Political Commentary
The Only Shepherd
By DAVID WATT Within two minutes of Sir Alec sitting down after his maiden speech to the Commons as Prime Minister, the Palace of Westminster was a hub- hub of discussion and speculation. 'I can't think why he gave up a fourteenth earldom for that ...', of course it was a very noisy House ...', '... batted pretty well, considering ...'. '... hit wicket, I should say, ha ha ...', impossible task ...', pathetic ...'. The heads wagged, the fob-chains heaved and all on the basis of a firm belief that it was (to borrow Mr. Wilson's vivid imagery) the man and not the ball that mattered.
Let us therefore look at the man for a moment, however frivolous this may appear to be. The Prime Minister's supporters were, I should judge, moderately well pleased. His speech was, as a maiden speech to a difficult audience, trans- parently a brave and honest effort; but as the speech of a new Prime Minister attempting to strike the bright image of his administration it was pretty awful—for it had neither the con- sistency, the fire nor the freshness that such an occasion demands. It demonstrated very efficiently what are likely to be Sir Alec's main strength and weaknesses in Parliament. He stood up well to Mr. Wilson in the hand-to-hand fighting and he put over two really simple points with great effect; on the other hand he meandered aimlessly amid the mazes of economic theory and statistics, he was caught out on one important home issue and his language never rose far above banality. He talks about 'modernisation' but he does not enthuse about it, and he mentions 'growth' with the air of a man who is thinking as much of sixty thousand acres in Scotland as that extra one per cent of national effort.
The question is whether, making all allowances for nerves (to which even earls are subject) and the novelty of the strange audience, this is good enough. There appeared to be two main schools of thought on the Tory back benches. One school believes that provided the Prime Minister is even barely adequate and workmanlike in the House of Commons all will be well. His chief asset, on this thesis, is his direct appeal to the country— Sir Alec only has to go on to the telly or the platform and spit enough simple sentiments through clenched -teeth and the great British • public will be convinced not only by his obvious honesty but also by the righteousness of his cause. Mr. Wilson and his friends may go on winning cheap debating victories in Parliament but the main battle will meanwhile be being lost outside. This was certainly the reasoning behind the remark of one enthusiastic Tory Member who said, 'Before. Alec came in it was 20-1 against us; now I think we have got a faint chance'.
The other hypothesis is more sobering: for its basis is that even in this radionic age, a Prime Minister cannot hope to make his way in the country without establishing his mastery over the House of Commons. A constant stream of mediocre performances at Westminster might alienate even a Conservative press and spread a disastrous sense of unease through the party; only a stream of excellent ones will really revivify the faithful and spur them to the necessary efforts.
Of course from the Conservative Members' point of view it does not matter much which of these theories is correct, for, to put it crudely, they are stuck .with Sir Alec either way and must make the best of him. The argument becomes much more interesting when it is transferred to the Labour side of the House because on the result depends much of the Opposition's strategy in the coming months. A good deal of lively dis- cussion' has gone on in the party behind the scenes during the last fortnight about the Home problem. There has been a fairly large and influential group of strategists, a rather bizarre alliance of left-wing and intellectual members, whose opinion is that the electorate has made up its mind to vote Labour anyhow. It follows that Sir Alec's performance inside the House or out is irrelevant and that it will only irritate the public if the party seems to be out to 'nail' the new man or create new difficulties for the legislative pro- gramme. Labour should gently press on with expounding its own policies—when necessary pausing to expose the Conservatives as frauds— and the approving ballot papers will fall like manna into its lap.
The opposing faction, mainly younger activists and old-time trade union militants, have been in favour of a rousing, rampaging onslaught on everything in sight. 'Would the Tories be well behaved if they were in our shoes?' they ask. They answer themselves, 'If the last days of the Attlee government are any guide there would be little finesse and even less scruple—there would be a crude war of nerves with every weapon from vulgar barracking to procedural obstruction thrown into the struggle.'
In the end, aftet some argument in the Shadow Cabinet meeting, a compromise solution was reached on the strength of a compromise argument which runs like this : The Con- servatives have only two cards left to play—Home and modernisation. Home (especially since he is backed by Mr. Selwyn Lloyd) is unlikely to set much of a pace in Parliament anyhow. Labour can't stop him doing quite well in the country, but he hasn't much time left for that. It follows that Labour may as well let Home alone and concentrate on the modernisation issue. If the Op- position can conveniently make a mess of the legislative programme in the House and render Selwyn Lloyd's life a misery by obstruction it should certainly do so, but the main thing is to expose by the fiercest possible arguments that the Tory modernisation schemes are ill-considered, bad value for money and above all the product of death-bed repentance.
There seems little doubt that on this programme the Opposition can make life very difficult for the Government since the volume of legislation pro- posed is enormous and the available parliament- ary time before the Budget in April is very short. It does, however, leave out of account the mega- ton weapon which Sir Alec himself apparently be- lieves is going to be the election winner—the British Bomb. Mr. Wilson and his senior col- leagues thought until lately that this issue was un- likely to get off the pad because in their view the man on the Clapham omnibus does not mind much whether Britain has the bomb or not. They are beginning to have unpleasant doubts—not so much because they have changed their minds about the public mood but because they can now foresee severe trouble within their own party. if the Conservative campaign is kept up Mr. Wilson may well be forced to define his policy with much greater precision and in that case we shall prob- ably see plainly what has been likely all the time— that a Labour government would not give up the British deterrent at all, and would only give up the theoretical independence in return for some tang- ible diplomatic advantage vis-a-vis America or Europe. This is a policy which Mr. Wilson could get away with if he were in office and conse- quently had the left in irons, but it is highly dubi- ous whether the extreme left even in its present mood of docility would stand for the policy which ran contrary to the sacred tablets of the CND.
A handful of Conservative back-benchers have serious doubts about the Prime Minister's nag- ging insistence that the possession of the bomb is the entry ticket to high international conferences, for they observe that nothing is more calculated to encourage the Germans to draw the unwelcome moral than this. However, they are a tiny min- ority and in present circumstances Sir Alec, what- ever may turn out to be his weaknesses, will have little trouble with his flock. He is the only shep- herd they have.
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