iOssman diaries
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From Professor Antony Flew Sir: In his characteristically generous review of the first volume of the Crossman diaries (December 13) Lord HatIsham notices the assurances of Dr Janet Morgan 'and Jennie Hall "that there has been no
,9xp9rglitrpn. Reading it from cover to cover we may, I think, be fully certain that this is so."
I am afraid not, at least not quite. For in the Sunday Times version of the entry for February 2, 1965, we were allowed to see not only the author's pride in his cleverness in disposing of an "impertinent" parliamentary question from John Boyd-Carpenter; but also the basis of his pride, a flat lie to the House of Commons.
In the book version (pp. 146-147) we read: "On this occasion I felt pretty sure of myself and I managed by a carefully calculated, self-controlled riposte to knock out John Boyd-Carpenter. He was asking me an extremely impertinent question about the delicate subject of how much I consulted Fred Willey on planning decisions. The truth is that, although the PM has often suggested I should be tactful and talk to Fred, I haven't done it on a single occasion. So I had to get out of answering that one and ,l think Hansard shows that I was not unskilful in so 'doing."
But in the Sunday Times version we were provided with the extract from Hansard, which begins simply and baldly: "My right honourable friend and I are in constant contact over policies relating to the supply of land . .."
Had I not seen this Hansard statement there then I should not have today verified it, as I have just done, in our library copy of the relevant Hansard. But, as it was, I then wrote a letter to the editor of the Sunday' Times, which he eventually decided not to publish, raising what still seems to me to be the interesting Epimenidean question whether there may not be a second still unpublished meta-diary, perhaps already — spare the mark! — in the hands of some competitor of the Sunday Times, in which Crossman, so well nicknamed double-Crossman, records his pleasure in lying to all the readers of the first diary.
Antony Flew Department of Philosophy, University of Reading, Whiteknights, Reading
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