Sir: One expects plain speaking from The Spectator, of which
The nerve of Mr Heath (September 15) was a telling example, Two related points in this perhaps call for special emphasis.
1. You may well "wonder why this Government's economic policies have been chopped and changed so much in what looked at the time like extremely nervous reactions to the econbmic and industrial situation." The latest U-turn on bank !endings and deposit interest rates is, of course, only the latest of such (previously styled pragmatic) reactions. Yet there are some policies to which the Government continues to cling with a quasi-fanatical obstinacy, notably its determination to phase out the regional employment premium, when not only has it done so much to put regional policy on the European map, but its head has gone out of his way to insist that " our precious resources of man and woman power " are still not being used to the full in
the interest of maximum and sustained growth. Happily, there is still time for further second thoughts — and, for a change, no "nervous reaction " — to prevail.
2. More generally, your warning that "a pound which, because of government policies, continues to depreciate in value should, at some time or other, cause even the most imperturbable of governments to change those policies " (my italics) is, if not a belated glimpse of the obvious, a timely reminder of the overriding (and continuing) importance of sound domestic policies, of whose shortcomings a depreciating pound, not least in terms of foreign currencies, is a measure and direct consequence. Besides, whatever difference of opinion there may be about the merits of the floating pound, there can be no denying what the International Monetary Fund (in its annual report) has just reaffirmed, that " exchange rates are intrinsically a matter of international concern " — something to which this Government, for all its apparent imperturbability, has not been consistently blind.
If nerve — or its opposite — is therefore no substitute for longheadedness, the latter — like charity — begins at home.
W. Grey 12 Arden Road, Finchley, London N3
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