Political Commentary
From the grass roots
Patrick Cosgrave
There are three facts highly consequential to any analysis of the significance for the future Of the local election results. The first is that Mr Heath need call no general election until June 1975, though the reduction of room for Manoeuvre which such a postponement Would entail may encourage him to wait no longer than October 1974. The second is that the councillors elected to the reformed local authorities last week will not take office until a Year from now. The third is that, because of the reforms that have taken place, and the new relationship that will exist between local and central government following those reforms, this year's local elections have a different kind of significance from that of previous ones.
Let us first take a look at how the prospects for a general election might seem to Mr Heath. Certainly he is aware, and his ministers are aware, that the run-up period has almost begun, and that time is now getting Shorter . There are indications that the Con1 servative machine is already beginning to be I tuned up, and that those arduous preparations are already in hand, the meticulousness . of which is the wonder of the political comMentator, though it makes opponents suffer _nightmares. On the other hand, the Prime Minister knows perfectly well that an attempt at a triumphant general election shortly after the end of Phase 2, when the Prices and Incomes policy still appeared to be working, but before the unions had settled down into a habit of serious co-operation with the Government, could create industrial bitterness of a kind not so far seen, which would be extremely difficult to eradicate or overcome, even for a Government with an increased maJority. Moreover, in Mr Heath's reckoning it Must be apparent that it will take the public some time to appreciate what benefits there are in the EEC, and some time to learn to applaud the hard line he intends to take in the councils of that body on matters affecting British interests, most notably food prices and the Common Agricultural policy. Finally and this has been a consideration since before the last general election — if this parliament runs its full term the next election will take place just after the new and better benefits of Sir Keith Joseph's radically innovative Pensions Act begin to be paid.
On the other hand, it is always dangerous to underestimate Mr Heath's talent for the unexpected. He has already shown himself a cunning manoeuverer with a great capacity for taking the wind out of the sails of his opponents individuals as he specialises in un
manning in private conversational exchanges — most notably when he produced a free vote on the principle of entry into the Common Market. His tendency in these matters, it is true, inclines to inertia, and he has by no means lost his stubborn conviction that he is, in spite of all appearances, a different and straighter kind of politician than Mr Wilson: these two factors in the calculation, and his memory that his last manifesto was ' a programme for a parliament,' will influence him to see the thing through to its end, as his ministers virtually to a man believe he will.
But — two years in politics is a very long time indeed. Again and again since the local elections Mr Ron Hayward, the general secretary of the Labour Party, Sir Reg Goodwin, the new leader of the GLC, and other Labour spokesmen have stressed two things: the determination of the new Labour authorities to resist and destroy all those things about modern urban politics which people hate — ringways, and roundways, and underways, and whatever else the monstrosities of the planning departments and the traffic experts are called; and they have pledged themselves to attack the property developers, the land speculators, and all the nameless hobgoblins which can be blamed for the frustrations of • modern living as readily as the Zurich gnomes could once be blamed for our economic difficulties. These Labour spokesmen have stressed, too, their belief that their new power at local level provides a crucial litmus paper test of the calibre of Labour politicians.
Given the size and, in consequence, the importance, of the new local authority monoliths any Labour success in administering them would attract far more attention, and enjoy far more impact in national electoral terms, than successful local management has attracted or enjoyed in the past. Moreover, .during the next year the Labour men will be playing themselves in: they will have a year in which they can be both informed and irresponsible. Then, if parliament runs its full term, they will.have a further year of administration — long enough to attack effectively all the things people hate, but not so long that their real capacity to produce effective solutions would be very seriously tested. If the Parliamentary Labour Party and its local cohorts can, during those two separate periods, work closely and sensibly together; and if, in the meantime, Mr Heath enjoys no particularly spectacular national triumph — it seems unlikely, for example, that the next couple of years will see any very dramatic reduction in the rate of price inflation — then the situation could look grim indeed for the Tories, At the same time those beavering (and almost invariably both accurate and acute) psephological experts in the Conservative Research Department and in Central Office must be consoling their masters with readings of the local election results which are not at all grim, in that the Tories could expect noth ing much less than heavy defeats in the circumstances. Their analysis goes, I imagine, something like this. Given the difficulty of making accurate comparisons in changed circumstances, it is clear that the Tories have not suffered as severe a drubbing as they received in the run-up to the 1964 election, or as they administered to the Labour Party before the election of 1970; and they certainly suffered less than they expected to. Then again, the Liberal challenge has been beaten back. For all the frenetic, if a trifle spastic, gyrations of such as Mr Bernard Levin, the 37 per cent of the electorate professing liberal aspirations in the London area alone would not come out and vote Liberal. And even if Mr Thorpe can now take two London councillors home to Devon and nurse them in pride and admiration, it is clear that the soppy desire the British occasionally reveal, to be governed by a conglomeration enjoying a title as splendid, as nice, and as moralistically appealing as ' liberal,' only irregularly manifests itself either in votes or in seats. No, the Tory experts must be saying, it was the main opposition who benefitted from discontent and protest, both against the Government's handling of major issues, and against those frustrations of life today which I mentioned earlier. This in turn suggests that last week's vote was more volatile and less settled than the votes of 1963 and 1964 or 1969 and 1970. Volatility can be eitploited between now and the autumn of 1974 or the summer of 1975, but probably not between now and next autumn or next spring.
Moreover, in spite of everything, the contempt of the Tories for Labour still runs very deep indeed and, if there is even a reasonable improvement in their opinion poll position over the summer — traditionally a good time for governments — few Tories would enter an autumn campaign with any particular trepidation. Such a campaign would have the additional advantage of automatically silencing the growing incidence of discontent with the leadership which is manifesting itself in the constituencies and even on the backbenches — discontent with changes of policy, lack of general success, lack of ability on the part of the leadership to show empathy with the led, and a gradual dissolution of that intense loyalty on which the Tory Party has always depended. An election victory would, of course, do much not merely to destroy the Labour Party and confirm Mr Heath in power for a very long time, but would do much to restore the constitution of the Party as well. It is all, of course, as yet merely a scenario: but Labour may live to regret the triumph so joyously celebrated last week.
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