The Spectator's Notebook

Europe is likely to become a better place as a consequence of Willy Brandt's electorial triumph in West Germany. The consequences of the Brandt-Scheel victory. are calculable and good. The two Germanies will recognise each other; the division of Germany will become as permanent as such things ever are; the Ostpolitih, promising not only better EastWest relations, but better internal conditions in the communist countries of eastern Europe, will flourish; and the Prospect of next summer's European Security Conference achieving a general settlement is greatly improved.

Brandt is now the senior statesman of Europe. Understandably, perhaps, Ted Heath has spent more time and energy cultivating President Pompidou than Chancellor Brandt. Brandt has become the more important, and I expect that the Prime Minister and the Chancellor will move rapidly to establish a close understanding.

Running a railway

Thern one-day railway strike looked to me like a typical example of managerial inefficiency. ASLEF, the striking union, represents the railway's skilled footplatemen and is entirely in favour of the advanced Passenger train project. Ray Buckton, the onion's leader, is a reasonable man. His Union, bearing in mind that when a nationalised airline introduces a new aircraft the pilots get whacking increases, reckons some increase will be in order for the Men who man the new trains. A joint committee of union and British Rail representatives, to discuss manning, pay conditions and so on has been set up. The trouble: it has met only once in the past four months. The union is angry and reckons that Richafd Marsh, the railways boss, IS determined to push the project through as fast as possible without what the union regards as sufficient consultation.

Dick Marsh, according to Cecil King's diary, is one of the ablest administrators of recent years.. Really? His officials declined to meet the union on Wednesday until they knew the strike was on, whereupon he immediately requested an urgent meeting. What a way to run a railway.

Hunting the hunters

The killjoys are out in packs, hunting Princess Anne for having gone hunting. Abhorring horses, I have never hunted— although years ago I occasionally followed lloY car and on foot the Percy hunt and, °rice, one of the Lake District hunts (Blencathra?). There is an element of hcruelty involved in hunting, as there is in ricking and playing fish or winging birds; 10

say horses do not like being ridden a.nd spurred and whipped to victory and defeat, nor greyhounds being raced against a, Mechanical hare they can never catch. here is undoubtedly cruelty in football and rugby, and cricket is not always cricket. I have some respect for those who take a rigorous view on blood sports and on cruelty to animals. For myself, man's inhumanity to man offends me far far more; and the sporting and aesthetic pleasures of hunting, shooting and fishing, not to mention cricket, to my mind far far outweigh the pain they presumably inflict. If Princess Anne wants to hunt, then let her. And if those who oppose blood sports think that it is inappropriate for the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh to give their patronage to such bodies as the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and, the Wildlife Fund, let them argue their well-founded case.

Arresting MacStiofain

The circumstances surrounding Sean MacStiofain's long-overdue arrest are causing great trouble in Radio Telefis Eireann, southern Ireland's BBC. For a long time RTE reporters have been banned from interviewing members of illegal organisations under a formal directive issued by the Minister of Posts and Telegraphs, Gerry Collins. RTE staff men have found this restriction most irksome, and have got round it by interviewing IRA leaders off the record. Last Saturday night Kevin O'Kelly, senior presenter of the main RTE radio news magazine, was telephoned by David O'Connell (the IRA man involved with Maria McGuire in the Brussels arms smuggling episode, and generally regarded, at least until Miss McGuire's expose in the Observer, as the brains behind the Provisionals). O'Connell told O'Kelly that Sean MacStiofain was willing to give an interview and would telephone him shortly. Ten minutes later the call came through, and MacStiofain arranged to go straight round to O'Kelly's house, were a taped interview took place. After leaving O'Kelly MacStiofain was arrested.

On Sunday morning, O'Kelly turned up at the RTE studios and broadcast a piece on the 1.00 pm programme based on the interview. He also discovered, to his natural dismay, where and when MacStiofain had been arrested. After the programme had gone out. Tom Hardiman, the Director-General of RTE, turned up, impounded O'Kelly's tape and put it in the safe of his deputy, John Irvine. Meanwhile, O'Kelly was getting extremely worried that he would be accused, and punished, by the IRA for being a 'felon-setter.' He had a further talk with O'Connell and convinced him that he had not, in fact, informed on MacStiofain's movements.

By Monday, the Irish Government had learned that RTE had the taped interview in its possession. The Minister of Justice, Desmond O'Malley, had said, after Joe Cahill had not been convicted because of insufficient evidence, that the next time they picked up an IRA leader, they would have enough evidence to nail him. On Tuesday, the Irish court hearing the MacStiofain case made an order directing Tom Hardiman to produce the tape, and it is expected that this will provide the vital evidence against MacStiofain.

Direct confrontation

The matter does not stop there. Who tipped off the police about MacStiofain's movements? The subterranean Dublin speculation is that O'Connell may have shopped MacStiofain with a view to reestablishing his own position within the Provisional leadership.

Further, more serious problems: What happens if, in fact, the RTE tape is responsible for MacStiofain's conviction, and if it subsequently becomes a generally accepted Irish myth that RTE not only set up MacStiofain's arrest but also provided the evidence?

And what will RTE do in future, about reporting on the activities of the IRA? Gerry Collins, the Minister, who is taking the view that O'Kelly's interview and broadcast were a breach of his directive, has issued what amounts to an ultimatum to the RTE Authority, to come up with assurances that this sort of thing will not happen again. The Irish Government is thus seen to be in direct confrontation with Radio Telefis Eireann. It is thought that, unless the members of the broadcasting Authority satisfy the ambitious young Minister, they will be dismissed and a stooge body put in their place. If Hardiman knuckles under, then RTE will be unable to report accurately on the main Irish story. Hardiman — an engineer, not a journalist, who nevertheless has supported his journalists — is unlikely to give the assurances Collins really seeks. Thus a huge crisis now confronts RTE itself and also its best men, like Hardiman and such able journalists as Jim McGuinness, its head of news and current affairs, and Kevin O'Kelly.