Cheating the Liberals
Patrick Cosgrave
I have never been inclined to take the Strasbourg Assembly (which some benighted souls call a Parliament) very seriously, nor am I normally noted for paying an extravagant amount of attention to the doings, or the woes, of the Liberal Party. In the matter of the enforced reduction of the Liberal representation at Strasburg by 50 per cent (or one person), however, I feel Mr Thorpe has every right to be exceptionally angry; and that the Conservatives in particular ought to be ashamed of themselves.
Now, of course, the business managers of the two main parties at Westminster have perfectly plausible reasons for reducing the representation of the Liberals, especially given the balance of parties within the House of Commons. And their action in this respect may well ieem all the more reasonable — and all the easier to get away with — given the miserable performance of the Liberals in the Woolwich by-election. But what Mr Thorpe clearly feels on the subject — and clearly feels passionately — is that the action is contrary to natural justice, and I agree with him. I have never myself been a supporter of the EEC, nor an advocate of Britain's membership of that organisation, but Mr Thorpe and the vast majority of his colleagues have carried a torch for the EEC for as long as I can remember, and they carried that torch before either of the major parties was willing to risk the flame. No.w, such a record would clearly not entitle the Liberals to, say, membership of the Council of Ministers, nor to the appointment of one of their members as a European Commissioner. Nonetheless, in picking the Commissioners, Mr Heath was unusually wise in giving one job to a Tory and the other to a socialist. It helped considerably to preserve what there was of bipartisanship in the whole European operation. If such a balancing act was desirable in dealing with the central organisation of the EEC, it was surely even more desirable in the case of an institution which is at present unformed, and the future of which is uncertain. Moreover, the Liberals did espouse the general European cause earlier than anybody else;, they were earlier and more vigorous advocates of developing at Strasbourg as well. And nobody can question that their two delegates, Lord Gladwyn and Mr Russell Johnson, have worked quite exceptionally hard, and attracted attention to a far greater extent than their paltry numbers suggested they would. True, though Mr Johnson is a most amiable fellow, there have been various complaints to the effect that Lord Gladwyn is an exceptionally pernickety creature, and over-conscious of his own past record as a senior diplomat, as well as over-inclined to exaggerate his own importance. There will certainly be sighs of relief at the absence of Lord Gladwyn; but they avoid the point, that he is a most senior figure, and that he has worked unusually hard to make a go of both the Assembly and the British delegation to it.
Nor does the argument, put forward by the business managers of the main parties, that the Liberals have received no less than their due in proportion to their strength in the House, hold water when it is considered alongside the system of appointments to Commons committees, likewise supposed to be determined by the balance of parties. For it has ever been the case that committee appointments take account of the exceptional achievement by individual members in a given subject, as well as of exceptional achievement by individual members in a particular field. And it is ludicrous in the extreme to suppose that the Scottish Nationalist MP, Mrs Winifred Ewing, is a suitable replacement for a Liberal delegate. For Mrs Ewing and her party, while they were divided on the merits of UK membership of the EEC, were always prepared to consider the merits of membership for an independent Scotland; and their presence at Strasbourg will be designed more to advance their' domestic political fortunes, rather than to attend to the business of the Assembly in the interests of either the United Kingdom or the EEC as a whole.
In any event, these matters are supposed to be decided, within the Westminster tradition, with a certain degree of flexibility. The usual channels — as the means of communication between the business managers are called — are designed essentially to prevent rigidity, to encourage compromise, and to avoid confrontation. They are not supposed to be mathematical or unflinching in their operations, and especially in a case like this they should have been able to act with a modicum of common decency. It is particularly to be regretted that the Conservative Party abandoned the Liberals in this crisis, for without the Liberals Mr Heath could never have hoped to get his EEC legislation through the House of Commons. Certainly, he depended on Labour deserters on the occasion of the overwhelming vote in favour of the principle of European entry; but in all the practical and detailed debates it was the steadfastness of the Liberals that gave him and his Chief Whip, Mr Francis Pym, most comfort. The Conservative Party remains a predominantly pro-European Party; its record of attachment to the EEC is as superior to that of the Labour Party as that of the Liberals is superior to either; and the Conservatives ought to have felt able to support Mr Thorpe against Mr Mellish.
What, after all, would it have mattered if the Labour delegation consisted of seventeen members instead of eighteen (assuming it was felt really necessary to conciliate the Nationalists?). Would it have mattered, indeed, if the Conservative delegation were reduced by one, in order to preserve the paltry numbers of the Liberals? It is the principle of the thing that matters, and on the principle, as well as on the record, the Liberals deserved more consideration from those who have proclaimed themselves desirous of making both the EEC and the Assembly work.
It is not, as I said at the beginning, a matter of whether Strasbourg is terribly important or not. Indeed, it is of little importance compared with either the Commission or the Council of, Ministers. But it may well prove to be a chrysalis of sorts, and there is a certain amount of fairly good work to be done there: the capacity of the Liberals, even when under-represented, to do that work was always self-evident; and they deserved better treatment because of the efforts they made.
There is, however, another more general and perhaps more important point here. The Liberals were — in the word I prefer to use — cheated of their natural rights by the reduction of their representation. And that cheating, , believe, took place not as the result of considered party policy on the part of either Conservatives or Socialists. It took place, rather, as part of the virtually automatic operation of a system of parliamentary management which is becoming increasingly blinkered and uncertain. The various public failures of British governments of both parties in recent years have become well known; and they have materially conspired to reduce both the faith of the public in politicians and the hope of the nation for the future. Still, all the evidence is that the British people still most enthusiastically believe in the virtues of their system of government, however fragile the human vessels called upon to administer it. If, at its very heart, the machine increasingly shows itself inflexible and thoughtless and blind to natural justice, the eventual damage to public confidence could — .though I doubt whether very many electors noticed the unfairness to the Liberal Party — be considerable.
This is especially so at a time when it looks as though the broadcasting of Parliament is going to become a permanent feature of proceedings. The radio broadcasts have been, by all accounts, unexpectedly successful, popular with the public and sufficiently competent to remove many of the doubts and fears hitherto felt about the whole experiment by members. If, as seems likely, the House of Commons decides to renew the experiment, the understanding of the operations of Parliament by the public will grow in sophistication. It is true that, for the moment, people have been content to listen to perfectly ordinary exchanges in the Chamber, and accept as satisfying fairly simple explanations of the reasons for particular procedures. But as the broadcasts continue, public questioning will become more critical, and it will not easily be satisfied by the kind of arcane reference which contents most MPs. Parliamentary procedures will not only have to be fair, they will have to be seen to be so.
The Liberals are less important, less innovative, and less popular than they like to think and pretend. But they have been, in the last few years, considerably more than a collection of political gadflies. I, and other critics, have often pointed to the confusion of their economic policies, and especially that curious mixture of libertarianism and authoritarianism which they favour. But they have been genuinely innovative; they have a following of some millions in the country; and they have worked exceptionally hard and consistently at what has been their foremost policy, that of British entry into Europe. As this new age now begins, following its dawn at the referendum, it is a paltry spirit indeed that denies to the Liberals a reasonable share of the opportunities that lie ahead, and even reduces that share which they now have.
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