activities are a matter in which we, the security service, should be involved.

“In fact he makes exactly the same remarks in the Houses of Parliament pretty frequently.”

Concerns

McCarty writes: “The papers show MI5 first opened a file on Bevan when he was backbench Labour MP for Ebbw Vale in 1933.

One of the first reports included an account of an anti-Nazi rally in Montreal, Canada, which Bevan addressed in 1934.
“Bevan has inherited the evangelical fervour of his Welsh forebears and knows how to use it in the Communist cause,” it said.

“In 1943, Roger Hollis, future director general, summarised what they knew of Bevan’s activities.

|In 1933 he said the MP had been “in close touch” with Communist Party of Great Britain general secretary Harry Pollitt and party members who backed his plan to organise “workers’ freedom groups” to defend against “capitalists”.”

An officer wrote: “I do not think that Bevan’s activities are a matter in which we, the security service, should be involved.”

“In fact he makes exactly the same remarks in the Houses of Parliament pretty frequently.”

The BBC’s report adds: “In 1949 MI5 became increasingly concerned about Bevan’s friendship with Wilfred Macartney, “an unsavoury, unscrupulous character” convicted of spying for Russia in 1928.

“Recordings of conversations suggested he was passing information obtained by Bevan to Communist Party leader Pollitt.”

Many have questioned the MI5’s intentions, with calls for answers over exactly the exact nature and reasoning behind MI5’s surveillance of one of Wales’ and the UK’s most enduring politicians, whose legacy and story it seems has yet to be fully told.

Bevan passed away in July 1960, but it wasn’t until 1975 that his MI5 file was closed.

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