1 MAY 1971, Page 5

THE SPECTATOR'S NOTEBOOK

Catch phrases are peculiar things. Comedians like them and try hard to invent character- istic ones for themselves. Some catch on. Most don't. Occasionally there is a phrase which becomes itself of political importance, actually changing behaviour as well as illus- trating the man who made it and the time and situation in which it caught on. Mac- millan's 'You've never had it so good' is such an example. There is another phrase which I hear constantly when talking with politicians. I do not know who first used it, or in what context. But it's used all the time now, and always in the one context, of the Common Market, The phrase is, of course, 'It's not on'.