ST GEORGE'S
THE church of St George-in-the-East, one of Hawksmoor's noblest creations, has served the people of what was originally outer East London for over 250 years. Sited between Cable Street and the Rat- cliffe Highway, in a district notorious for unspeakable degradation and poverty, Christianity was maintained there through- out the 19th century by brave and selfless priests, often despite violent local opposi- tion. Gutted by bombs in the second world war, the great walls of Portland stone now shelter a smaller, modern church. In this building the Church's mission has con- tinued, despite the ruthless depopulation and redevelopment of the old East End. Now, owing to the regeneration of Dock- lands and the surrounding area, a new population is at last moving back into the parish. This is the moment the Bishop of Stepney has chosen to consider closing European proposal. Even if Westland's shareholders do finally accept the Amer- ican Sikorsky offer, there is no doubt that the offer has been significantly improved by direct response to the European bid. The strong commercial case for staying with Sikorsky has been forcefully put by Sir John Cuckney and his board: Sikorsky is America's leading helicopter manufactur- er, with worldwide markets and a single, clear hierarchy of commercial decision- making, while the Anglo-European con- sortium is a complex tangle of five very different kinds of enterprise, liable to all sorts of political pressures and bureaucratic delays, and mainly operating in one, already overcrowded market. But the Westland board definitely overstates the chances for the company of retaining all its old European links and opportunities, while at the same time developing its American ones. By his sensational demar- che Mr Heseltine has precipitated the European reaction, exemplified by the warning from the EEC Commissioner for Industry, but that reaction would have come anyway: better now than later. The Solicitor General may have been technical- ly correct to pick up the Defence Secretary on the precise wording of his letter to the European consortium's bankers, but Mr Heseltine's basic point remains valid. The Sirkorsky deal would be seen in Europe as an American foot in the European door (and why else is Sikorsky so interested in this British lame duck?). Moreover, the both St George-in-the-East and the nearby ancient chuch of St Paul's, Shadwell. While foolish and defeatist proposals like this are made, while the parochial and architectu- ral legacy of the Church of England con- tinues frivolously to be abandoned, it will remain difficult to take the Church's cur- rent pose of deep concern about inner city problems at all seriously.
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