THE THREAT TO TORY REFORM
The Queen's speech from the throne in the House of Lords outlined a programme of Tory reform which will be widely welcomed; and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, speaking to the Institute of Directors, proudly announced: "The signs are that the economy is now expanding at the rate of at least four to four and a half per cent, which I forecast in July, a rate twice as fast as the average for the past six years." He could have added (but, being a politician, naturally did not) that the present rate of growth is also well above that being enjoyed in the Common Market. It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that, whatever may have been the economic arguments in favour of entry during the period when the British economy was stagnating and various British governments demonstrated few if any policies of economic and social reform, such arguments are made spurious by the Government's programme and the Chancellor's optimism.
Mr Peter Walker and his team at the Department of the Environment are pressing ahead with the necessary and overdue reforms of local government, and of the finance of rented housing. With a combination of luck and good management from Mr Carr, the Industrial Relations Act should start biting, and his Code of Industrial Relations Practice, when presented and if adopted, could further contribute towards the ordering of more sensible arrangements between both sides of industry. Although it is arguable whether raising the school-leaving age to sixteen is a sensible way of spending further money on education, Mrs Thatcher's proposals to replace and improve primary school buildings show a proper concern with priorities. The Government is to be congratulated on its determination to press on with law reform. And if the establishment of a value-added tax is seen as part of the overall scheme of fiscal reform, this will be entitled to be considered on its merits (although the simpler-to-understand sales, or consumption, tax might prove preferable: there is much to be said for taxation which is understood by those being taxed and not only by those doing the taxing. VAT is unlikely ever to be generally understood in the way that purchase tax, or income tax, is understood).
With a confident programme of legislation, high growth and the intimation of a boom, Mr Heath's Tory administration ought to be riding the crest of a wave. It is not. It faces the gravest combination of circumstances, some of its own making, others not. Thus far, the Government has failed to stop prices and unemployment from rising. In time Mr Barber's boom may lead to a reduction in unemployment, and the Government's economic and industrial policies could succeed in resisting the rise in prices. But the Conservative party will reap no electoral harvest from the Government's vigorous policy of Tory reform, even if the policy meets with great success, so long as it fails to deal with Northern Ireland. If the Prime Minister were to devote half the time, energy and will-power which he spends upon his European adventure upon the Irish mess which it is his prime duty to endeavour to clean up, then he would at once cease to be an electoral liability to his own Tory reforming administration and become its greatest asset. It is the Tory party which is more likely than the Labour party to founder in the quick. sands of Europe and of Ireland; and it is Tory reform which is threatened.
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