POLITICAL COMMENTARY

JOHN MACKINTOSH, MP

To sit through Mr Rippon being questioned in the Commons is a curious experience. One can understand the reactions of the wogs- begin-at-Calais type of Tory and their preference for white English-speaking na- tions as allies. But it is Labour members who see the most. Below the gangway, Douglas Jay's indignant running commentary almost drowns the answers, Peter Shore leans forward, portentous and tense. Stan Orme shouts about a 'sell-our and on my right one member thought he was scoring a palpable hit by calling 'II taut que vinis repondiee.

The curious point is that it is difficult to see why opinion has hardened against the Market in the months since the Labour government made its application for entry. Indeed some of the fears that were expressed at that time ought to have diminished. Mr Ian Mikardo and his friends' worries that an enlarged EEC would deepen the division between the blocs in Europe should have declined in the face of Willy Brandt's determined effort to remove old sources of tension in eastern Europe. Also we have witnessed the first change of power in Germany as the result of a general election and this should have had some effect on Mr Hugh Jenkins and others who have doubted if Europeans (other than the British) un- derstand democracy. And as to the cost, the balance of payments surplus which has been trotted out so proudly in so many Labour speeches should at least have put this pro- blem into..better perspective.

But the mere process of setting out these points seems to reveal their irrelevance. The positive anti-Europeans in the Labour party are not interested in safeguards or in the precise cost. They would resist the proposal just as much if it included free gift coupons. Most of these opponents are on the left of the party, all of which tends to suggest that the issue is not the precise nature of Britain's role in world affairs. The more one listens to the sparring, the clearer it becomes that the European question is now a facet of old, half-forgotten divisions within the party.

For instance, notice the distaste which a left-winger can infuse into the single word 'market'. It suggests money-changers, hag- gling and hawking, all of which has no place in the pure temples of socialism. Of course they realise that to sign the Treaty of Rome would not prohibit further- nationalisation, but it would commit Britain to organising its economy by reference to market forces, to 'consumers' desires. And why not, especially when the more progressive of the 'socialist' East European economies are moving in this direction? There is no answer, but for this section of the party, • socialism is not primarily a matter of improving The quality of community life; a few remaining shreds of Marxist thinking make them feel that socialism first of all requires a new economic system. Once economic changes are cartiecr'

through, all the other desirable im- provements in the tone of British. society will flow from these changed relationships.

This thinking is typified by Norman Atkinson's complaint that the fault of the Labour government was in 'trying to make capitalism work', implying that the existing pattern of industrial and commercial organisation could have been replaced by some other system. It fits into Messrs Jones and Scallion's view that an incomes policy may well be fair, helpful and inherent in socialist thinking but that it cannot be in- troduced until 'after we have a socialist economy'. This is safe enough because no one can explain what such a socialist economy would be like or how it would work nor can they point to any part of the world where it exists or is coming in.

While this is the position on the left, it is significant that almost all the dedicated marketeers in the Labour party belong to the centre and right, people for whom socialism is a matter of rapid growth and the use of the extra wealth to create a more classless society free from the poverty, suspicions; and discriminations which arise when some are much better off and more powerful than others. In other words, this is the old Clause Four argument rearing its head again.

There is a further underlying division between the pro- and anti-Marketeers. The latter, and Michael Foot is a classic example, actually believe in the old-fashioned concept of national (or at least British) 'sovereignty. In the same way, the Tribune Group is about the only body of MPS who still believe that speeches on the floor of the House are of crucial importance. For them, statements, resolutions, pledges really are valuable in themselves. So they think that Britain is still free (as they are in the House), to take a stand on Vietnam, to start unilateral disarmament or to announce a boycott of South Africa and therefore they have not noticed the limitations on what Britain can do. Presumably, for them, the explanation of the foreign and domestic policy of the recent Labour government is the old one that the men at the top were not sound in their socialism or that they were 'blown off course' by international speculators and so on.

For those who are pro-Market, there is the much more down-to-earth realisation that Britain has to choose between being a minor partner of the United States or a power capable of leading an increasingly united Western Europe. One of the great neglected facts of modern British politics (well revealed in the Macmillan memoirs) is that since the United States put a stop to our ill- conceived invasion of Suez in 1956, Britain has not been free to pronounce on world issues without the consent of Washington. Britain's support for the war in Vietnam was simply given in return for United States backing in our applications to the IMF (although George Brown and Michael Stewart came to believe strongly in the arguments of The pro-war elements in America). It was Professor Milton Friedman who recently shook a distinguished audience in London by saying that once Britain decided to peg the pound to the dollar, we were left with less independence than Illinois which did at least have two senators!

The paradox underlying the fear that Bri- tain's alleged independence of action would disappear if we joined the Common Market is that it was France under de Gaulle which pursued precisely the policy which the left had hoped for froth'' a Labour government—withdrawal from NATO, con- demnation of the Vietnam war and an at- tempt to set up a new relationship with the Soviet Union. For the pro-Marketeers, these particular policies are unappealing but

joining Europe would require Britain to have

a regular and persistent foreign pOlicy. This would be very different from the old 'in- ternationalism' of the 'peace movement' type which denied the need for alliances, defences and diplomacy but was always willing to give benevolent lectures to black men about how to run their local government and educa- tional systems.

If there is a real interest in Britain resum- ing an active role in world affairs, there is no reason why an enlightened and flexible ap- proach towards Eastern Europe should have been left first to de Gaulle and now to Willy Brandt. And there are other areas where Europe including Britain could have a salutary influence. France, Germany and Britain have common interests in keeping the super-powers out of a clash in the Middle East and in developing Africa's links with Europe when none of these powers could achieve much on their own and even less if in competition with each other.

While Labour MPS fence uncomfortably over these largely concealed differences, it is as well to remember that their quarrels will have little effect on what happens. If the Prime Minister gets terms which he wants to accept (as appears increasingly likely), the vast majority of the Tory party will fall into line. One doubts whether even Mr Neil Marten or Sir Derek Walker-Smith would be willing to act in a manner which wouldaetu- ally bring about the defeat of the Conserva- tive government. If the Labour shadow cabinet decides to allow a free vote, this will permit a few conservative anti-Europeans to abstain but it is unlikely that the Govern• ment will need the votes of the fifty to sixty Labour mas who will support entry whatever the party decides to do.

But the debate is symptomatic of Labour's problem in coming to terms with its present situation and in understanding the real choices open to it in any future period of office. The anti-Europeans tend, on the whole, to believe that Britain can continue to operate on her own, that it would be possible to socialise the economy (without being too precise as to what this means) and their enemies are still the demon figures of the 'thirties and 'forties; city financiers con- spiring with the gnomes of Zurich to bring a Labour government to its knees.

For those who accept the case for joining Europe, there is no necessary conflict between modern management, particularly of the multi-national corporations and social democratic politicians committed to a higher rate of growth, and the use of this extra wealth to create a more egalitarian society. The real enemy is a subtler one of concepts of personal aggrandisement which make many, including weekly wage-earners, resent poverty programmes and public expenditure designed to help the underprivileged. In foreign policy terms, there is no particular virtue in British leadership but it is as well to be clear about our current relations with the United States and about what it is open In Britain to achieve in Europe. In politics. as in most aspects of life, living with old assump- tions and reactions in a world which has a decreasing relation to reality is certainty. soothing but, if carried too far, it leads sin* to a failure to assess situations, to act cor- rectly ancl.therefore to achieve one's original objet4Iteig