The Spectator Notes
CHARLES MOORE bviously Ruth Kelly is a 'hypocrite', but the hypocrites in her party are more admirable than the consistent ones. At least the former show some human feeling. There must be Labour ministers who know that their children would be better off in a private school, can afford to send them there, and still don't, because of their careers and their opinions. That really is disgusting. It will be interesting to see whether young Leo Blair finds his way into a private school once his father leaves office. Miss Kelly pleads her son's 'special needs'. In this area, Labour is truly hoist with its own petard. It has been the slave to a doctrine — the classroom equivalent of 'care in the community' for the mentally ill — which says that all children benefit from being among normal children, and so it has closed special needs schools. The truth is that some children with special needs — most notably those with autism — are positively damaged by going to ordinary schools. And in all schools it is hard to find time, energy and teachers to deal with special and normal needs at once. Miss Kelly seems to have found this out the hard way, and acted against her government's policy and in favour of her son. This process ought to give Labour politicians pause. What Ruth Kelly is doing is what every parent would hope to be able to do — thinking about her child's special needs (and there is a sense in which every child's needs are special) and choosing what is best for him How many more generations have to be wasted before it is accepted by all parties that this choice should be a source of pride, not shame?
Afriend who wants to get his children into a well-known public school cheaply heard that it has a custom known as Founder's Kin. If you can prove that your son is related to the mediaeval worthy who set up the place, you can get money off the fees, several old boys of the school assured him As his wife is Founder's Kin, my friend was excited. He rang up the bursar's office and explained. The secretary asked him to hold, and returned after a couple of minutes. 'I have spoken to the bursar,' she said, 'and he tells me that there used to be such a custom, but I'm afraid the practice was abandoned several centuries ago.'
When Tony Lambton died at the turn of the year, his daughter Isabella remembered how painful the press stories about his resignation had been for her as a young girl, and wanted to avoid a repetition for her own children. Because one of her sons was away staying with a schoolfriend, she rang the friend's parents and asked them to shield her boy from anything nasty about her father in the next day's papers. Later, she realised that she had not told the parents who her father was. The morning papers were full of obituaries of Saddam Hussein. She rang up the parents to apologise for not making things clear. 'I did ask my husband,' said the schoolfriend's mother, 'whether Saddam Hussein could possibly have been your father, but we thought probably not, because of that silly moustache.' Tony Lambton would have enjoyed being almost mistaken for the monster of Baghdad.
It is interesting that opposition parties are almost always more Green than governing ones. The reason lies in the difference between general aspiration and direct effect on oneself. With everything Green, distance lends enchantment to the view. We disapprove of American gas-guzzling cars and Chinese coal-fired power stations. But when we actually get Green legislation, we find it bureaucratic and oppressive. The collection of domestic rubbish, for example, the one thing which we pay for in our council tax which directly benefits us, is becoming more fraught. The separation of paper and other material for recycling has become an excuse for less frequent collection and transferring more work to the taxpayer. Now comes the suggestion that we should all pay for our rubbish collection according to the amount we use. In principle, this is sensible, but in practice it will not mean that our council taxes are correspondingly reduced, so there will be a revolt. The great paradox of Greenery is that you tend to be a big, rich consumer before you embrace it. For the poor, it often seems an unaffordable luxury. It is therefore much more unpopular than it appears. Cameronite Conservative politicians now jostle to get the poshest Green car and other badges of environmental friendliness. For the present this helps the Tories in the opinion polls, but if they achieve office, these 'How Green is Your Valet?' competitions won't work.
SORS, the Sexual Orientation Regulations (Northern Ireland), which were hotly debated in the House of Lords — if anything can be said to be hotly debated in that Chamber — this week, are based on the principle that what is legal should not be discriminated against. Thus, because homosexual acts between adults are permitted, it will be an offence for a bedand-breakfast in, say, Ballymena, to refuse a double bed to a gay couple. That sounds only fair, but is it? The fact that the law allows something should not automatically mean that we all have to permit it ourselves, even when offering a service to the public. Take drinking. It is legal to buy alcohol over the age of 18, but is there anything wrong, morally or legally, with a temperance hotel? Indeed, except in insanely restrictive societies like Saudi Arabia, the difference between legality and social approval almost always applies in sexual matters. Adultery and premarital sex are not forbidden by law, but are disapproved of by churches etc. How far, I wonder, do the SORS extend in the sexual orientation to which they give rights? If you turn up in Donaghadee and demand that your orientation towards three-in-a-bed sex be catered for, where does the law stand?
Since this column last referred to the subject, I have had an even more threatening letter from TV Licensing. Our London flat does not contain a television, and this is something that TV Licensing does not seem to think possible, so it keeps on accusing us of evasion. The latest letter, from a John Hales, says, 'We have caught 519 evaders in your area in the last three months alone' and warns that the flat will shortly be visited by the London Enforcement Team. There is a 'very real chance' that we shall be taken to court. I refuse to reply to any of these letters, but just sit and wait.
T feel it is time to update various children's 1 books for the internet age. I suggest Five Children and IT, Swallows and Amazon and Thomas the Search Engine.
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