AS I WAS SAYING
Why Eurosceptics should be at least as worried about Westminster's sleaze as New Labour's voters
PEREGRINE WORSTHORNE
Initially, of course, Thatcherite Conser- vatism was indeed a great cause as well as a winning one, no less attractive to the ideal- ist than to the careerist. But as time went on and what had begun as a moral crusade and an adventurous exercise in intellectual pioneering settled down into becoming lit- tle more than a vehicle for an easy ride, the supply of careerists increased and then, on the principle that birds of a feather flock together, increased still further, while the supply of idealists, more and more put off by the company they found themselves keeping, first dwindled and then disap- peared.
Of course, none of this necessarily results in sleaze. Not all careerists are sleazy, any more than all idealists are unbribable. But it is surely fair to say that a party in power for a very long time, which is pretty well bound over the years to have accumulated more than its fair share of careerists, is likely to be more prone to sleaze than a party out of power for years, which is pretty well certain to have accumulated more than its fair share of idealists. In short, if it is true that rats proper are more prone to leave ships which are sinking than those which are riding high, so are their human variety more prone to joining political bandwagons which are going at full throttle than those which are slowing down or even grinding to a halt. In time, of course, if the Labour party wins not only this election but the one after and the one after that, a surfeit of careerists more interested in what they can get out of politics than what they can put into them will become its problem to the same degree that it is now the Conserva- tives'. But that is not likely to happen at once. At least for one parliamentary term a sleaze-mongering media is likely to find slender pickings. For however much it may suit New Labour's opponents to paint the Blairites as being themselves from the word go careerists of the worst possible kind, prepared to jettison all their principles to be on the winning side, this charge strikes me as grotesquely unfair. At the time they cast in their lot with Labour, that party looked more like a hearse than a bandwag- on. That they did not join the Labour party out of any idealistic faith in socialism, so much has now become obvious. But that is not at all the same thing as having joined it opportunistically only to further their careers.
A more likely parallel, it seems to me, would be with the generation of young men who came to prominence in the Tory party after Labour's landslide victory in 1945 the Macleods, Heaths, Maudlings and even Enoch Powell. With the exception of the last, not one joined because he believed in true-blue Toryism, i.e., in what the pre-war party had stood for since time immemorial. They recognised, as did their patron, R.A. Butler, that true-blue, semi-feudal Toryism was unelectable that the Conservative party's only hope was to adapt to the post- war zeitgeist, i.e. to aspects of socialism. Hence the adoption of the Middle Way Harold Macmillan's phrase — which involved accepting the welfare state, plan- ning, cosseting trade unions and anti-colo- nialism.
To old-guard Tories like the late Lord Salisbury, this seemed a betrayal of princi- ples. But to those young men themselves, the Butlerites, it seemed like a rebirth of principle — giving new life to the old Tory ideals of paternalism and noblesse oblige. Opportunistic yes, but not cynical. Building up a new Middle Way Conservative band- wagon, which is what the Butlerites suc- ceeded in doing, is quite different from joining one. Sleaze starts developing not 'I'm slipping out for a leak.' when a party wants power very much, but when it starts taking it for granted. Eventu- ally, in the last years of Macmillan, that did happen to the Middle Way Conservatives, as it has now happened to the far right Conservatives and in time, as I say, may happen no less fatally to the Blairites. But it has not happened yet.
This is Labour's signal advantage and, in these non-ideological times, when no pro- found issue divides the parties, arguably its most decisive one. For in policy terms it is unlikely to matter vitally who wins the elec- tion. Neither party is promising to do any- thing which the other could not live with. Equally difficult to assess is the respective quality of the two front-bench ministerial teams. No, there is only one area where the difference between the parties seems to me to stand out like a very sore thumb, and that is in their respective capacities to make the air around Westminster smell a bit sweeter.
Eurosceptics should be the first to realise why this is so vitally important. It is vitally important because if the British people are to be persuaded, in the course of the next Parliament, to fight to the last ditch to defend rule from Westminster, there must be something there worth defending, some- thing there which inspires admiration and devotion. As it is, the British people are increasingly distancing themselves from Westminster, not so much in disgust as in indifference. Just when Parliament needs to show itself at its best, it is showing itself at its worst. Of course the sleaze scandals are petty and paltry, more demeaning than shocking, but that only deepens the indif- ference. An Augean stables is at least worth cleansing. Faced by nothing worse than a bad smell, people can't be bothered. They just pass by, holding their noses.
To believe, as I do, that New Labour might sweeten the atmosphere at Westmin- ster is not to credit them with superhuman rectitude. Any party halfway healthy could do the same. As I say, the sleaze is petty and paltry, and what condemns the Tory party is not so much the prevalence of it in its ranks as the incapacity of those in charge to do anything about it. Yet some- thing must be done about it, if Westminster is to be seen as worth defending. Making the British hate Brussels, that the Tories can be relied upon to do, but New Labour is the more likely to restore their faith in Westminster.
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