Gaitskell warned the Economic Policy Committee (3 April 1951) of the shortage of machine tools, and stated that some could be imported from the US but that this would weaken the balance of payments. Harold Wilson, speech at a luncheon in the House of Commons to commemorate the centenary of Ramsay MacDonald's birth (12 October 1966), quoted in The Times (13 October 1966), p.

Campbell argues that "history overwhelmingly supports" Gaitskell's argument that elections are won by appealing to the centre ground rather than to a party's core base, tempting as the latter strategy often is to parties in opposition. At the time Gaitskell was much-criticised in the press, especially for his ill-judged and unsuccessful plea for Tory dissidents to remove Eden from power. When perhaps any Government would have been broken by economic events beyond the control or even the influence of this country—but when the outdated Treasury views of the pre-Keynes era, reinforced by the Puritan Cobdenism of Snowden, prevented any expansionist action to relieve unemployment. At a party meeting a few days later (16 March) Bevan accused Gaitskell of having told a direct lie against him and declared that it was "those hatchet-faced men sitting on the platform" who were undermining the leadership.Not only were higher interest rates seen as associated with the Gold standard and the deflationary policies of the 1920s, but the policy preference in the 1940s was for quantitative controls (e. a total over a three-year period); at this stage it had appeared that the US would be willing to help foot the bill. Gaitskell was determined that there would not be an open-ended commitment to welfare spending at the expense of economic investment or rearmament, and rejected Morrison's proposal.

This claim was given new life by Peter Wright's controversial 1987 book Spycatcher, but the only evidence that ever came to light was the testimony of a Soviet defector, Anatoliy Golitsyn. In a speech to the party conference in October 1962, Gaitskell argued that if the aim was for Britain to participate in a Federal Europe, this would mean "the end of Britain as an independent European state, the end of a thousand years of history! He and 62 other abstained in the vote, leading to demands from loyalists that the party whip be withdrawn from him as a preliminary to him being formally expelled from the Labour Party by the NEC.In 1927–28 Gaitskell lectured in economics for the Workers' Educational Association to miners in Nottinghamshire. After leaving office in October, he was created a viscount and made lord privy seal, but he left that office in 1932.