Attlee has been labelled ‘the accidental Prime Minister’, but, as this biography demonstrates, Labour’s longest-serving leader lacked neither ambition nor ability, and his party’s landslide victory in 1945 was not merely due to a temporary wave of populism. Jago traces Attlee’s rise to power, including his role as Churchill’s wartime deputy, and shows how his relentless quest for a more egalitarian society inspired far-reaching reforms, not least the creation of the NHS.