VOTES OF CONFIDENCE?
From Smethwick, With Love
By ALAN WATKINS
WHEN he was visiting Cambridge some years ago, Mr. Patrick Gordon Walker was asked by an undergraduate what he thought of the idea of turning Trinity into a mixed college. It was pointed out to him that Whewell Court, being separate from the main buildings. could con- veniently be converted into a women's annexe. Mr. Gordon Walker thought for a moment and then replied. 'That,' he said, 'would give rise to the most grave disciplinary problems.' This ex- change of views on women's education lasted only a minute or so. Too much should not perhaps be deduced from it. And yet it was surely revealing of some sides to Mr. Gordon Walker's character. It showed, first, his intense earnestness: for to a question that was put half-seriously Mr. Gordon Walker answered with all the deliberation of a former Christ Church don and a future Foreign Secretary. It showed, again, his concern with questions of order and propriety. And it showed his fundamental conservatism.
These qualities, whether found singly or to- gether. are, one might imagine, perfectly appro- priate to a senior Labour politician. Even a cer- tain conservatism is not wholly out of place (think, for instance, of Lord Morrison of Lam- beth or Sir Frank Soskice). Yet in the case of Mr. Gordon Walker those qualities of con- servatism and high seriousness do not pro- duce quite the effect they should. It is difficult to compare him to, say, Gladstone, even though Gladstone might equally well have de- livered himself of the observation on mixed colleges. Mr. Gordon Walker is not a towering moral pillar in British politics. But why not? Why is it that, on the contrary, this decent, serious, civilised man so frequently meets with dislike and even open hostility? It is something of a mystery. And we may find some clues by observ- ing Mr. Gordon Walker's progress in the Leyton by-election.
It is a most curious by-election, and Leyton is a most curious, place. Though it is only a few stops from Liverpool Street on the central line, it seems to be part of East Anglia. The clouds scud across a vast East Anglian sky. under which run rows and rows of grey, Edwardian houses, with an occasional chapel to enliven the scene. It is to these grey streets that Mr. Gordon Walker goes at 10.30 each morning, accompanied by a loudspeaker van, hordes of 'middle-aged women party workers, the Reverend Reginald Sorensen in a beret, and a Foreign Office detective in a Gannex. mackintosh. Ctrs better than working in the office,' said the detective.) 'Good morning: booms the loudspeaker, 'this is Patrick Gordon Walker, the Labour candi- date.. . . I will devote my time to looking-after the borough in its many different aspects... I will also play my full part in the Labour cabinet.... I'll be coming along the road in a moment and will be very happy to have a word with anyone.' And it is at this stage of the ritual that the heart bleeds for Mr. Gordon Walker. He is simply not good at making contact with people. The whole business of apprehending complete strangers and inquiring after their health, work and families is clearly distasteful to him. He would much rather be composing a stern note to Indonesia. To be fair to Mr. Gordon Walker, he tries hard; so hard, indeed, that when I was quietly getting out of the back seat of the car parked immediately behind his modest Wolseley, I was amazed to be greeted with an outstretched hand and a deep-voiced 'Good morning. Nice to meet you.' What had happened? Was Mr. Gordon Walker an un- expected reinforcement to that small band of admirers of this column? Not so. Mr. Gordon Walker had mistaken me for an elector of Layton.
However, to return to the content of Mr. Gor- don Walker's loudspeaker message, two points may be noted. First, he is at great pains to emphasise that he has the interests of Leyton at heart: it is obvious that he wishes to dispose of the idea that he lost Smethwick because he was an indifferent constituency MP. Second, neither in the loudspeaker messages I heard nor at the meeting 1 attended was there any mention of colour by Mr. Gordon Walker.
It is very difficult indeed to say whether he is right to exclude the question. On the one hand, it is absurd for anyone to suggest that there is a colour problem in Leyton. The immigrant population is scattered throughout the borough, and has caused no resentment whatever. Both the Liberal candidate, Mr. Alistair Mackay. and the Conservative, Mr. Ronald Buxton. agree on this: and the slightly supercilious Mr. Buxton— a veritable Peter Wimsey among structural engineers--- has given instructions that immigra- tion is not to be brought up by Conservative canvassers. But, on the other hand, though colour may not be a real issue, it is a meta-issue. It is something that has been put in people's minds by the mere fact of Mr. Gordon Walker's candidature. And the egregious Mr. Colin Jordan (who has been encouraged in his activities by certain sections of the press) has inevitably moved in with his louts.
One odd result of Mr. Jordan's antics. and Mr. Gordon Walker's silence, is that the Foreign Secretary is acquiring a quite undeserved reputation for extreme liberalism where questions of colour are concerned. (Remember Seretse Khama?) In Leyton. however, this may well work to Mr. Gordon Walker's advantage. Leyton, it should be remembered, is not only part of Essex but also next door to the East End, which is used to immigration and is not well- disposed to characters like Mr. Jordan. If Mr. Jordan accomplishes anything, it will be to mobilise the Labour vote.
But this will be a party vote and not one for Mr. Gordon Walker. His great difficulty is in getting through to people. His problem is the problem of communication. Perhaps through shy- ness, perhaps through honesty, Mr. Gordon Walker finds it hard to identify himself, or to appear to identify himself (as Mr. Harold Mac- millan did), with the aspirations of ordinary mortals. And he has the same difficulty inside the Labour Party itself. At Monday night's meeting, for example—a meeting largely attended by Labour Party supporters—Mr. Gordon Walker said that as Foreign Secretary 'my aim is first of all to increase Britain's influence in the world.' The quotation might have come straight from . Canning. It probably did. As a statement of the traditional Foreign Office position it could hardly have been bettered. But it was not what local Labour supporters wanted to hear from their Foreign Secretary. 'All men are brothers,' George Lansbury used to say, over and over again, in his high-pitched London voice; and people loved him. Mr. Gordon Walker would shrink from such generalities.
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