"The '70s was in many ways a pretty good time" - f**kin' priceless Kevin.

Here's your 1970s:

We found oil in the North Sea at the start of the 1970s. This should have been the eureka moment that the British economy needed, a fillip to the nation's purse and the guarantor of an era of prosperity. But it didn't quite work out like that.

Compared to the Sixties , this was to be a decade brought to a halt by industrial action, a decade of falling productivity and an economy wilting under the hot lamp of globalisation.

Edward Heath, The Prime Minister, presided over an economy that had tied itself into a Gordian knot. Inflationary pressures were almost visible to the naked eye. Unemployment was high. Heath's Conservative government was principally concerned with curbing trade union power; the striking British worker would be a leitmotif for the decade. Even if union bosses could be talked out of striking, even they could not exert full control over their members. The British worker was not generally well-paid, and there was a growing militancy to their discontent. Also, The Troubles in Northern Ireland would reach their bloody peak under Heath's leadership. Constitutionally, he had the awkward issue of Europe.

It wasn't just the conflict in Northern Ireland that was putting pressure on Heath's beleaguered administration. In 1973, war between Israel and Egypt emptied British petrol tanks. Motorways had their speed capped at 50mph to help preserve petrol stocks.

The three-day working week was enforced in '74.

Television broadcasting stopped at 10:30pm. Post-watershed programming was restricted to shorts.

People encouraged to see to their daily toilet in the dark, sharing bathwater and a nationwide parsimony when it came to putting central heating on, Britain was shutting down. Would the last one out please switch the lights off?

With the country in a bit of a state, the 1974 general election saw a Labour campaign win under Harold Wilson , Wilson's second term in office ended after just two years, his resignation announced on 16th March 1976 . Citing exhaustion, owing probably to the early onset of Alzheimerís, Wilson was succeeded by James Callaghan . The economy was choking on both inflation and unemployment, the recession was crippling the country.

Inflation peaked in 1975 at 26.9 per cent.

Callaghan had to approach the International Monetary Fund for a crisis loan of £2.3billion in 1976. Public sector spending was iced as a condition for the loan.

Britain shuddered to one of its most notorious moments of economic dysfunction: the 1978/79 Winter Of Discontent.

The Transport And General Workers Union struck first; petrol tanker drivers and lorry drivers went on an overtime ban, just before Christmas. The threat of fuel shortages panicked the government into putting the army on standby. The situation worsened in the New Year. Having been placated with a fifteen per cent rise, the lorry and petrol tanker drivers went on strike again. This time, the fuel shortages closed petrol stations. With the overwhelming majority of Britain's goods delivered by haulage, this brought the panic button ever closer.

Hospital ancillary staff, refuse collectors and even undertakers went on strike; the latter seeing 300 dead in Liverpool going unburied while the streets were filled with rotting bin bags. Schools stayed open with the help of volunteer janitors and secretaries. Even hospitals would be picketed.

"Pretty good time indeed".