The flaws in the coalition argument
Patrick Cosgrave
The recent tactics of Mr Heath — both in his new presentation of the Conservative as an essentially national party, and in his invitation to every Tom, Dick and Harry to consult with him over government policy, and perhaps even join his government if he is elected — as well as the disputations of the Liberal Party at Brighton, have given new impetus to proposals for either a national coalition or an arrangement between two or more of the political parties, so as to save Britain the difficulties of minority government, such as we have endured for the last six months. Now, it seems quite probable that in a few weeks the electorate will sweep all this chatter aside by giving one of the major parties a clear parliamentary majority: but they may not. A further erosion of Labour support in Scotland, combined with even a modest advance by the Liberals in England, could produce another hung parliament; and the cries of the coalition mongers might then prove hard to resist.
There are two quite different abstract reasons for favouring coalition, though they may, of course, combine — as appeared to be Lord Alport's case in this paper last week. The first is that a coalition may be able to take strong and radical measures which a single party would fear to take in the face of vehement opposition. The second is that a coalition, by bringing in to it dissident, if powerful, elements in the community would be able to muzzle such elements and their protests in order to give the body politic a chance to heal recently inflicted wounds by lying fallow for a period. This is What might be called a Palliser coalition, but anybody who believes that Britain's problems today could be solved by such a period of inactive government — and I am far from saying that masterly inactivity is never justified — would, naturally, now favour a coalition, and honourably so as well. But there must be few such people.
There is another point in tavour or coalition — that is, that the people undoubtedly feel generally in favour of one. It is easy to see why this should be so. There is little doubt that many of our citizens regard our politicians as shiftless or incompetent. But there is an important element in their thinking that does not regard the politicians as bad or dishonest. Rather, they seem to feel, there are good men, if not great, in all parties. Why should they go on screaming at one another, rather than getting together to do what can be done for the political and economic health of the nation? It would be unwise to ignore this kind of feeling and Mr Heath, it is clear, proposes to meet it as fully as he possibly can, even by dropping completely many of the proposals that he regarded as crucial to national survival in his manifesto of last February. However, there is something reminiscent of the Palliser mentality about this approach too.
Finally, there is what appears to be an important historical precedent for successful coalition: that of the last World War. To pursue this precedent very far, however, is to expose its absurdity. The central point to face at the moment is that, while all are agreed that there is a most serious national crisis, all are not remotely agreed about the measures needed for its resolution. Indeed, widely different measures, all of a radical nature, are put forward. There are thus serious differences of fundamental policy. Now, in 1940, when Churchill formed his coalition, all were agreed on the overriding policy — to fight Germans and kill
them. The only questien was how this could be done most efficently, and Churchill was selected as the man who could do it most efficiently. Not only is there no comparable man today, there is no comparable agreement. The movement of an army from here to there, the sending or not sending of tanks through the Mediterranean, the appointment or dismissal of a general — all these are decisions different in kind from the decision to fight inflation through control of the money supply or by different means.
None of this is to suggest that the plight of Mr Thorpe, contemplating the attractions of coalition, should not command sympathy. It is pretty clear that he and several at least of his parliamentary colleagues would like at least a brief period of sharing in government: only the vociferous opposition of some of the elements at the roots of their party have prevented them from saying so openly, and forced Mr Thorpe to insist on hard and probably impossible condidons for Liberal entry into a government dominated by another party. Mr Thorpe, understandably, feels that without some experience of office Liberals cannot expect to do well if and when they attain a real position of power, with the possibility of forming a government by themselves. Further, he muses, without being or having been in office, the Liberals cannot overcome that final stage of the credibility gap which they must cover before he becomes an obvious candidate for Prime Minister.
The antipathy of the Labour party to coalition has self-evident reasons. Like the Liberals of the nineteenth century, today's Socialists have discovered that the Tories are dangerous coalition partners, apt to swallow their companions and digest them. Because of this track record alone the present Conservative wish for coalition is understandable, but it is purely tactical nonetheless, and it might even produce severe repercussions for the great party which has been brought to a dangerous pass by the contradictory surges and impulses and changes of mind of its present leader. , During the traumatic weekend following his defeat at the last election it can hardly be doubted that, in seeking a coalition with the Liberals, Mr Heath was more concerned with staying in office than with helping his country. Though this paper and others denounced hen most severely for just that concern at the time, it is fair to recall the words one of his friends spoke to me a few weeks later. "You did not appreciate", he said, "just how much of a shock it was. Nobody should be judged on what they do in the first couple of days after such an experience". However, even acknowledging the weight of that view, I think most observers — and many of his own partisans — have noticed an increasing tendency in Mr Heath absolutely to identify what is good with what he wants; and this tendency has been growing since 1970. Thus, a man who was once noticed not for his personality or his charm but for the distinctiveness of his policy has become noted for the willingness with which he changes not all, but some of his policies.
This may seem a churlish judgement to make just after the publication of the Conservative manifesto, particularly since I among other Conservative critics urged on the leadershiP the dropping of some policies from the February manifesto, which have been dropped, and the modification of others which have been modified. Then, again, this current manifesto is the. most literate to emerge from either party for many years, and most of the softenings and droppings are right and proper. However — and it is no denigration of the considerable talents of Mr Gilmour and Mr Patten and Mr Sherbourne and Mr Deslandes and others who have done the drafting to say so — a Conservative manifesto is always in some way the personal utterance of the Leader of the Party; and its . promises are his promises. The suspicion thus arises that almost every tactical act of Mr Heath is nowadays merely cosmetic, from what he advances as measures of policy, to his espousal of coalition. In what way would it be unfair to suggest that the return of the same Prime Minister would produce the same confrontations as before, just as the return of Mr Wilson has produced the same indecision as before?
These doubts which may reasonably be felt about the motivation of Me Heath can be applied generally to the propagandists of coalition. Only a very few, like Lord Alport, can put forward anything remotely approaching a policy, or set of policies: most merely propound a kind of amorphous, goodwill. The real difficulty of Britain today is that it has a choice, speaking broadly, between two different emphases — the socialistically collectivist, arid the determinedly free enterprise. What is required is not the adoption of some muddled and impermanent middle way between the two, but the implementation of one or the other with a great deal of political skill. Thus many of the critics of Sir Keith Joseph's Preston speech missed the point of his own qualifications. Sir Keith was not advocating a purist monetarY policy, with the devil taking the hindmost, but a policy that was in its emphasis monetarist, with shifts that were merely tactical. He did not invite the sweeping away of all subsidisation, but the retention of such subsidies only as were tolerable or necessary within the general concept of a balanced budged. Above all he stated the surely true and unanswerable necessity in Britain for a consistent policy, consistently pursued over a longish period. M. Gaston Thorn, the Prime Minister of Luxembourg, recently lamented the impossibility of any European government pursuing such a policy because of the current rush to impermanence of European electorates: he might better have lamented the lack of purpose among European politicians. But one policy or another we must have; and a coalition is most likely to strive desperately to avoid having allY policy at all.
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