By the mid-1950s his health was failing. One of his last major speeches in the House of Lords was in November 1956, when he criticised the government's Suez policy and the damage it was doing to Anglo-American relations. He did little to challenge the critical view of appeasement which was then fashionable. His 1957 autobiography "Fulness of Days" was described in the "Dictionary of National Biography" as "gently evasive". David Dutton describes it as "an extremely reticent book which added little to the historical record". He gave the impression that he had been Chamberlain's faithful subordinate, omitting to mention his role in changing policy in spring 1939.