DIARY
JOHN MORTIMER
he Labour Party's dinner dance, at the Park Lane Hotel last weekend, a hugely enjoyable occasion for those of us who attended it, produced predictable media reactions from the wearier Tory hacks, who didn't. What's the reasoning behind these criticisms? That Labour supporters are meant to give all to the poor and not have fund-raising dinners; but that Tory support- ers, who apparently don't give a damn about the poor, can have as many such bashes as they like? Or is it that Tories only feel safe while all socialists are wearing bobble hats and anoraks and eating muesli? No one raises an eyebrow when the Ameri- can Democrats have thousand-dollar-a- plate dinners. The only perceptible differ- ence is that Labour appears likely to win the next election, which no doubt accounts for all the fuss.
0 ne of the more alarming words in use today is 'care', and the wariest eyes have to be kept on the 'caring professions'. It's almost impossible to understand how these 'carers' could have participated in dawn raids in which children are snatched from their homes, their parents and their toys, let alone the cruelties which apparently oc- cur once they are taken into 'care'. I was talking, this week, to a lawyer from the north of England where the caring infec- tion is rife. One little boy who liked to get into bed with his mother and cuddle her was indicted for 'inappropriate sexual be- haviour'. Another who drew a picture of a witch with her broomstick up her behind, not a particularly tasteful joke perhaps, was charged with an even more serious offence. Such offenders are deprived of their liberty, without the benefit of trial by jury and, no doubt, sent off to be bathed, and have all their personal possessions removed and placed in solitary confinement in a way appropriate to such terrorists.
It's hard to resist the conclusion that many of those responsible for these injus- tices take up `caring' because of some deep insufficiency in their own characters. From the statements they make when the facts come to light it's clear that they have no conception of the harm they do. They may also be blinded by the meaningless and arcane language they use. `A client in need of residential services' is a descripton of a child locked up and stripped half naked in a children's home. Such clients would no doubt welcome a little healthy neglect. What is needed is another Dickens to do for the caring professions what he did for the deeply concerned Mr Wackford Squeers. He would not have been deterred by the health minister begging him not to
be beastly to those who ran Yorkshire schools because theirs was a tough job and all they needed was a little training.
We have just finished filming a story I wrote about the Oxfordshire countryside and, during such an exercise, fact and fic- tion continually merge. We staged a demonstration against a fictional new town with actors carrying placards with `Save Our Valley' written on them. A number of motorists stopped their cars, got out and asked to join the demonstration, or at least sign the petition. We put up a property telephone kiosk outside the church and people queued up to make calls. In Henley a concerned citizen warned me to move my car because there was a warden coming down the street. There was; she was an extra and we had brought her with us. Now the filming has finished and real life can continue in all its improbability.
Agood old-fashioned religious contro- versy would be extremely welcome; far more so than arguments about a common European currency which seem to provoke strong feeling among Tory MPs and practi- cally no one else. But Bernard Levin's attack on Andrew Wilson seems somewhat ill-judged. Mr Wilson ventured to point out that fundamentalism, Christian or Muslim, has produced such hatred and mayhem in the world that perhaps we are better off without an irrational faith whilst retaining 'Would you like a doggy bag?' our undying respect for Christian ethics, the Christian civilisation of which we are a part, and our love for the Bible and much of its teaching. Mr Wilson apparently intends to publish a life of Christ next year, Mr Levin has written a scornful and prema- ture review of this work, perhaps founding a tradition which may add greatly to the terrors of authorship. Mr Wilson, it also appears, may speculate as to whether Jesus was married. Bishop Montefiore, no less, wondered whether he might have been a non-active homosexual. I don't remember Mr Levin attacking the Bishop, though he may well have done so, but Hugh Monte- fiore was not depicted in a cartoon in the Times carrying a huge pound sign as though it were a cross to Calvary. The position of anyone still devoted to Christian morality who cannot believe in miracles, and Mr Levin himself calls the resurrection a 'metaphor', is one I share. Indeed it's diffi- cult to discover, in an article which reads at times like the Revd Ian Paisley on a good day, what Mr Levin's own beliefs are. I can remember when his religious views seemed influenced by the magic of the East. Now he says, `For the fourteen-thousandth time I am not a Christian, partly because I do not think myself worthy to be one.' He should take courage. One of the great virtues of the Christian Church is that it has received even the most unworthy into its arms.
Some whimsical joker on the Sunday Telegraph has suggested that I might be dumped on the Woolsack during the forth- coming Labour government. I can imagine no worse fate. Lord Hailsham, who showed, on that uncomfortable seat, every sign of terminal boredom, told me he kept awake by muttering 'Bollocks!' to the bench of Bishops. I am far too fond of those gentle and well meaning creatures for even this diversion to be open to me.
Lif e is full of marvellous stories. The following account was given to me, during a local dinner party, of how a neighbour came to break her arm. Her husband came home drunk one night and fell asleep at the foot of the stairs. The two sons came home later, found their father sleeping, went to the refrigerator from which they extracted a turkey's giblets, unzipped their father's fly and inserted these pieces of offal. The unfortunate mother awoke and came out onto the landing to see the cat apparently eating her husband's private parts. She was so appalled that she fell down the stairs. Yes, life is full of marvellous stories, but if you put them in a book no one would believe them.
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