Another voice

Coping with Shirley

Auberon Waugh

11 the CBI's proposals for the creation of more jobs seem to me fatuous and most of them harmful, with the possible ex- ception of the one about encouraging tourism. The sad truth emerges that the business brains of the country are pretty second-rate. This will come as no surprise to those of my own age who have followed the careers of their contemporaries. It was my observation 15 years ago that all the brightest and the best went into journalism, the second best into the diplomatic service and academic life. What went into industry was pretty good rubbish, just a whisker ahead of the absolute rubbish which went into politics.

So here we have the pretty good rubbish preaching to the absolute rubbish about how to run the country. No doubt the ab- solute rubbish will listen respectfully, if on- ly because the CBI, representing the settled conclusions of its members, a consensus of the second-rate, is obscurely thought to have some sort of political 'clout'. It has scarcely opened its mouth in the last five years but to say something irredeemably stupid. Can Sir Geoffrey Howe, as an Englishman — let alone a Conservative or a member of the middle classes — seriously wish to encourage the construction in- dustry? Not only is it manned to a very large extent by Irish visitors who pay no taxes and vote Labour, but it has also been responsible more than anything else for making Britain the hideous, rootless, alienated country it is rapidly becoming. One of the great blessings of the recession is that even the most spendthrift local coun- cils and public bodies have had to cut back on their building schemes. Long may the cut-back last, even if it does not seem to have reached Taunton yet, where British Rail has spent the last two months building a palatial and completely unnecessary new booking office, to the grave inconvenience of its murderously over-charged customers.

Because it does not represent the settled conclusions of a committee, but only the brilliant mind of a wise and good man, nobody is likely to pay any attention at all to the suggestion by Mr Peregrine Worsthorne that an enormous number of jobs would be created (and much good done) if domestic wages were made tax- allowable. Traditional wisdom has it that the psychological barriers are too great, and the days of domestic service (which until the first war was the biggest single source of employment in the country) are ir- retrievably over. I confess that my own philanthropic heart quails a little at the thought of Shirley Williams end-products from Merseyside and the Tees roaming around my home, even if they were only allowed into an outhouse to clean the shoes. But necessity is the mother of invention, and I should have of that the technological society of the future might easily require some such adjustment to the class antagonisms which flourished during the era of heavy industry.

Instead of which we have the Govern- ment's half-baked scheme to bribe employers to the tune of £15 a week for each Shirley Williamser they hire at under £40 a week. The scheme is open to objec- tions on many grounds: it creates a new field of public expenditute; £40 is too high a wage for young people living at home in any case; by bribing employers in this way, the Government is bound to create a whole new lump of idle, uneconomic employees. Last week, the Mirror produced a new objec- tion, claiming that a 'slave trade' has sprung up in young employees who, through terror of the dole, are being forced to work illegally long hours. It quotes Mr Christopher (`Chris') Pond, described as 'a director of the independent watchdog group Low Pay Unit' (I wondered who pays for this obviously vital body), and reveals that 'so many parents have complained about this exploitation to Dudley Council in the West Midlands that it is to make spot checks on the hours the youngsters are made to work'.

By law, I should explain, no one under 18 is allowed to work more than 48 hours a week. That seems to me a fairly reasonable, humane law. One compares it to these passages, which come from the Answers to Correspondence column of the Boy's Own Annual of 1879-80 and of 1888: `AN ANXIOUS MOTHER wishes to know "if an ironmonger can compel his ap- prentices to be behind the counter till nine o'clock one evening and ten another night". The hours mentioned certainly seem late, but there may be indulgence on the other side of which we know nothing. Speaking broadly, we should say that nothing will be gained by the apprentice standing too much upon his "rights".

`E. C. BARK. — Fifteen hours a day is, we consider, much too long for a boy of fourteen to have to work; but we do not see what you can do except complete your ap- prenticeship. You should not have chosen a trade in which such long hours are necessary.'

But the most interesting thing, I feel, about the Dudley shock horror is that British youths are actually prepared to work more than the legal maximum of 48 hours a

week — in the West Midlands, if 11°I Liverpool, Newcastle or South Wales. TI115 seems to me an immensely important discovery, which puts in doubt much e°11. ventional wisdom about the Younger generation of Britons. The pressure to 501„

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them working comes from the parents, not from themselves, just as the pressure t° stop them learning anything at school canto from the teachers rather than from any unusual resistance on their own part. The Falkiands war showed us how Young Britons could still be moulded into obedient and efficient soldiers even after five Years spent without discipline or useful occaPa" tion in Shirley Williams's concrete massage, parlours. The Dudley experience confirm' that some young people are still prepared t° work if they can get away from all the Pe° ple trying to prevent them from doing s°' In this context, it will be interesting t° follow the efforts of the new Chief Seoul; Major-General Michael Walsh, to repair r the damage done by his predecessor, Sts William Gladstone, and smarten the la up. In the best tradition of General 'Wet_ into the room and call him 'Chief', or `S1r,s'

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Nidgett of the Royal Army Tailoring (General Walsh was himself a Para anec former Director of Army Training) he us.,. his first address to the Scout Comm stoners to call for a return to standards °, fitness, respect, discipline, behaviour, Per" sonal turn-out and hygiene, sportsmans11,1111: politeness and care for others. Mod making and electronic toys are out. Carty ing and the survival skills are back in. expects Scouts to stand up when he corn.

I do not doubt that the ethos of Boy Own Paper and Scouting for Boys would every bit as acceptable to the Young us generation today as any of the vart.°,11. slobs' characters available from the Kid Community Rights workshops, polYtecrio. social science syllabuses, Arts Council, 1,61 units. ses.mwanhaotr community welfare watchOgt

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like Major-General Walsh, they will °vet- have the opportunity presented to thern .0 making such a choice. The vast mat It will never come near any such influences' is a waste of time to blame teachers or parents. Like Shirley, they are to set 10 their ways for any change of attitude. you cannot suddenly introduce discipline Ine the comprehensive school system by decre ;

The slobs' generation which created thesli

schools and continues to promote its c1° f ethos in the universities, the Department °, , Education, the Guardian and neal everywhere else was, of course, rea a. gamst a traditional, disciplined uPbrIllovf mg. The most fascinating development all will be if something like the Boy's e Paper ethos of cold bath tubs, disciP111).., and hard work develops spontaneously Pr the young despite the efforts of the der generation to prevent it. I must say, ratheili that coennostiroIctciaonn't bear the thought of

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