POLITICS
Sheep may not safely graze; but Labour can, for the moment
BRUCE ANDERSON
There have been recent signs that Tony Blair's luck is not immortal. But poor Mr Hague seems unable to benefit. John Maples, the rightly sacked former shadow foreign secretary — with all the emphasis on shadow — has now added his far- thingsworth of criticism. Mr Maples is a negligible figure: the Platonic template of political eunuchry. On the day his letter appeared in which he complained that William Hague had never discussed foreign affairs with him (a double mistake, William; you should have fired him earlier but in the interim you should have humoured him), I came across one of London's most distin- guished Arabists. He was reading the Maples letter. When he finished, he put down his Times and an expression of sublime contempt spread across his features. Gazing into the middle distance, he said, 'Would there be any point in discussing foreign affairs with John Maples?' But John Maples's observations were not wholly contemptible, though they could have been expressed rather more rapidly than he man- aged in 1,200 words of pique-saturated, bile-strewn prose. They had indeed been summarised by E.M. Forster: 'only con- nect'. There is no need for the Tories to worry about appearing too right-wing, too left-wing or too any other wing. Their task is to re-articulate their political identity and to recover public trust. Until they do that, and however many excellent speeches William Hague makes, Labour losses will not trans- mute into Tory gains.
Mr Hague made another good speech last Saturday, with some cracking phrases, the best of which was: 'the control freaks have lost control'. He was referring to Mr Blair's recent difficulties in Wales, which have been widely construed as embarrassing to the PM, and which have indeed provoked weeping and gnashing of teeth in No. 10. But this is unjustified. At least for the moment, the fall of Alun Michael and his replacement by Rhodri Morgan will work to Mr Blair's advantage.
Though some of the landscape is so attractive that it could almost be mistaken for Scotland, Wales is a curious place, the Welsh a curious people. As the doyen of political columnists, Alan Watkins, was complaining last week, it is permissible to describe the Welsh in terms which could provoke legal action if they were applied to Jews or Negroes. (Those of us who remain impervious to Matthew Parris's strictures elsewhere in this issue are only thankful that it is still possible to be anti-Semitic about the Welsh.) In one respect, however, the Welsh are wiser than the Scots. They did not really want devolution. They voted for their Assembly in small numbers by a narrow margin, an outcome which could have been averted if any government had had the foresight to relax the laws on sexual rela- tions with sheep and exempt wide-brimmed welly boots from VAT. (In rural Wales, what do they call a sheep tethered to a lamp-post? A leisure centre.) Apropos of leisure, Ron Davies was never up to much, at any rate as a politician. But the Prime Minister made an arrogant mis- take when he replaced him with Alun Michael. Whatever the vices of the Welsh are, they do not include dullness, yet Mr Michael is the bard of dullness. He does have occasional spasms of bad temper, the only trait which distinguishes him from a low-grade machine tool. A creature who makes John Maples sound like Churchill and Neil Kinnock seem intelligent, Alun Michael is a spavined, miserable, whey- faced, whining dunce.
As such, he is much to be regretted, for he was undermining the Welsh Labour party. For some years now, clever Welsh Labourites have been worried about the erosion of the pit and chapel culture which underpinned the Welsh Labour vote. Up until and including the last election, however, there was no sign of any psepho- logical effect: in most of the Valleys seats, it was still possible to weigh the Labour vote rather than count it. But the Assembly elec- tions did provide Labour with good grounds for anxiety. Rhondda and Islwyn lost; several seats with 30 per cent swings against Labour; only five out of 38 seats held with more than 50 per cent of the vote. All of that is alarming news for a party which in normal electoral circumstances must rely on a sizeable contingent of Welsh MPs.
Alun Michael would have been incapable of shoring up the Labour vote, for he was merely a strutting little Blairite gauleiter. But Rhodri Morgan is different. One should not overrate his political skills; he usually looks as if he has spent rather too long try- ing to summon spirits from the vasty deep. He always speaks from the heart and indeed seems all heart, especially between the ears. But he has principles and personality. Even if erratic, he is a decent and likeable man. He will make it possible for Welshmen with self-respect who take their politics seriously to go on voting Labour.
But not indefinitely. Mr Morgan will help Labour in the short-term; in the long-term, he could be a threat. if the new Assembly grows in stature, as .Rhodri Morgan will help it to, it will increasingly become the focal point for Welsh political identity. This is already happening in Edinburgh. The first point that ought to strike anyone examining Scottish politics is the extent to which it has already diverged from English politics, and the momentum can only increase.
So in future, why should a Welshman or a Scotsman who takes his politics seriously care very much about whom he sends to Westminster? If he is a Labour supporter, he probably prefers Labour politicians who cannot spell ciabatta. He may very well be tempted to use UK general elec- tions — unlike the real ones at home — as by-elections: an opportunity to give the government a kick. Even if the Nats never take power in Edinburgh or Cardiff, they may well gain increased representation at Westminster.
Tony Blair does not believe in thinking anything through, and as he had little interest in devolution he took none in its consequences. He seemed to believe that he could, both have it and not have it: the natives would be appeased and he would still be in control. But that is not how the world works. If you set up a quasi-parlia- ment in the capital city of an ancient nation, you create a new dynamic force. As Baldwin observed and as Tony Blair will discover, a dynamic force can be a very ter- rible thing.
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