LABOUR AND THE WILL TO GOVERN

By HENRY FAIRLIE TliE most significant political fact of the past year will be celebrated at Scarborough next week, For the first time in twelve years, the Labour Party looks again like a great govern- ing party.

do not wish to be misunderstood. There is much in the attitudes and policies of the Labour Party that I dislike; even more that I do not comprehend; I am certainly not inclined to repeat the quixotic gesture of actually wishing it victory. But none of this alters the single fact —which even a Conservative may applaud; which, perhaps, a Conservative should applaud —that it has emerged again as a party fit, willing, even anxious to govern, capable of making and sustaining a broad national appeal, and of acting within a political tradition 'in which government, as such, is the first consideration.'

To put it quite briefly, the two major parties in the country should be broad-bottomed, and the Labour Party is broad-bottomed once more. The result, in an important sense, is that almost half the nation has been re-enfranchised; in a further sense, in so far as genuine choice will again exist at the next election, it is even pos- sible to say that the whole nation has been re-enfranchised.

The return of the Labour Party as a great governing party is a stupendous achievement: its own achievement a.nd an achievement of the very political system which is today so much criti- cised. We have become so used to partial and niggardly criticisms of the working of this system that it is worth standing back and trying to grasp exactly what has been accomplished.

After its first experience of real power, the Labour Party had to make a colossal readjust- ment. It would have been difficult enough any- how: it was made vastly more difficult by the size of the social change with which it was con- fronted—full employment--and by the rapidity with which this change affected ordinary people's habits, expectations, attitudes and responses. It had, then, to show that it was capable, like any other governing party, of adapting itself to cir- cumstances which its founders could not have conceived to be possible, and which its members, even after 1955, were reluctant to accept as facts. It had, moreover, to make this adjustment while keeping its identity—and its members.

It has, at last, done this without splitting. I will repeat that. It has, at last, done this without splitting. The struggle has been terrible; but, now that it is over, we can see that the only casualties are the dead. In my view, this is a remarkable achievement.

'At the moment,' a friend wrote to me last week, 'I am profoundly depressed by the English scene. Our politics are like the Third Republic at its worst.' (What does he imagine is happen- ing: that Mr. Macmillan has his Egeria, as Mr. Reynaud had his Mme de Portes?) But, more seriously, his statement is untrue in terms of the Labour Party alone. The survival, through a tremendous upheaval, of the Labour Party, of an organised non-Communist left, of a social demo- cratic party resting on as broadly national an interest as the trade unions: this is something the Third Republic did not achieve.

But it is not simply the achievement which is worth remarking; it is the methods by which it has been accomplished. No one who cares for the political life of the country has enjoyed watching the Labour Party apparently tearing itself to pieces in the past twelve years. Perhaps the thing could have been done in another way: we shall never know. But, in retrospect, the gains seem to have been as great as the cost.

Imagine those past twelve years, not only without the Labour Party, but also without the argument it has been publicly conducting.

Consider, simply, three men, whose influence will, I believe, enrich politics for a long time to come. It was the Labour Party in opposition which gave Bevan a whole nation, if not all the world, as his audience. It was the Labour Party in opposition which drew from Gaitskell a greatness he might otherwise never have dis- covered. It was the Labour Party in opposition which helped Strachey to find at last a task con- genial to his mind and spirit. Imagine the Britain of the past twelve years without them, without their public, political, party dispute, and you imagine a land which has shrunk indeed. These were, certainly, remarkable men in themselves, but so was the debate in which they were engaged.

It is foolish to undervalue a party which has been able to conduct such a .debate, at such a level, in such a manner, over twelve years—and emerge at the end of it, as I have said, with no casualties but the dead (and the CND?). It is equally foolish to undervalue the political system and the political tradition which have helped to confine the dispute within the party, and so prevented any serious fission on the left.

I am concerned, here, with the health of the political system, and not with party points. But I recognise that these points must be met. It will be said, by Conservatives and Liberals, that the Labour Party has not adapted itself enough. Per- sonally, I would agree. But I am not convinced that one of the primary objects of the Labour Party is to adapt itself to meet my wishes or cater for my interests. There is, in fact, a good deal to be said, on all sides, for a leadership of the Labour Party which forces me, as a Con- servative, to vote as a Conservative. In a politi- cally homogenous country, polarisation is healthy.

It may, again, be said, that there are points on which the Labour Party is wobbly (especially foreign policy), and others on which it is un- candid (especially in anything involving increased government expenditure). Again, this is true; and, between now and the election, it should be, and no doubt will be, pressed hard to clarify its position. But, if we are honest, we shall admit that a party which, in opposition, clarifies too much is likely only to make its chance of office dim. We should, in this respect, be honest, too, about the change in the character of the Labour leadership. Much of the impression of renewed vitality whiCh the Labour Party gives is due to Mr. Harold Wilson's imperturbable skill in avoiding every awkward issue and every occa sion which might embroil him in a too positive statement of his intentions. I liked Gaitskell for his honesty, but I fear Mr. Wilson for his cun- ning: and that is about all that need be said about their respective political qualities.

Gaitskell would have a public view about almost everything, and I would praise it, and the Economist would praise it, and Encounter would certainly praise it, but it would lose a packet of votes. In comparison, Mr. Wilson's public views are almost banal in their impre- cision, but the tidy packet of votes remains for him to gather.

Gaitskell took no trouble to conceal, which of his colleagues were closest to him, and there- fore found himself lumbered with anything they might say. Mr. Wilson, on the other hand, gives the impression of living in at least semi-detach- ment from all his colleagues, and no one can lum- ber him even with the weekly views of Mr. R. H. S. Crossman. Gaitskell's behaviour was, no doubt, personally, the more attractive, but there can be little hesitation about which is politically the more relevant. I still believe that the traumatic experience of Gaitskell's leadership was neces- sary to the Labour Party after 1959. But there seems little point in denying that, since he became leader, Mr. Wilson has avoided throwing away the chances which events have presented to him, when Gaitskell would probably have destroyed those chances by a moment of devastating honesty about his educational policy.

There seems little point, either, in denying that Mr. Wilson is probably in more complete (be- cause more subtle) control of his party than Gaitskell ever was, or ever could have been. This is, perhaps, the ultimate reassurance that the electors needed. To them it matters more than anything else that a Prime Minister should be in effective control of his government and his party, since this affords the only chance of reasonably competent, calm and stable adminis- tration.

Gaitskell's leadership always carried the threat that his Prime Ministership would be a series of colossal, lofty, but disruptive, battles with his party. Mr. Wilson's leadership carries only the threat of Mr. Wilson. Even to a Conservative, the second may seem to offer more quiet.

Let me again emphasise that nothing I have said is intended to be an argument for voting either for or against the Labour Party. Nor is it intended as a prophecy of how the electors will conceive their interests. I am concerned merely to stress that we are, as electors, again con- fronted. by two governing parties; that, after twelve years of one party's rule, we again have two parties which are not so far apart that there is no practical choice, and yet not so alike that there is no real choice. The provision of this practical and real choice between two governing parties seems to me to be the first condition of the health of a political system; and, once again, our political system has done its first job.

I find the current fashion of making irrelevant

.• comparisons between the performances of coun- tries whose problems and aspirations are widely different more than a little pointless. Nevertheless, it .is worth pointing out that the present political system in France provides no such practical or real choice, and that the present political system in West Germany has not been seriously tested.

The return of the Labour Party as a govern- ing party should, then, please all those who care for the political health of the country. But, I would have .thought, it should especially please those who regard themselves as radical critics of the present state of the country. There, if they are serious at all, is their instrument. There, if they mean what they say, is their opportunity. There, in return for their support, they would receive the nourishment which their starved spirits need. But no 1 They skulk. They sniff at the Labour Party, and turn their backs on it. It is, they say in effect, not good enough for them.

It is possible to take seriously men like Pro- fessor Titmuss or Mr. John Vaizey, Professor Blackett or Mr. Gerald Gardiner, who, as re- formers, are prepared to seek the opportunity of effective action. It is impossible to take seriously those who, professing themselves re- formers, disdain the opportunity of effective ac- tion, and content themselves with being clever and self-indulgent critics.

I do not wish to occupy space here with the individual retorts which could be made to them. I am concerned with trying to discover the reason for the continuing dissociation which so many intellectuals make from the political life of their country. The hostility between 'we' and 'they,' which should be assumed in any free society, becomes serious only when 'they' is interpreted, as it is now, to mean all the great institutions of the country, whoever controls them. That it

encouraged such an interpretation is the unfor- givable achievement of the phrase, 'the Estab- lishment.'

I' have argued and written about this almost continuously over the past year, and I grow more and more convinced that the fundamental reason for this dissociation is that the critics expect too much of politics, and therefore end by expecting nothing. Sir Philip Magnus makes much the same point in his life of Gladstone when he says, repeatedly, that one of Gladstone's great weak- nesses was that he 'always made 'the best' the enemy of 'the good.' There is no more urgent task today than to understand the limits of politics. In no other way can we make politics our accomplice in whatever we wish to do.

The kind of attitudes to which I am referring may be briefly summarised. Since, when the Labour Party was in power, it failed to 'revolu- tionise' society or remodel men, it is assumed that there is an 'Establishment' which is always in power. Why, therefore, rely on politics? Since the betterment of .the material condition of the people has not made them different people, then their material betterment (which I take to be one of the primary objects of political action) is a fraud. Why, therefore, look to politics? Since perhaps a third of the working class may be found voting Conservative—against their real interests?—there is no hope of organising them by political action. Why, therefore, waste time On politics?

Similar attitudes may be found in other places for other reasons. Sir William Haley, for ex- ample, is a disappointed nineteenth-century liberal. He can never forget his noble failure, at the BBC, to drag the populace up, from the Light, through the Home, to the Third. But was • it, in fact, noble? Why should other people adopt professional middle-class literary tastes; and what possible justification is there for believing that, if they, adopt these tastes, they would be one whit the happier? Sir William himself is hardly an advertisement for happiness. Yet he goes on flailing the parties for not making everyone like him.

. meanwhile the American and Russian blocs have signed the Test-Ban Treaty. Even Mr. Malcolm Muggeridge's contempt for politics stems from the unhappy but irrelevant discovery that men still remain fallen, whatever the politicians accomplish. So I could go on, showing over and over again that most of the dissociation from the political life of the coun- try current today has its origins simply in too high an expectation of politics.

This applies even to the more particular criticisms which are made today of our institu- tions. (Intellectual fashions are increasingly dilet- tante these days: everyone has suddenly dis- covered that it is, not 'the Establishment,' but our national institutions that are to blame.) The whole system is condemned because it does not achieve an arbitrary rate of economic growth fixed, I sometimes suspect, by Mr. Andrew Shan- field. The Civil Service is blamed, because it does not do what a Commissariat could do with the help of a secret police. Parliament is reviled be- cause it represents us and not the technocrats. The parties are disdained because they try to attend to our little weaknesses and not to a divine purpose discovered by Mr. Arthur Koestler.

Of course, 1 agree that there is ample reform needed in all our institutions. But, if one wants to discover what lies behind the more extrava- gant attacks on these institutions, it is to be found on page 10 of the now fashionable pamphlet of Professor Brian Chapman, British Governnzent Observed: Proud and ancient countries may for a time wallow in self-pity and bitter recriminations, but they will throw up in the end a man or group of men who will cajole, bully and galvanise their fellow citizens into fighting for survival rather than luxuriating in remorse.

Professor Chapman had better go on a weekend trip to the country with a family which has never owned a car before, and he might stop talking about them 'luxuriating in remorse.'

But the really frightening phrase is: 'a man or group of men who will cajole, bully and gal- vanise.' There, brutally clearly, he reveals what he really admires in the French regime. We are back, again, at the kind of leadership which people expect from politicians, and it brings us back, too, to the vital difference between the leadership of Gaitskell and the leadership of Mr. Wilson. The essential fact about Gaitskell's leadership is that it was, as one cap now see, charismatic. Exciting, glamorous, uplifting, tense; challenging occasions, rather than using them; bringing tablets down from the mountain, instead of pitching his tent at night with his followers.

In striking contrast, one can also now see that Mr. Wilson's leadership is utterly conven- tional. (Again, how irrelevant the customary labels of politics seem.) Mr. Wilson, in fact is a dull, conventional, parliamentary leader—and, in .that, lies both his threat to the Conservatives and his promise of health to the political life of the country.

I distrust Mr. Wilson, as a Conservative should; I fear Mr. Wilson, as a Conservative should. But that is no reason for failing to recog- nise that he is offering exactly the kind of leadership which makes the Labour Party intelli- gible again as a parliamentary, governing, party. Perhaps the example of this leadership will help to remind intellectual critics that politicians and the political system have functions to perform —other than conforming to their prescriptions. Perhaps, too, when they consider next week the return to strength of the Labour Party, they will pay tribute, for it is long overdue, to the patience of those Labour politicians throughout the past twelve years who have worked away in the wilderness, without panic or despair, and tribute, also, to the equal patience of the political system itself which has worked again to provide the people of this country with what so few other electorates now have—a free, practical and real choice between two governing parties. '1 hold,' said the lesser Salisbury, !to the con- viction that the surest safeguard of our liberty is two sets of gentlemen contending for office.' But the two sets of gentlemen must have the will to govern, and it is the evidence that it is there in the Labour Party and in Mr. Wilson himself which may at last, end the impotent, a-political, criticism of politics. Perhaps we have to endure another winter of Saturday, evening discontent with our politicians. But spring cannot be far behind, and the ordinary people of this country will again speak with all their calmness and inar- ticulate vision of their interests.