SPECTATOR'S NOTEBOOK

J. W. M. THOMPSON

The new national library alongside the British Museum should be built and in use in not more than ten years' time, according to

Sir John Wolfenden, the director of the BM.

It is, one might think, an optimistic view, bearing in mind the deplorable history of the

enterprise so far. The site is not yet com- pletely acquired, the building is not yet de- signed, the national library authority which is to control it is not yet in being—altogether, the hurdles still to be surmounted before the national library catches up with current needs are Innumerable. It has taken more than two years, after all, to reverse the Government's 'irrevocable' decision not to build on this Bloomsbury site (which had in fact been earmarked for the purpose as far back as 1947). Even Sir John, I gather, although naturally well pleased with the latest turn of events, has warned a private meeting of senior am men that the reversal of the decision about the Bloomsbury site was only 'the end of the beginning'. The real struggle ib still to come.

Nevertheless, this change of mind does indeed represent, as the Museum trustees claimed, a victory for common sense. An immense amount of high-level lobbying lies behind it, as witness the fact that the Dainton committee, although instructed to review the library problem in general but to disregard the Bloomsbury site, nevertheless exerted formidable pressure in favour of that for- bidden area. I agree with a political friend who describes the affair as a good illustra- tion of the value of Cabinet reshuffles. When- ever ministers are shunted around from job to job, one always hears comments on the apparent futility of such swopping of port- folios. But it is impossible to believe that Mr Gordon Walker, who was responsible for the 1967 blunder, could have brought him- self to eat his words so humiliatingly if he were still at Education; with another man in his place, the process was easier.

I seem to remember that 1967 was a vint- age year for such decisions, for while Mr Gordon Walker was consigning to the dust- bin twenty years of British Museum plan- ning, Mr Douglas Jay was announcing the Government's fixed and unalterable deter- mination to build London's third airport at Stansted. And that was another case where the dropping of a minister eased the way to the dropping of a bad plan.

Publish and be blessed

In the long run, at least, the British Museum's problems look like being solved; but in the long run, as has been observed, we are all dead. For quite a few years to come, the BM is clearly going to fall well below proper standards through simple lack of space and resources; it will only mildly console the frustrated scholar to know that a decade hence things will be decidedly brighter. Of more immediate solace is a plan I hear of to provide about 150 extra seats for readers— not in the already packed Reading Room itself, but in various nooks and crannies about the place. There are also hopes of providing a decent restaurant before long.

But it's not only the scholar who is in- adequately served by the BM at present. Its failure also to meet all the needs of the general public is, I have long thought, exemplified by the publications department. This, by all modern ideas of museum man-

agetnent, ought to be making available a great quantity of material—reproductions and facsimiles of pictures and documents and so on. In fact, it deals almost wholly in postcards: a great opportunity missed.

I said as much to Sir John Wolfenden the other day and was pleased to find him in full agreement. He holds very strongly the view that 'publication', in the widest sense, is a chief duty of a modern museum. The block- ing of the expansion of this activity into what it should be—'something between a university press and a fine art publisher', says Sir John—is a sad tale of administra- tive impediments; under existing practice, if the BM expands here it must contract else- where (which it clearly can't afford to do)— even though there is probably a large income to be gained from such expansion. But I dare say it won't be long before some way out of this impasse is found. The am lobby is feel-, ing rather muscular at the moment.

All quiet

Where I live, the county council election came and went without any visible signs whatsoever: no election papers through the post, no canvassing, no posters, no meetings, nothing. A subtantial part of the population, I am sure, hadn't the slightest idea that they were, in theory, involved in an electoral pro- cess. The polling showed a slight swing to the Conservatives; but in such conditions of widespread indifference or ignorance the meaning of any result in terms of general election prospects seems highly dubious.

I think one could argue that every elector ought to receive an official notification of the polling date, and possibly of the candi- dates' names also. But I see that in the inquest on these county elections, there is a tendency with some voters to blame the political parties for not doing more to arouse the electorate: a curious example of the 'them' and `us' attitude. Surely if voters think 'the parties' ought to be more active it's their duty to join them and activate them, not to grumble in the manner of school-children complaining of an indolent master?

Misconceptions often arise because there is so much loose talk about 'party machines': these allegedly formidable entities are gener- ally speaking both amateurish and inade- quate. Even so, in London they were enough to dish the brave band of independents cru- sading under the slogan 'Homes Before Roads'—a great pity, not only because they seemed to be speaking with the voice of sanity but also because this kind of non- party uprising against conventional dreari- ness offers the best hope of reinvigorating the local political scene.

The politesse of politics

(From Hansard, 7 April) Sir W. Bromley-Davenport: When have I raised a point of order that was not a point of order, you great ugly brute?

Mr. Speaker: Order. I must remind the hon. and gallant Gentleman that I am neither great nor ugly.

Sir W. Bromley-Davenport: I apologise, Mr Speaker, if that was thought to be a reflec- tion on the Chair. But we look at these animals on the other side of the House day in and day out ...