Political Commentary

The Policy Makers

By ALAN WATKINS

IN what does the Conservative Party now be- lieve? 'Land of Hope and Glory' may be heard at meetings with happily increasing rarity, but the platforms at the village halls are still adorned With the Union Jack. And yet, does the party be- lieve in the British Empire? Certainly not. Does it believe in Europe? Well, up to a point. Does it believe in competition? Of course, provided Mr. Enoch Powell's more harsh conclusions are not taken too literally. The Conservative Party, in fact, is engaged in making up its mind about its beliefs.

It is perhaps unkind to say that the party is in

a state of confusion: 'flux' or 'transition' is the Word that would be preferred at Smith Square. And, in an effort to make the transition more easy, one of the most elaborate exercises in policy creation that have ever been known is now being Undertaken. There is an Advisory Committee on Policy, with Mr. Edward Heath as chairman and Sir Edward Boyle as vice-chairman. Subordinate to this committee there are twenty-one groups concerned with specific topics. In addition there are roughly three hundred groups scattered throughout the country which are affiliated to the Conservative Political Centre.

Before going into the details of this structure,

it is worth noting that the exercise is substantially different from the one supervised by Mr. R. A. Butler (as he then was) after the defeat of 1945. Then the revision of policy was largely, a back- room operation carried out by the Maudlings and the Powells and the Macleods of the party. There Was little attempt to involve the back-bench MPs, Still less the rank and file in the country (except for purposes of endorsement at the annual con- ference). Today all that is changed. And it is a change which is dangerously radical in nature. The theory in the Conservative Party has been that all policy emanates from the Leader. Of course, it has long been realised that this was a fiction, though occasionally a convenient one. Ltut it is a fiction which cannot really be main- tained any longer. It cannot be pretended that the fount of all wisdom is Sir Alec Douglas- Home. The Conservative Party has suddenly be- come democratic. Indeed, Mr. Richard Crossman has in effect suggested that the Labour Party should itself do something of the same kind.

But let us not be too carried away by all this Wild talk of democracy in the Conservative Party. Things have not changed as much as all that. One has only to look at the composition of the Advisory Committee on Policy. They are a sober- sided lot; no revolutionaries they. In addition to Mr. Heath and Sir Edward there are present, as rePresentatives of the 1922 Committee, Sir William Anstruther-Gray, Miss Harvie Anderson, M11.. John Hall, Sir Ian Orr-Ewing and Mr. William Roots. Lord Carrington and Lord Col- ville are there on behalf of the Conservatives in the House of Lords. Proudly bearing the stan- dard of the National Union are Sir Max Bern- rose, Mr. Sidney Chapman (the chairman of the

Young Conservatives), Lord Chelmer, Lady Davidson, Mrs. Charles Doughty, Sir John Howard, Sir Dan Mason and Dame Margaret Shepherd. Mr. Edward du Cann is there as chair- man of the party; Sir Michael Fraser, Mr. David Howell and Mr. Michael Noble have been co- opted; and the secretary is Mr. Brendon Sewill of the Research Department.

All these meet together once a month to re- view the work of the study groups. So far, after four meetings, they have these achievements to their credit. They have agreed on a manifesto which would be used if there were a snap elec- tion. And they decided to amend Conservative policy on land prices to the extent that a special tax would be levied on any increase in value.

However, the detailed work is being carried out not by the Advisory Committee but by the groups, of Which sixteen are main groups and five subsidiary. (For instance, there is a group on taxation which is subsidiary to the economic group.) The topics covered include overseas aid, technology, education, rates, trade unions and insurance. Each group has between eight and twelve members, of whom half are MPs. These MPs, so it is claimed, are chosen to represent both the regions of Britain and the range of opinions inside the party; and there is also an overlap between the membership of the groups and that of the ordinary Conservative back- bench committees.

So far as the groups in the constituencies are concerned, the Conservative Political Centre fixes a topic of the month—trade unions for example —and sends out a questionnaire. Officials at Smith Square have been surprised at the un- reactionary nature of the replies. It seems that Conservative women in the North are devoted to the National Health Service. Answers of this and other kinds are then processed, and the composite results handed to Mr. Heath and the Advisory Committee.

Now there can be no doubt that Mr. Heath has done his best to ensure that all these groups are as representative as possible of the whole party. Nevertheless, the fact remains that at Westminster

'Show me a successful man—and behind him I'll show you a determined, well-programmed computer.'

his activ'ties have been regarded with some suspicion. There has been some talk of Mr. Heath selecting the groups that will produce the results he wants. To a certain extent this criticism is in- evitable: as only ninety or so MPs can be actively involved, the ones who have been left out natur- ally feel that some skulduggery is going on behind their backs. By bringing some people in you en- sure that others are left out.

Having said this, however, One cannot help feeling that Mr. Heath has brought some of the trouble on himself. He has done so by a wholly excessive passion for secrecy. Admittedly some group chairmen are known : Mr. Selwyn Lloyd, for example, is chairman of the immigration committee, Mr. Anthony Barber chairman of a committee of the consumer. But this is not the kind of thing which Mr. Heath is prepared to publicise at all widely. He believes that group members are liable to be bothered by newspapers and television if their special subject happens to be in the news at any given time. (Mr. Lloyd re- cently refused to go on television to discuss the development of Conservative policy on immigra- tion.) Mr. Heath is also afraid that some of the outside members of the group—Mr. Paul Cham- bers is one name that has been mentioned—will be reluctant to give their services if it is known that they are helping the Conservative Party. This latter objection may be valid enough, but it does not exclude the publishing of the group chairmen's names. If Mr. Heath did this he might make his task easier.

But there is a more fundamental criticism than the one of secrecy. The real fallacy lies in the idea that policy can be devised simply by a con- sensus; by a number of groups who have neither a common interest nor a common view of what the Conservative Party should be doing. Three recent pamphlets, by Mr. Howell, by Mr. Eldon Griffiths, and by Mr. Timothy Raison, all put their faith in a high degree of competition at the expense certainly of social equality and possibly of social welfare. Mr. Reginald Maudling's Barnet speech is on much the same lines. Does the Conservative Party accept this? Or does it not? Is efficiency really everything? If not, where and why should there be limitations? I come back to the question I asked at the beginning : in what does the Conservative Party now believe? Mr. Heath's groups may labour but, until this question is answered, they will labour in a vacuum and in vain.

In last week's privilege debate Mr. Michael Foot became, or appeared to become, highly indignant about 'smears.' Mr. Foot, however, is not above doing a bit of smearing himself when it suits his purposes. For instance, in Tribune of a few weeks ago he said that

writing in Mr. lain Macleod's weekly journal the Spectator [Alan Watkins] talks of The Steel Rebellion.' The trick is too clever by a quarter. For it surely helps Mr. Harold Wilson to be conveniently told in advance how the most skil- ful of Tory strategists would like restive Labour back-benchers to behave.

The trouble with Mr. Foot, I suspect, is that he applies his own and Tribune's standards to the Spectator. Certainly I know at least one dis- tinguished Tribune contributor who has found the attempt to impose a party line on him in- creasingly irksome. But whatever Mr. Foot's or Tribune's practices may be, this column is not inspired by and does not reflect the views of Mr. Macleod or indeed of anyone except myself. I write what I like. This may be difficult for Mr. Foot to grasp, but it happens to be so.