A Spectator's Campaign Notebook

The experience of attending a Conservative ,cloption meeting, at least so far as a consti`11encY party member is concerned, is by no °leans an unbridled pleasure. Chichester, i'hich must be served by one of the best agents ,,11 the country, have found a new member to `feeplace Christopher Chataway, whose majority I, heavily in February. The new man, isntnony Nelson, is aged twenty five or six and \en accountant or something with Slater alker. He appears to be a slightly pudgy but cIiiiable young man with an urchin grin. sr,eateway Made a long and boring seconding ch with the usual ration of Conservative s

new—eak: „ .

, p Britain cannot stand alone", "The '2,11Y of the little Englander", "Fortress Britain". ;1'.!I We were spared were the Union Jack, `Auld SYne' and any mention of Edward Heath. ole‘lsort, in accepting the nomination, spoke at 10' "n°1 Would have seemed an inordinate length la a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. It was `.1,4ie the sung eucharist and a performance of the sung Day in the Cduntry, recently shown t't the Chichester Festival Theatre, put °gether. But although he was long-winded, he :13Peared numerate and put inflation forward vs the main issue to be tackled by a Conserva had No doubt the poor man had to give the accepted oath of allegiance on C°11hrion Market to Sir Richard Webster, `4th's man at Central. Office, but he had the pocl sense not to mention the matter to serried waws of the newly impoverished farmers he coas addressing. Notwithstanding, the younger nservatives like Nelson give some hope for `",e future of the party, which for so long has not lel up the resolution to get rid of the ader that makes their chances at the polls so

Stuck

I hay yet to meet a Conservative within

ad"larnent or in the country who does not w tnit, when pressed, that the party's chances not be improved with a new leader. Ted ueath's main fault, leaving aside his general bill.Pleasantness and lack of conviviality, is his itindhess to his electoral liability to the Party. 1-, contrasts characteristically with Sir Alec ":/tiglas-Home's self effacing modesty. ltOw that the election has been called, it is at Possible to reveal that a deputation of ,..",e„rilhers of the backbenchers' 1922 Committee a,7,41ed on their Chairman, Edward Du Cann, C suggested that they should tell Ted Heath at they no longer had confidence in him and tWhaeri,,te d his resignation. To ensure no argument LProposed to say that they had simu tanclusly released this information to the press. Said It Cann no lion when it comes to courage — c that he would see Humphrey Atkins, the that ief Whip. Atkins spoke to Heath and said L at the lads were unhappy. Heath replied that u7syvould call a meeting and cheer them up. The

tImate Atkins had to say that this might

enough and that they might want his s-signation. Heath, undismayed, blandly a`torted that the procedures for the selection of benew leader were laid down and that, if that focartle necessary, he would put his name 0 rtvard for selection. The 1922 were tolltrirrianoueYred. If Heath were to lead the Party pa,„'efeat again, it is difficult to know how the Th'Y. will get rid of the incubus of their leader. ato're would naturally be several candidates, one of them might again be Heath. The

Praetorian guard and their placemen, and the placemen's henchmen, and the paid hands might be counted on to return their ultimate paymaster and patron.

Final honour

Whatever happens in the General Election, Wilson will have a Dissolution Honours List to fill. There will, of course, be the usual collection of worthy and unworthy alike. One name the Prime Minister or, as he may be, ex-Prime Minister -seems certain to advance is that of J. B. Priestley. Priestley, England's foremost man of letters and using that phrase in its old sense to describe a writer prominent in a large number of fields is already known to have refused a peerage more than once. It is said that the only honour which might tempt him would be the Order of Merit. This award, of course, is not solely within the Prime Minister's gift, the Queen having the last say on whether it is handed out or not. However, in this, Priestley's eightieth, year, a galaxy of literary and artistic talent one of the most prominent members being Lord Olivier have come together to urge Priestley's merits. Let us hope, however gloomy the political and economic situation, that the one dignified touch of recognition for J. B. Priestley will not be lacking.

Anxious days

I have been surprised astonished would be a better word to see the state of nerves currently afflicting some Conservative politicians. Only the other day a Conservative backbencher, who sits for one of the safest seats in the country, expressed his fear that he would lose it to the Liberals. His was not the perfunctory, modest statement of nervousness required of every candidate before entering on a campaign, but an expression of a deep fear. Moreover, only a day or so after I had seen him, a senior Shadow minister expressed precisely the same worry. Few Conservatives, clearly, hope to win the election; many are resigned to losing it. Even a defeat, however, need not be a rout. The anxiety appears to be that a single serious mistake during the campaign could put the Tory Party, which is by no means loved, on the run. After all, parties do occasionally practically vanish from history witness the Liberals after the First World War.

Campaign surprise

One surprise :nove which Mr Heath is reported to be contemplating is an acceptance in mid-campaign of Labour's plan for a Common Market referendum, Tory anti-Marketeers would, naturally, be overjoyed by any move such as this which would greatly relieve the embarrassment they currently suffer in their constituencies. A group of them recently presented the leader of the Party with a memorandum, based on public opinion poll analysis, suggesting that anything between three and fifteen per cent of basically Tory and uncommitted voters could be favourably affected by such a switch on his part. Naturally, Mr Heath has no desire whatever to accept such a proposal, though he could quite honourably do so without giving up his own passionate adherence to the European cause. Anyway, he has asked one of the Conservative Party's private polling teams to check out the conclusions of the memorandum, and I gather that, though they lean towards the lower rather than the higher figure, they do not dispute the general conclusions. Not least among the substantial advantages which acceptance of the referendum would have would be the gaining of Mr Enoch Powell's support of the Conservative party.

No insights

One of the shoddiest pieces of `insight' journalism for a long time appeared in this week's Sunday Times, in the course of an analysis of the Conservative party's preparations for the campaign. The piece advanced the thesis that Mr Heath and Mr Whitelaw had been striving might and main to reform and reconstruct a shoddy and incompetent Conservative machine against strong resistance from both Central Office and the Conservative Research Department. There is no doubt that the Party machine last February fell a long way below its usual high standards, but there was no question of resistance to the changes introduced by Mr Whitelaw when he became chairman. How could there be? The idea that the Research Department in particular could be a bastion against change is too ludicrous to contemplate. It is a small office, staffed in the main by bright young people who, however excellent their work, and strong their opinions, have no political weight with which to oppose the wishes of the leader of the Party. Certainly, a good deal of bureaucratic inertia has been evident for a long time in Smith Square, but again Mr Heath and Mr Whitelaw had no problems whatever in rearranging the high command there.

Good luck

Normally, the old truism is that a campaign never ends with the same subject as it began. This one, however, looks like being an exception. The theme of inflation has been so prominent both in the minds of the people and in the utterances of the politicians that it would seem impossible to shift it from the centre of argument. This is all the more so as neither major party has anything like, or anything that looks remotely like, a new or convincing policy for the anti-inflation battle. We are stuck with the old gang.