AT WESTMINSTER
THE slow development of the Persian drama has disabled the House of Commons for debating the question. Members could only wait and see whether Mr. Harriman, as • the welcome deus ex machina, can promote a satisfactory denoue- ment, and they willingly forfeited the debate arranged for Tuesday lest anything should be said which might prejudice his efforts. For lack of this debate the puzzle of the apparently differing attitudes of the Opposition leaders remains unresolved. Mr. Eden in his speech at Melrose on Saturday repeated his statement in the Commons' debate that evacuation would be disastrous, and went on to argue that now it would run counter to the injunction of the Hague Court. Consistently with this view, Mr. Eden appealed to Mr. Morrison on Monday to make it clear that the Government desires the staff of the Oil Company to stay. Mr. Morrison re-affirmed the Government's wish that the staff should stay " as long as practicable." There had been no qualification about as long as practicable in Mr. Eden's plea. Once again Mr. Churchill was a passive auditor of his second-in-command. Never before this Persian affair has Mr. Churchill exercised such restraint when Mr. Eden has been handling large questions in his presence. He has invariably lent him a hand.
* * * * His son-in-law, Mr. Duncan Sandys, has freely cross-examined Mr. Morrison and has seemed to approximate to Mr. Eden's position. He had nothing but welcome for Mr. Harriman's good offices, but he was at one with Mr. Eden that what the British Government is entitled to is American support, not mediation, and like Mr. Eden he was firm that nothing ought to be done in Persia that conflicts with the Hague Court's interim ruling that the company must continue to operate until the Court has heard the case. Mr. Sandys has shown' ability in questioning Mr. Morrison on this and the `Empire Roach' affair. He has at command a rather intimidating frown that somehow wins him an uninterrupted passage with the Government's supporters, which is what his father-in-law rarely obtains.
* * * * The hammering that One Way Only has received for its muddled thinking and its wrappings of Bevanesque tushery must have been music to Mr. Morrison ploughing his troubled Foreign Office furrow. He is the head and front of the opposition to Mr. Bevan in the Labour Party, for Mr. Attlee, though he may pounce some day on the late Minister of Labour, has been content to be a largely silent backer of the Foreign Secretary in the contest with the member for Ebbw Vale. Notwithstanding the whipping the pamphlet has had, Labour critics of Mr. Bevan do not conceal that it may have its seductions for some who like to think there is a primrose path to security and peace.
* * * * Mr. Bevan disappeared from the Chamber while the pamphlet was in gestation and again he has become a rare visitant. His great companions are generally present—Mr. Michael Foot, pale with contemplation of the arrested Socialist revolution, and Mr. Mikardo, who is at least a humourist. The Bevanites must find it as difficult as other people to keep pace with the gyrations of another member of the coterie, Mr. Crossman. The unearthing of the article he wrote for the January-March Political Quarterly extolling western defence plans in almost an ecstasy of enthu- siasm is the jest of the week.
* * * Entirely wanting in the meekness proper to a Labour Minister who comes out of the topmost drawer, Lord Pakenham took it upon himself to sit on. Mr. Bevan in the Lords on Tuesday, though it is true he did not mention him by name. Hearken unto him. It is the " height of folly " to conclude that our rearmament programme is greater than we need or can carry. It is " grossly misleading " to suggest that the programme must destroy the Welfare State or lead to the slashing of the social' services ; and it is " simple defeatism " to talk in general about the awful consequences of rearmament. Lord Pakenham must expect to hear about this from the bottom drawer. H. B.
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