The flawed nobili of Heath at bay
There is a kind of nobility about the prospect of himself the Prime Minister demonstrates. Man to himself is always a large prospect, and when a man is a ruler then the prospect of himself Which he puts forward to his subjects will seldom be other than ample. There have, however, been many occasions during the past four years or so when the prospect of himself which Mr Heath has put forward to the rest of us has seemed tight, constricted, hemmed in, gangliated and altogether lacking warmth and amplitude. In his speech to the rally which closed last week's Conservative Party conference at Blackpool, little warmth, Whether of affection or anger, was shown; but the Prime Minister did seek, not without success, to show to us the breadth of his concerns, the extent of his ambitions and hopes, and thereby his OW n stature. It is no mean stature. It could become heroic — it could, as easily, and with rather more likelihood, become tragic and the stance which accompanies it is in its way noble. The image Mr Heath recalls is that of the stag at bay, and as sucti Sympathy and respect are alike demanded, and readily given. rhis sympathy and respect will not, however, sensibly dissuade us from giving consideration to the content of what he said, for the content can be just as important as the stance. We realise and happily acknowledge the courage with which the Prime Minister confronts his situation and grapples with the nation's Problems. But courage is not enough. With what sense and sensibility does Mr Heath perform his duties? How, his courage apart, did he address himself to the Conservative Party as its Leader and to the country as its Prime Minister at the conclusion of what was more than once described as possibly the last party conference before the next general election? How does he measure up? Is his justification of himself and his policies sound?
In one extremely difficult matter the Prime Minister has displayed courage and sense and sensibility. His policy on Northern Ireland has been most soundly based — and most soundly executed by Mr Whitelaw. The Government was right to get rid of Stormont, despite the grave affront that action was and is to many loyal members of the Unionist Party. It is also right to keep reserve Powers in Westminster's hands while attempting to force Ulster Politicians to arrive at an agreed coalition government for the Province. It may be that this attempt will fail, in which case direct rule as it is now exercised will have to continue indefinitely. Mr Heath and his colleagues were also right to introduce the notion of an 'Irish dimension ' into official British thinking on an eventual solution to the problems of Northern Ireland. In particular, the Prime Minister was fully entitled to call attention to his visit to the Irish Republic last month — " the first official visit by a British Prime Minister and the first talks the Prime Minister has had in the Irish Republic in Dublin since the Free State was set up more than fifty years ago." As Mr Heath said, it was high time such a visit was made and he was absolutely right "to take the risks Which were involved, political or otherwise, in the hope of reconciliation between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland." That reconciliation, which will require further great constitutional changes in north and south, must remain the long:term objective of British policy; and it is immensely to the credit of Mr Heath and his administration that they realise this and accept that the road on the way will be hard and long, and that there are no swift solutions which would not be far bloodier than the present slog. There is a general field in which the Prime Minister's touch has also been both sure and firm, and that is the field of foreign and commonwealth relations. Here Mr Heath has had the good fortune to have had Sir Alec Douglas-Home in the Foreign Office throughout his administration. It is a pity that neither Mr Heath nor Sir Alec responded with any generosity to Dr Kissinger's and President Kennedy's notion of a new Atlantic charter '; and some will think that it took Britain and the Soviet Union rather longer than necessary to resume straightforward relations following the expulsion of a couple of busloads of Soviet agents. But in general British foreign policy for the past three years has been both modest and sound. And as for the Commonwealth, the result of the ill-tempered Singapore conference of Commonwealth prime ministers, where Mr Heath did well to show his teeth without once smiling, was two years later the well-tempered Ottawa conference. Mr Heath can take great credit for having knocked much sense into the Commonwealth and having thereby given it new credibility and new life.
The record of Mr Heath and his administration in the general domestic field of welfare is also creditable. Sir Keith Joseph may be one of the less publicised of ministers, but he is one of the most powerful and successful. The Prime Minister's claim that on pensions and " right across the field of social services " the Government has either kept or exceeded its election pledges is broadly justified, as is his boast that this Conservative administration has done better than its Socialist predecessor. It is true that so it should have done — after all, during a period of inflationary growth, revenues from taxation make it particularly easy to be pretty generous towards the recipients of welfare. Nevertheless, provided Sir Keith can contrive a system for keeping the costs of the National Health Service within acceptable bounds without at the same time destroying the confidence of the medical and ancillary staff who work it, the Government looks like being able to look back upon a good and generous record. A question mark hangs over education — the raising of the school-leaving age was a very foolish step which will undoubtedly be regretted and should be reversed. But if Mrs Thatcher is able to stop the slide towards illiteracy then her venial errors will be forgiven her and she may even be able to outlive the splendid folly of stopping the supply of free milk to children the milk may well have been bad for.
The Spectator has frequently applauded the Government's decisiori to float the pound, while criticising the abdication of its 'lame-duck' policy and regretting the spendthrift way it has increased the money supply. We do not doubt that the principal cause of inflation is that the Government is overspending, and we are not impressed by the Government's argument that inflation is out of its control because it was due first to union wage demands (in the first two years of office) and to overseas commodity prices (in the present year). The Government's economic policy remains a great gamble, and a reckless gamble. We hope it succeeds, but only because all of us are in the same boat as Mr Heath and his colleagues. If they were in a different boat from us, then we would hope the gamble would fail, so that the Government would then have to learn how to swim, or otherwise sink.
This leaves us with our principal criticism: the European policy. Mr Heath last Saturday spent much time and some eloquence on this. He talked much rubbish: witness his assertion that at a meeting of foreign ministers in Copenhagen last month, presumably by some miraculous sea-change, Britain, France, Germany and Italy and our other partners were able "to' agree on a common European identity" and to work out a common European policy towards the United States." This is an ignorant assertion; and indeed ignorance is what chiefly characterises Mr Heath's European notions — ignorance of history, of geography, of this country and its traditions and institutions and nature. " We are," said Mr Heath twice during his speech, "an island race." Yet, in his overwhelming ambition he seeks to change this: he seeks to make us no longer an island and no longer the race we have become. It is a vast and terrible ambition, beside which all his other ambitions must be judged. It is an ambition which, whether he fulfils it or not, must vitiate all others. This ambition flaws his nobility, and in the weighing of him counts most heavily in the scales against the many achievements of his administration and strengths of his character. 'It will also cause the country, in the event of his economic growth succeeding, still to doubt whether to trust him with another term of power, and in the event of the growth failing, to reject him utterly.
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