15 JULY 1972, Page 25

'A Conservative"?

Sir: Who is this person (" a Conservative," The Spectator, July 8) Who writes that Mr Heath is " not a natural Conservative," " made a Compact" with the Conservative Party and has now " betrayed" it?

I could see what he meant if he had mentioned Ulster, though in that case he might have thought twice about writing in The Spectator. But does he doubt that Mr Heath is a distinctive Conservative (in a late twentieth century idiom) and that whatever Position either occupies in Whatever regime should happen to occur, he and Mr Powell are the Conservative .Party's two natural guides to the coming decade.

Maurice Cowling Peterhouse, Cambridge