National Trust

'Incompetence and incivility'

Yvonne Brock

After the publication of my article on the National Trust last November, in which I revealed hold Viscount Head, the chairman of the recently formed Wessex Regional Committee, had sacked my husband and myself from our posts as resident administrators of Montacute House, the Editor expressed surprise and concern that the Trust had not seen fit to answer the charges I had made. I was not surprised, for no explanation they could have given would have shown their actions in a favourable light. There have, it is true, been one or two " pro-Trust "letters, and I suppose one could call that an oblique response — or one could call it something else.

I .do not propose to waste more time and energy on Lord Head than is strictly necessary for the purposes of this article, but it is without hesitation or compunction that I accuse him of incompetence and incivility. I was about to add inhumanity to the catalogue of his crimes, but summoning what charity I may I will acquit him ' on that charge. It is possible, I suppose, that he thought we were affluent people with a home to go to — he just didn't bother to inquire, or to check the information that had been given him by the area authorities concerning our length of service, or even to have a little chat with us about our intentions before he wrote his illogical and ungrammatical letter, the original of which never reached us. Since the only time I had met him previously, he, his wife and the Agent had been drinking our sherry in the Great Hall at Montacute, I considered this outrageous conduct. This revelation is probably in rather bad taste. Our hospitality was offered freely enough and freely accepted, but I am afraid that Lord Head and the Wessex Area Authorities do tend to bring out the worst in me.

And what, I wonder, is the worst that could be said about my husband and myself? That we do not suffer fools gladly? The sheer stupidity of it irks me as much as anything. If Lord Head had taken the slightest trouble he would have discovered that, having realised that we had lost our battle to save Montacute from exploitation, we were prepared to resign as soon as we were able to make other arrangements, as the most honourable course in the circumstances.

I have dwelt on this personal aspect only because it is my belief that if the Trust can be incompetent and uncivil in its dealings with long-term employees (or any employees for that matter) it is capable of behaving in a similar fashion with outsiders. And, come to think of it, incompetence followed by rudeness formed the basis of most of the complaints about the Trust (at Area level) that we heard during our time at Montacute.

Any organisation with a moral purpose, such as the National Trust, inevitably attracts a good deal of to itself, not only from its natural enemies, such as the property developers, but from mean-minded and resentful people who dislike the idea of anyone doing anything for reasons other than personal gain. We anticipated this, yet when we first came to Somerset we were slightly shocked by the degree of hilarity or anger provoked by any mention of the Trust. Really?, we said, and Surely not?, as we heard the stories of letters unanswered, donors unthanked, or local dignitaries upset by casual or high-handed behaviour..

A myth sedulously fostered by head office (and believed by them for all I know) is that all people working for the Trust work together in peace and harmony. How nice if this were so! Shortly after our arrival at Monta cute the posts of Agent (financial and structural responsibilities) and Representative (aesthetic matters) were both held by young ish men, and they fought like Kilkenny cats. I remember one of them telling us, quite im

properly but with considerable satisfaction,

that he had managed to reduce the other to tears in his office; which is hardly my idea of harmonious working arrangements. Both were bachelors; one lived (reputedly) on champagne and cornflakes and the other ap

peared to exist largely on buns. I fancy. I should have Mrs Vandyke Price's support in considering that such inadequate and unwholesome diets are a contributory factor in the making of irrational decisions. I think outsiders would hardly believe the mess and muddle that existed in the area offices. One example, perhaps rather extreme but not untypical, will suffice. Nearly all National Trust properties are closed on Good FridaY. and Montacute is no exception. Shortly after our arrival, however, the then Agent in response to an inquiry from the Athenaeum Club stated that it was open, booked a partY for us, and neglected to inform us of his actions. We had departed to find what peace we could in the countryside, but mercifully a responsible Guide observed the coach drawing up at the locked gates. As he hati a key for emergency use he opened up and conducted the party round the house, so the Trust was saved one (justifiably) angry letter.

It was during this same regime that we were suddenly required to have four chamber music concerts on four successive Sundays 1.ri June. This was all in connection with a charity which was presenting chairs to the major properties in the area. Now even if you hold (as I do) that chamber music is a good thing. experience had shown that these concerts needed to be carefully spaced and properly advertised. Our audiences consisted largely of colonels, dragged thither by their culturehungry wives, and we felt that we should have difficulty in attracting adequate audiences. No matter, said the Agent: all fees will be paid and someone (the charity?) will do the publicity. So we gave in, nothing was done, and hot foot from Glyndebourne and such came artists of the calibre of Sheila Armstrong, Marisa Robles etc, to audiences varying between twelve and twenty persons in the 180-foot Long Gallery (capacity 500). On one occasion the artists had not even been told the hour at which they were to perform! Understandably they were bewildered, and In some cases distinctly annoyed. We did what we could, and our wine bill rose that month.

On the morning of the Sunday on which Ma' risa Robles was due to perform the Agent

telephoned us to say that he wasn't sure that she would be bringing her harp, so we'd better be prepared to borrow one. A harp? On a Sunday, in a Somerset village? FortunatelY she brought it.

Now I realise in retrospect that all this is really very funny, and it makes me smile as I, write it. But it does make rather nonsense 01

the "our Masters" attitude indicated as al?' propriate to the National Trust Area Authori

ties by one of your correspondents. In anY case I detest servile attitudes, which often cloak something very unpleasant. Uriah HeeP was not a nice person.

I have a whole fund of anecdotes of ca tastrophes or near-catastrophes when the area authorities intervened, but such interventions were mercifully limited. At least we knew that expert opinion and ultimate authority were contained in head office, but What has happened now? Since the row over the dismissal of Commander Rawnsley and the establishment of regional committees, head office seems to have abdicated its authority. Mr Robin Fedden, the deputy director-general of the Trust, in reply to an appeal made to him by my husband on the question of reconciling his (Mr Fedden's) requirement that we should never permit overcrowding in the house with Lord Head's threat to treble the attendance, wrote that where a committee had been set up his function was " only advisory." Now I can see that this regionalism might work (and no doubt does in some parts of the country) but it obviously has built-in riSks and disadvantages. Should it not have been the committees whose function was only advisory?

I now propose to give the National Trust some advice (which it will ignore) and that is that it should listen more to women. An organisation like the National Trust is naturally somewhat reactionary, which is no bad thing, but even in reactionary circles, where women are supposed not to bother their pretty little heads over politics or business matters, they are expected to know something about houses. Yes, I know that one finds the statutory woman on these committees, but there Should be more. It is significant that when the Agent told us that Lord Head was finding difficulty in forming his committee and asked us for recommendations and the two people who Sprang to mind just happened to be women, the Agent said he didn't think Lord Head would be prepared to listen to women. When Pressed as to whom he would be prepared to listen, he thought for a while and then said — Perhaps viscounts. Now I realise that this was intended as some kind of a joke, but there is a simple type of thinking which equates worldly success, rank and title, with wisdom and sound judgment.

If some of the retired politicians, high-ranking service officers and bankers who figure so largely on National Trust committees were replaced by•artists and writers a more bal anced state would exist. The late Elizabeth Bowen, whose marvellous sense of place Shone through all her writings, would have been perfect. So would, for instance, Sybille Bedford, Iris Murdoch, Pamela Hansford Johnson — people whose work shows that they combine sense and sensibility. The fact that such people do not usually like cornmittee work is an added qualification. The po litician/business man is invaluable in fund raising and cheer-leading activities, but eager-beavering requires wise direction from those gifted with vision — the Poet/philosophers perhaps? Above all, the National Trust should have clear and firmly stated national policies, not conflicting ones.

Since however head office apparently proPoses to leave the regional committees to Operate as they please, interpreting their terms of reference in accordance with the Personality of the respective chairmen, there IS a case for strengthening the position of the Representative, rather than weakening it by Making his eventual role as no more than secretary to his committee. He should, to my mind, be a man of great culture and ex perience, leisured and preferably wealthy, for his post is hardly a " job " in the normal sense. In short, the sort of man whose taste and knowledge one instinctively respects and one who would stand no nonsense from committees. I know that such people seem in creasingly rare, but they do still exist and are Worth seeking. I think also that he might be given a more dignified title than Representative, which is after all what the commercial travellers call themselves these days. Spectator readers must include many NT members of the old school. who do not use their membership solely to gain free admission to properties, and who would be shocked at certain manifestations of the new commercial attitude. If, in the near future, they made a point of visiting more properties than is their wont and reporting on what they see and hear, they could help arrest and perhaps reverse present trends. If they do not care for shops spoiling the entrance to houses, shops actually in houses, and their friends who may not be NT members being pestered to join in the said shops, then they should say so — loudly, clearly, often and at the next AGM. Why should it be assumed that any form of criticism is wrong and harmful to the Trust?

Edward Norman, writing in these columns recently, rebuked certain radical clergy for their tendency to see themselves as sociolo gists rather than as priests, and even to equate Christianity with Communism. Surely he is right to do so? The Church would be a deplorably feeble institution if it crumpled under such criticism. The National Trust too is greater than the sum of its parts, and will survive.. When the shops have been put in their proper places (in more senses than one); when the Ad men have gone back to advertis ing and the drop-outs from industry have dropped in again to whatever branch of industry will have them; perhaps not until we are all dead and gone but eventually the ideals of the founders will be uppermost again. There are considerable grounds for optimism.