Power to the people
Rhodes Boys on
The Protest Virus Peter Evans (Pitman E2.50) There has never been a completely settled time when men lazed contentedly on beaches and youth foreswore revolt. There are, however, times when discontent seems to multiply to a point where it threatens the social fabric, and a country ignores such tides at its peril. There certainly is in Britain widespread disillusion with politics and the values of our society and a desperate search for identity. Majorities and minorities both feel neglected and when they also feel threatened their actions can be irrational, unpleasant and dangerous.
Peter Evans does not subscribe to the 'conspiracy theory' about the present age of protest and I would agree with him. Politically-motivated men simply thrive at a time of doubt and lack of confidence. The book tries to discover the basic reasons which prepare the field for protest in its various forms. It documents thoroughly the view that those are the erosion of identity, and the ignoring of the instincts and wishes of individual people. It is a formidable case.
The Common Market threatens English nationalism while the Council bulldozer has destroyed millions of homes and hundreds of genuine communities with their social cornershops, their old pubs and their identity-giving backyards. It has removed their inhabitants to huge depersonalised flats, to which families are allocated on a bloodless, friendship-breaking Points system.
Ancient loyalties are destroyed in a disastrous local government reorganisation, all done in the name of efficiency. Similarly, the large comprehensive school with its economic units and option groups replaces the genuine neighbourhood school, and the universities are expanded to justify expensive equipment and to make staffing ratios more economical. Identity , and security are destroyed in the process.
All these changes seem a product of the late twentieth century when the second Industrial Revolution abolishes brain-work in the same way as the first Industrial Revolution largely destroyed muscle and four-legged horse power. It is probably more dehumanising to watch the dials of control machines than to work on production lines. Peter Evans quotes the slogan of the Chicago World Fair of 1933: "Science explores: Technology executes: Man conforms" and Le Corbusier, the architect, once described a home as "a machine to live in."
I accept the analysis of Peter Evans but I disagree with his suggestions for change. I agree with him that coach trips to the old pubs In the city centre of Manchester from the suburbs in which people have been rehoused is mere nostalgia. But aren't his suggestions the same? To give more power to trade unions is to hand people over to a new tyranny. The industrial sit-ins, which the author seems to favour, are a pale shadow of the worker self-help movements of the nineteenth century.
There has been little or no attempt to create workers' self-financing co-operatives: the state IS simply expected to bale out people to stay in their jobs at the expense of the standard of living of the rest of the community. Wedgewood Benn is aware of the problem of Identity but his form of worker controls seems to give power without responsibility. Nor do I see the miners' pay struggle of 1972 as a beacon of light — it did protect identity but at the cost of damaging our social fabric. The long chronicle
of student revolt does not lead to much sensible change but rather to endless mindless slogans. The Left is completely barren of ideas and is becoming expert in destruction without purpose. Man is still tribal ana he needs his loyalties, his territory and his festivals. The graffiti of London with its "Chelsea rules," the skinheads, the pop festivals, motorists putting their county badges on their cars, even the old jeans uniform of the university students prove this. Yet in many new schools we have destroyed all frontiers and all security with no uniform, no rules and no pride. Nationally, we have turned our back on carnivals and festivals. Bonfires and parades should have been organised in every village, town and city on the marriage of Princess Anne instead of schools being allowed to choose on which day they should have their day's holdiay. In the nineteenth century, when there was growth, the government was not identified with it. Indeed the Manchester Liberals complained that no government wanted growth. But this meant that the state was umpire not pacemaker, and individuals could look to it for help. Now the state taxes and pushes everyone around for a growth which doesn't come. It promotes and finances Concorde, Maplin, the Channel Tunnel; it builds motorways, it expands universities, it forces local education authorities to build comprehensive schools, it dehumanises by postal codes and all-figure dialling. A government prices and incomes policy brings the state into inevitable conflict with trade unions and business in turn.
It is tragic that the Conservative Party has identified itself with the destruction of identity and the God of growth. This is why there is widespread disillusion and revolt. This is also why there is a gap in politics being filled by the Liberal community politics, the Celtic national parties and Mr Enoch Powell's appeal to the deep instincts of the nation.
The problem of identity in our modern society can only be filled from the political Right. The Conservative Party must return to the support of small local government units, to small schools, to parental choice, to lower taxation, to overt patriotism, and to the taking of the state out of business. It is the party of conservatism and the people, and the people have the right to decide whether they want to change or not, to have growth or not. If the Conservative Party loses this historic link with the deep instincts of people it has nothing to offer which the Left cannot do better. It must give a sense of permanance and a realisation that the quality of life is a concern above and beyond man's material needs. It is also arguable that if the state got out of business identity would be helped because units of work would be smaller. Big business is possibly only kept in being by government subsidies and it is now difficult to have bankruptcies for firms employing more than one thousand workers because governments fear the political results. Free capitalism also allows each individual to make his own choice as to whether he wants growth or leisure, high wages on machine production lines or low wages with hand production. It also makes people more self-reliant in making more decisions for themselves: on housing, education, pensions and health it gives back a genuine identity which William Morris sought in vain for a whole people. The people have sent up their rockets of hope: twice they have overthrown, scientific poll forecasts and elected an unexpected government. The popularity of Tolkien's writings was a parable of nope, and antiques are selling better than modern furniture. The Left has no philosophy. There is a vacuum a sensible Con' servative Party could fill. This and not a coalition is the need of the time.
,Rhodes Boyson, formerly headmaster of flighbury Grove School, is now Conservative MP . for Brent North.
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