QUESTION TIME
N0 sooner had Parliament turned its back three months ago than the wild world was on its horse and gallop- ing off in all directions. Modesty must prevent members from showing open irritation at such inconsiderate behaviour. But irritation is nevertheless what a great many must be feeling now that the long recess is over and they are back at Westminster, peering dutifully through the clpuds of dust to see what is going on, and why. Perhaps there was indeed a time, as some still maintain, when international affairs seemed to present a single coherent pattern at any given moment. Now everything happens at once. There was a time, they say, when it was good plain Hogarth. Now it is Boccioni and Marinetti. Crisis is the normal condition. Small wonder that after ten confusing weeks M.P.s should be bursting with questions and clamorous for the Government to tell all, like the players. In the few remaining days of the present session there is the tail-end of the legislative progranime to be dis- posed of, but it is not this which will keep the air humming at Westminster until the new session and the fresh domestic controversies which are likely to be foreshadowed in the Queen's Speech.
There was the warmest of welcomes for Sir Winston and Mr. Eden on Tuesday and a general sense of relief, by no means confined to the Conservative Party, to see them restored to health and duty. Parliament itself is healthier than it was before the recess. The Opposition has pulled itself together and to sonic extent composed or concealed its internal differ- ences: now it looks a little more effectively like an alternative Government than it did before Margate. The Government also has benefited from the tonic airs of Thanet, and it would be foolish to pay too much attention to the public opinion polls which put the ConservatiVes' popularity well below that of Labour. It is inevitable for the glass to be low at this middle stage in a Government's life. It may well go lower still as a result of the next session's programme, but a register of immediate irritation is not to be taken as an indication of how the country would act if it came to voting. In any event, Sir Winston has denied the likelihood of an early elec- tion (and suggested a little less strongly that there will not be one next year either) and promised his own continuing service. For how long no one can tell; but if he is not forced from office by ill-health Sir Winston is sure to remain in Downing Street so long as there remains a chance of his influ- encing events in the direction of genuine peace. Certainly he must put off many of the burdens which he carried uncom- plainingly before his illness, but Mr. Eden may be better able than one had thought to bear more than his fair share. His defence on Tuesday of the decision to withdraw from Trieste may not haVe been convincing, but in the performance of it there was nothing weak. The prestige of the other principal Ministers is so far undiminished and Mr. Butler's budget is producing the effect intended. His speech at the Mansion House last week was cautious enough—he had us " steering a fairly even course at present between the primrose path and the waste land "—but the facts are that industrial pro- duction is up and that thanks to the policy of cautious libera- tion the country is moving out of the economic doldrums in which it lay becalmed in 1952. Another delicately balanced dose of freedom would seem to be due soon if industrial production is to rise from 3 per cent. to 6 per cent. and more above the level of 1951. But on the whole, one must conclude at this stage, the Government and the country are in a relatively strong position to take the shocks that are coming to them. - lt is in the troubled field of foreign and • imperial affairs that the weaknesses will be probed during the remainder of the session. British Guiana is first on the list for discussion, and up to the time of writing (the debate will be in progress when this is in print) the Opposition has displayed a com- mendable restraint in spite of consciences automatically troubled by any action which savours of the old gunboat diplomacy. There are the usual exceptions, of course, on the Bevanite flank, but cooler heads must be persuaded by the White Paper that the ex-Ministers of British Guiana had made the operation of the Constitution impossible and by their policy had forced that drastic action of which they now dis- ingenuously complain. The White Paper may not offer finally convincing proof that the P.P.P. was on the point of settin up a Communist regime, and in other respects also the Oppo. sition may ask for more specific evidence; but it does show beyond doubt that the danger was acute and growing more so? There is a point where a democracy is obliged, to_ preserve democracy, to act " undemocratically "—and that point wa$ well and truly reached in British Guiana. Except to emotion- alists whose cheer is always " Up the rebels, right or wrong," and those who push liberalism to the suicidal extreme where liberalism is destroyed, it is clear that the Government's case is a strong one.
On other ground the Government stands less firmly. In his statement on foreign affairs on Tuesday the Foreign Secretary defended the Trieste decision as best he could, likening the desperate remedy to the lancing of an abscess—an operatioii which Mr. Attlee rightly said is not exactly sedative if the patient has been given no warning. Mr. Eden was obviously not altogether happy in his work, and try as he might he could not but give the impression that it was someone else's decision he was defending. But more will be heard of this in the foreign affairs debate next week. Meanwhile the armed forces of Italy and Yugoslavia, in ever increasing numbers, .glower angrily at each other across the frontiers, and news from the spot suggests that fighting could break out at any moment and carry the two powers into extended conflict. The best that can be said, in Mr. Eden's unhappy metaphor, is not that the abscess has been lanced but rather that it has been brought' to a head—and in the most painful possible way. For the rest, matters of more general import must wait until next week. Sir Winston contented himself with saying that he hoped Mr. Molotov would accept the invitation to Lugano, and on the question of the long proposed Heads-of-State meeting he stuck to his guns and reaffirmed his belief that such conversations might do good and cannot easily do much harm. Beyond this he refused adroitly and nimbly to be drawn. With equal and admirable agility he presented the Government's second thoughts on the restoration of the university seats—an adverse decision whkih delighted the Opposition and saddened some members of independent mind.
Controversy looms in home affairs. There have been hints enough lately that the Government is ready to tackle the rents muddle, and it is certain that the Queen's Speech will officially confirm them. Meanwhile Mr. Harold Macmillan is not to be drawn. However subtle the measure to increase rents, however elaborate the checks to ensure that nobody makes a penny profit out of it,' it is bound to cause an uproar. There will be heated words, on the question of capital punishment generally (thee Liberals are to ask for the suspension of the death penalty until the Royal Commission's report has been fully examined and discussed), and Mr. Bing and others are preparing another assault on the Home Secretary regarding the Evans case. Members may look forward in the new session to a renewal of the competitive television argument. But another domestic difficulty for the Government is -very hutch nearer. The third of the priorities listed by Mr. Butler in his Mansion House speech was agriculture. " Let the farmers have confidence that we need their efforts and their Output," he said, " and let them work out their future with us." Well and good, but this is a department where the passage from controls to freedom is sure to tell against the Govern- ment whether it appease the farmers. (so offending the con- sumers and giving the Opposition a powerful weapon) or offend the farmers (so risking the loss of a considerable section of support). There is a likeness here on a smaller scale of the difficulties which face the Republican Adminis- tration of the United States. One way and another Parliament is sure to have plenty on its hands.
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