Harold Wilson

Wilson's cabinets held more rivals than any other: George Brown, Callaghan, Jenkins, Crosland, Castle, Healey and Benn. He balanced them obsessively, suspected plots constantly and relied on an informal 'kitchen cabinet' including Marcia Williams. Richard Crossman's diaries, published in 1975 after the government failed to stop them in court, and Castle's later diaries are among the best inside accounts of cabinet government. His 1975 decision to let ministers campaign on both sides of the EEC referendum was a pioneering way to manage a split cabinet.