POLITICS
`This is the time of year when wars break out'
SIMON HEFFER
Ayear ago I found myself in a televised debate with Mr William Powell, the Con- servative MP for Corby. We were dis- cussing an attack by Lady Thatcher, in an American speech, on the Government's record. Mr Powell (who I hope viewers will have noted was the one who looks like a cross between a yeti and a train-spotter) felt she should shut up. I did not. To my regret I have no transcript of our exchange. However, Mr Powell damned his ex-leader for her lack of loyalty to Mr Major. His conception of loyalty, by the way, was to organise for Michael Heseltine against Mrs Thatcher in November 1990.
Now Mr Powell is up to his old tricks. On Monday he was one of three Tory MPs who voted against the Government on the clause in the Finance Bill that will levy VAT on domestic fuel. As Hansard reports: Mr Powell: Unwelcome though it will be to hundreds of my right hon. and hon. Friends, I make this confident assertion: because the Government will not withdraw this proposal, the Conservative party will lose the Christchurch by-election. One could not imagine a constituency - Mr Budgen: A very helpful speech.
Mr Powell may pretend to speak for the old and poor of Britain, not to mention for the good of his party, but that would be far less than half the story. His majority in Corby at the last election was 342. A gener- al fall in unemployment may be predicted but not, one suspects, in Mr Powell's case.
It is the Powells of this world (and there are a growing number of them) who repre- sent a new, and severe, threat to Mr Major. They are not embittered Thatcherites; they are MPs of all factions and none, united by a mounting fear of losing their seats. If Mr Powell is right (and, to judge from some Tories who have been in Christchurch in the last week, it is 99.98 per cent certain that he is) and his party is about to suffer the mother of all by-election defeats, such fears will grow more vivid, and the squeals against Mr Major more hysterical still.
During last month's crisis — the one about Mr Lamont's resignation speech — a consensus was formed. Senior 1922 Com- mittee members said that Mr Major was `on probation until next May. If we have another local government disaster and do badly in the Euro-elections, then he'll have to go.' Powellite panic is, though, eroding this consensus. 'We're possibly talking about an election within 18 months, if things go on like this,' one MP told me. `We just haven't got the time to faff around giving people second and third chances.'
As this month's crises hove into view not just Christchurch, but possible humilia- tion over plans to privatise the railways, and a still greater one on 26 July when sceptics and the Opposition parties may defeat the Government on the Social Chapter of the Maastricht Treaty — Mr Major's supporters seem to be becoming scarcer. It is not just the Powellites and the sceptics who are the problem. 'He's made two new groups of enemies lately,' a frus- trated backbencher said. 'There's quite a few of us who thought we'd been loyal enough long enough to get in the Govern- ment, but haven't. And there's quite a few more of us who've toed the line over Maas- tricht and thought we should have become PPSs [parliamentary private secretaries], but haven't.' When it was just the sceptics who might have rocked the boat in any leadership challenge, the threat was easily dismissed. But if a coalition starts to form against Mr Major, he is in trouble.
Most Tory MPs detect growing contempt for the Government and Mr Major in their constituencies. Again, less than half the story is told by Mr Major's dismal 'approval rating' of 14 per cent, reported by Gallup. It's not just the general punters, it's my own executive who are getting shirty about him,' an MP told me. 'They're having a hell of a job raising money. Collecting subscrip- tions is impossible. The professional classes are a real problem. They know all about leadership — they have to give it in their own businesses, or go under — so they know bloody well they're not getting it.'
It is no longer an economic issue. Lower mortgage rates have made most people richer. However, they are still not spending money. They seem to be hoarding it because, with Mr Major in charge and with memories of September 1992 still strong, they fear it might go wrong again. There are three other antipathies. 'They would respect him more if he had been straight with them at the last election,' a minister said. 'It's now clear that he wasn't — either that or he didn't have a clue how bad things were going to get, which is scarcely more excusable.' Second, there is the complaint about Mr Major's indecision, notably shown in his man-management skills Mellor, Lamont and Mates are cited. Third, as a constituency chairman put it, 'we still don't know where we're going. We get no clue from him.' Some compare Mr Major unfavourably with Sir Edward Heath; Heath's policies were undeniably worse, but at least he had plenty of determination.
Other rumblings give no comfort. The Liberals — the threat in most Tory seats are picking up support. Their by-election wins are still flashes in the pan; but since the local elections in May Liberals have shared power in most county councils. They seem to discharging that power sensibly, conscious that at the next election they can talk empirically of the benefits of pacts with socialists of the Blair/Brown modernist school. Tory MPs with a Liberal in second place to them are watching this prospect with growing concern. Mr Ashdown avoid- ed excesses of rhetoric after Newbury, call- ing it a 'building block' towards power. So, too, will he regard Christchurch if his party fulfils Mr Powell's prediction and wins. The lessons of Sir David Steel's hubris (`go back to your constituencies, and prepare for Government') have been learned.
Less noticed, but every bit as minatory to the Tory leadership, has been the first and so far only — selection in a Tory-held seat for a candidate to fight the next elec- tion. Mr Gerald Howarth, PPS to Lady Thatcher until he lost his marginal Staffordshire seat last year, has been cho- sen to replace Mr Julian Critchley in Alder- shot. His election has been dismissed by Mr Major's remaining supporters as simply the Aldershot Tories looking for a man as unlike their present MP as possible. In fact, Mr Howarth and Mr Critchley share a well- developed sense of humour and a regard for the pre-classless society which, in many non-political ways, makes them only too similar. What really swung Mr Howarth's selection had nothing to do with his prede- cessor's left-of-centre politics, but much to do with the fact that, of all the shortlisted candidates, he was most critical of the Gov- ernment's performance and its departure from the true creed of his former mistress.
Mr Howarth's selection reflects the dis- enchantment of the Tory grass roots. There will be a tense ceasefire until Christchurch is over, in a fortnight. To judge from the messages Tory activists are sending out already, hostilities may soon recommence.
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