Down With Experts . . .
Talking of honours, the Government's last- minute rescue operation on Fairfield's shipyard should certainly be worth a gong or two. But was it worth doing at all? Last year the Govern- ment set up a committee to look into the ship- building industry, under the chairmanship of Mr. Reay Geddes. The Geddes Committee has now completed its investigations—which of course included Fairfield's--and is due to report next month.
Did Mr. Brown take the trouble to consult the committee before swinging into instant action? Not on your life. If he had, he would have been told that the only hope of strengthening Britain's fragmented shipbuilding industry is for the Government to reinforce the strong and let the weak go to the wall. And by no stretch of the imagination, he would have learned, can Fairfield's be reckoned one of the strong.
But why bother to consult the experts -even if you've appointed them yourself? After all, as someone once said. the Labour party is either a crusade or it is nothing. And there's no doughtier crusader than the former Watford District Officer of the Transport and General Workers' Union. He's even got a rise out of Roy Thomson.
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