The National Trust

From Mrs James Brock Sir: Miss Leach's courteous and moderate letter in your correspondence coloumns (January 27) shows her to be the type of member for which the National Trust should be grateful. From the depth of her interest I suspect that she is an active member of a local NT centre, and probably gives freely of her time and services. Naturally such a person hates any public knocking of the Trust; I felt the same way in the 'sixties when Commander Rawnsley was making his more virulent accusations. But I think the facts of the present situation have to be squarely faced, and remedial action must be taken if the Trust is to regain and retain its status as a great moral authority in its concern for the preservation of our countryside and historic houses.

I note that Miss Leach does not query the accuracy of my story, nor does she suggest that, as a dissident ex-employee, I have written a bitter and ' unfair ' article. I have certainly not escaped bitterness, but I should like to think that I have achieved a measure of objectivity, and that my criticisms of present Trust policy are not just the venting of personal spleen.

When one has been the victim of injustice (in our case being rendered homeless and jobless for no more cause than 'holding views ' on the importance of the correct preservation and presenta tion of the NT property for which we were responsible) the emotions engendered are all destructive ones. Furthermore, there are the traps of self-pity and over valuation of oneself. I hope, in my case, that awareness has resulted in at least partial avoidance.

Certainly, I have no intention of ruining the rest of my life by brooding on the past. I am no saint, and no martyr's crown would ever fit me. I was wrong; it has happened; so be it. Miss Leach hopes that our experience was untypical and writes of the enthusiasm she has met among workers for the National Trust. Dare I suggest that the enthusiasm is found mostly in the Centres and among the newer staff? The information officers, those working in the shops and so on after all knew no better. Those of us who worked for the Trust before it launched itself on various commercial enterprises and ' pro motions (on a rather Readers Digest level) felt very differently.

That we did not make our feelings felt, other than correctly by internal memoranda, is a mark of loyalty and proper behaviour rather than enthusiasm. I 'know of more than one Administrator who is suffering from disillusion and frustration. Why then do such people not leave? Mainly because they cannot afford to. They are paid very little and receive their main benefits in the form of free accommodation, heating, etc.

Mostly they took up their posts (as we did) out of idealism combined with the personal wish to live in a beautiful place. Miss Leach is displeased with my use of the words ' shoddy ' and ' second-rate ' in respect of the Trust's commercialism and treatment of its staff. They are hard words, it is true, but not lightly chosen. I think that she, and most of your readers, would agree that the Trust's treatment of us was not exactly first-rate. As for commercialism, I did expressly not describe the Trust's merchandise in these terms, and would agree with her that much of it is of a high quality and certainlycompares favourably with the junk sold elsewhere. I have nothing against shops or visitors buying souvenirs — if they want to. It is the siting of these shops which is all important. First, they should be in villages rather than in the centre of sixteenth century properties, and if space is not available in the village (it was at Montacute) then any shop should be in keeping with its surroundings. At Montacute the shop is modern in its effect (though part of an old building). Furthermore (and worse) visitors are routed through it instead of being permitted to approach the house in a more conventional manner, i.e. up a fine drive. It is the present emphasis on buying and selling and promotion of the shops to the detriment of the properties which is all wrong — and I know that I am far from being alone in thinking so.

Miss Leach writes next of the Trust's financial problems, of which as a servant for thirteen years I am well aware. It is the zurrent methods of attempting to solve them that are open to criticism. The shops may indeed — and eventually — prove financial assets, but I am aware that the overheads must be enormous. Their secondary use — as 'Information Centres ' in order to persuade (in some cases by dubious ' hard sell ' methods) visitors to the property to join the National Trust on the spot rather than buy a ticket for admission is even more questionable. People thus persuaded — ' conned ' was the disagreeable word which we heard not infrequently at Montacute — will be in effect season ticket holders, using their membership solely to gain free admission to NT properties. Such people will have no incentive to renew their subscriptions when they have had their money's worth, so to speak. I am aware that the annual ' dropout ' of non-covenanted members not renewing their subscriptions rose enormously last year, which is exactly what I would have expected to happen. Covenanted members, whose covenants result in a saving of tax, are the only members worth having — the long-term friends, in fact. Thf ' season ticket holders' must causs actual financial loss, in terms of gate money.

When considering the Trust'l finances, one must also take int0 account the vast proliferation Of, staff in the regions — three agen(s in place of one, full-time Informa,tion officers, etc, with the extrai office staff necessarily involved MI such expansion. More financial outlay for the Trust, but has the' outcome been increased efficiently? Not in my experience, not would I

have expected this to be so. '

If Miss Leach thinks I advocate a policy of keeping everything iff aspic (the only phrase in her letter to which I take mild exception) then she is completely mistaken. At Montacute our average annual attendance was in the region of 20,000, which would surely disturb the aspic a little? (Last season's figures, incidentally, were down in the 17,000s. I wonder why?) The most frequently heard compliment during our administration waa "This place seems so alive Or 'lived in ')." This was our aim, an to further it we organised (or helped to organise) frequent concerts, verse recitals etc. But we always had regard to the scale and suitability of the proposed function. On the one occasion when matters were taken out of our hands and, in the first flurry of enthusiasm for Enterprise Neptune, a ' jousting tournament ' was held at Montacute, the event proved a financial as well as aesthetic disaster.

Miss Leach refers, more in sorrow than in anger, to "those who are ready to criticise the Trust." I would not willingly have done so. I am an extremely orthodox person with a dislike of splinter groups — certainly I was opposed to those who wished to ' reform ' the Trust after Commander Rawnsley's dismissal. My husband and I, seeing that we were not exactly in tune with this new ' National Trust, were prepared to resign (on the understanding that we should be allowed time to re-establish ourselves and to buy a house) after which we should have taken out life membership of the Trust, remained good friends and have ultimately become benefactors. That we were not permitted to do this, that we were disposed of in a crass, insensitive (and callous) fashion, is I suggest a symptom of decay; of the triumph of expediency over morality — and indeed of everyday wisdom and commonsense.

Yvonne C. R. Brock. Old Angel, Woodhill, Stoke St Gregory, Taunton

Religion in schools

Sir: I was fascinated by Edward Norman's polemical outburst, 'Christianity in the schools ' (December 23), and not least by the emotive use of language: apparently ordinary people have "convictions", middle-class intellectuals have "obsessional prejudices"!

Dr Norman first attacks New Life, the collection of hymns and songs for young people. With his criticism of the standard of some of the verse one must agree, but it is passing strange that someone who, in the same article, pleads for Christian instruction in schools and who objects to extra-biblical readings in morning assembly should complain about hymns which "dwell on the contemporary interests of race, war, the costs of defence, the inequalities of society, and a variety of what are thought of as social injustices". It is true that these 'left-wing' topics have not much in common with Hymns Ancient and Modern, but they are certainly among the major concerns of the biblical literature. Are we to have censored biblical readings in school assembly? Do we exclude the prophets, with their blistering attacks on social injustice (Amos 5:12, 6:1-6; Isaiah 3:14-15; Jeremiah 7: 5-6; Malachi 3:5, etc., etc.), or Deuteronomy, with its injunction to care for the foreigner living within the nation (Dt. 10:17-19)? Do we ban the Magnificat:

"He hath put down the mighty from their seats, and exalted them of low degree.

He hath filled the hungry with good things; and the rich he hath sent empty away." (Luke 1:52-53) Do we protect our children from the parable about the rich man and Lazarus (Luke 16:190, or the one about the inheritors of the kingdom of God being those who feed the hungry and take the stranger into their home (Matthew 25:31f)? If concern for the hungry, the homeless, the outcast and the oppressed is "left-wing", then the Bible must be called left-wing. It is not clear what Dr Norman understands by the "sound Christian instruction" he demands for the children of the land. He appears to approve the working-class equation of Christianity with "de• cency" — "an ethic , . . which is related to a heavenly world of as pirations". But "decency" is a very odd word to use to describe the teaching of the Founder of Chris.

tianity. His fiercest attacks were levelled at the law-abiding, decent churchmen of his day, and they regarded his teaching as a danger ous threat to conventional morality and religion. By all means let chil dren at school hear about the teaching that "turned the world upside down".

Dr Norman attacks what he as sumes to be the current approach to religious education, It i not sur prising that many people are confused about what is involved in the new RE, but when a person attacks it in print — in a reputable periodi cal it is not only irresponsible to do so without ascertaining the facts, it also leaves him in a very vulnerable position.

The religious education which is "often all about social questions" is part of the approach associated with the 'sixties. But the religious education of the 'seventies has a quite different look. To the extent that it includes biblical teaching it will, of course, include social concerns, but its overall aim is much more profound: to help pupils to understand, by the time they leave secondary school, what religion is and what it would mean to take one religion seriously. Some understanding of other religions will be essential if this aim is to be achieved, but one does not learn what it would mean to take a religion seriously by studying equal amounts of all the world faiths, and in this country, for many reasons, the religion which will be studied at greatest depth will be Christianity.

The implications of this kind of religious education — the schemes of work appropriate for different age groups, the foundations which need to be laid with younger children, the demands made on the teachers, the attitudes appropriate to the subject, etc — are too complex to be dealt with here. Suffice it to say that a thorough study of them is the essential prerequisite of any responsible public statement about religious education.

Jean L. Holm Homerton College, Cambridge