Not influenced by budgetary concerns

 in the 1970s.

Britain was then still a great country for ordinary people to live in. Employment was still pretty full. Wages and salaries were good. Strong Trade Unions generally protected ordinary people's living standards and gave them solid political influence: the interests of the bottom 50% of the wealth-income distribution couldn't be routinely dismissed and ignored as they are today. On top of that housing services were cheap and plentiful. Most people could accumulate. In the 1970s, it was by no means uncommon for people to retire at 55 on a good pension.

The Health Service was properly staffed and your treatment wasn't influenced by budgetary concerns. The education you got wasn't the result of post-code lottery: you attended your local parent-governed, local-authority regulated Comp. But that didn't hold you back. Bold experiments were then being made in Maths, Science and History education which gave children a real taste of writing and research in these areas. University education - then a choice, not a near-necessity - was free.