No final solution
Sir: In Quintin Hogg's article on race rela- tions (19 July) there occurs what is to me, at any rate, a rather remarkable sentence: '1 feared the irrational in human nature even in the palmy days when Mr Enoch Powell, Minister of Health, was busy importing West Indian nurses to man his hospitals'.
May I ask Mr. Hogg to tell us why they are only his hospitals'? Were they not Mr Hogg's hospitals, too? I am aware that they come under the Ministry of Health, but are we to understand that a senior member al the government. as Mr Hogg (or was it Lord Hailsham?) then was, can silently watch steps being taken which he fears might prove wrong, and afterwards say •I never told you so. but I thought so'? Is there not some cabinet doctrine about col- lective responsibility, or have I imagined the phrase?
I trust he will let us know the answer otherwise there is a grave danger that we will get yet another leader in the Guardian praising Quintin, the Good Tory.
Meanwhile, as a socialist. I derive comfort from the apparent admission that whether the hospitals are 'his' or Hogg's they are certainly not 'ours'.
L. E. Weidherg 14 Templewood Avenue, Hampstead, Lon- don, NW3
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