Cement Attlee, his ministers and MI5 had plans for an "Industrial purge" of communists from the industrial private sector. Attlee was about to announce it in the House of Commons, but othe advice of the TUC's General Council and the Confederation of British Employers, he changed his mind. He told ministers it was to be done secretly, without appeals, and MI5 was given a free hand in this state-controlled blacklist, without any political oversight or scrutiny. As MI5 completed a purge of 30 CPGB members working on secret government contracts, they gave the names of thousands of members of the CPGB to the Economic League

Mike Hughes' 1993 book "Spies at Work" regarded by many as the standard history of the infamous blacklisting organisation called the "Economic league". It was valuable evidence in group actions against blacklisting construction companies. In 2024 he is publishing two companion volumes to "Spies at Work' - "Inside the Economic League" and this in-depth investigation into the anti-communist purges of clement Attlee's post-war government.