The press
Superstars and dogstars
Paul Johnson
Michael Foot remarked sadly on television the other night that the days of proper election speeches, giving a com- prehensive analysis of the country's ills and how they can be remedied, were over. Whereas in 1945, or even later, Nye Bevan could hold a vast live audience enraptured for an hour and a half, and be substantially reported, today all that the greatest orator can hope for is a few isolated paragraphs and 20 seconds on TV. Harold Wilson was the first leading politician to grasp the new demands of the media. He always had the same speech, but he began it each time with a different, newsy lead-in, cunningly designed to supply a headline (`Wilson Slams City "Deadbeats" ') and make a neat clip for the evening TV bulletins. He was also adept at goading hecklers, whom he loved dearly, into carefully prepared traps, which provided equally acceptable news nuggets. Wilson had the gift of seeing the election through the eyes of a sub-editor or a TV producer. How we miss the little man! Today, anyone who goes in for high- powered oratory, above all it if embraces new ideas, is asking for trouble. Margaret Thatcher tried it once, in South Wales in 1979, and was instantly accused by the Wet quality press of being dangerously pro- vocative and confrontational. The British are a highly conservative nation, not least in their vices.
Most election news and such controversy as has so far emerged are generated in the morning press conferences. The 8.30 ses- sions of the SDP-Liberal Alliance, perhaps overwhelmed by the nostalgic splendours of the National Liberal Club, have not caught fire; the best moment, so far, was the re-
emergence of Cyril Smith, wider than ever. Roy Jenkins is now expected to hang on to Hillhead (his Tory opponent, would you believe it, is called Tosh) but he wags his jowls more than ever and radiates gloom and defeat. David Owen, if you can get over his uncontrollable arrogance, is by far their best performer, skilfully conveying knowledge and authority. But what does it profit him if he disappears into a Devon oubliette?
Labour's conferences are more tense, but nothing much has happened yet. Jim Mor- timer, who conducts them, supplies buckets of oleaginous ACAS tedium the moment the waters become troubled. Denis Healey is the star, filling the hole in the cast left by the apotheosis of George Brown; an Old Entertainer, a card, a bit of a rogue, not to be taken seriously but good for a laugh and a verbal knee-capping. For solid economic argument, of a kind, we have Peter Shore. He has developed a positively Churchillian timbre in his voice when he gets excited, at which point he will whip off his heavy specs with a flourish. Unfortunately when he does so he reveals a face strongly reminis- cent of Sir John Gielgud playing Mr Ryder Sr in Brideshead Revisited; and the illusion is shattered.
Between these two dependable chaps, rather like Pinocchio, sits Michael Foot, twitching a bit and sometimes shading his eyes as though, like Stout Cortez, he was searching the faces of the assembled jour- nalistic community for a glimpse of the Promised Land. Foot has a habit of turning his head through 90 degrees towards whichever of his platform colleagues is spouting, and listening to them with such intensity and passion, nodding his head vigorously, that he gives the impression he is hearing the stale claptrap for the first time in his life and finds it utterly astoun- ding.
Even Foot, however, was a bit thrown by the performance of Anne Davis, put on the platform to talk about the family, as typical (I presume) of the new 'moderate' wave which has taken over the National Ex- ecutive. Alas, as she launched herself on the evils of Thatcherism, her voice grew shrill and the decibels rose, and the minutes tick- ed by as she recounted the endless woes of working-class women. Damp flats in high rises. Incontinent elderly relatives. Rising prices. Children sent home too early from school. And, on top of it all, the Bomb, liable to rain down on their careworn heads any second. Foot nodded desperately, but restless journalistic feet shuffled, briefcases were snapped, watches consulted, a hum of conversation rose. 'I bet none of you have had to do it,' shouted Mrs Davis defiantly, sensing she had lost her audience; and then, falling into the ultimate error of the re- jected orator: 'I could go on and on' — at which point the room dissolved in laughter. Margaret Thatcher's conferences are altogether brisker affairs, cracking with electricity. The lady is tempted to go on and on too, but so far has resisted it. Her col- leagues sit alongside her in peril of their lives, liable to instant and public rebuke for displaying lack of enthusiasm. Francis Pym, it has been well observed, looks very like a tortoise, and the only occasion he poked his head out of his shell he had to retract it instantly, having imprudently been less than vehement on the matter of Falklands sovereignty. Mrs Thatcher, unlike Foot, does not allow the party boss (in this case Cecil Parkinson) to pick the questioners. She does it herself and seems to know everyone's name and face (`Now, Adam', `Yes, Sir Robin', 'Not at all, Mr Waller'). She displays a certain propensity to invite hostile questions, which may well be deliberate. After all, she has now had a lot of time in the House of Commons, and relishes verbal battle. Journalists who ask loaded questions are liable to get more than they bargained for; they may be put down ruthlessly, to the jeering joy of their col- leagues, always delighted to see the com- petition humiliated. Mrs Thatcher is in very combative mood at present, sniffing tory, breathing fire and slaughter, happy at the prospect of a landslide but plainly ahx. ious to be obliged to fight for it. Those wh say she has no sense of humour are just wrong; she gets a lot of laughs, albeit some is n with a hard edge. There is no doubt she is the superstar of this election show. My .s regret is that the Tory conference room is too crowded for me to get close Co Deprilg Thatcher and hear his muttered runnie t commentary (`That's right, old girl, silly
damned
tqoue 'set imo .t.huht ghueabrue o . old boy ...'). As Sherlock Holmes said of Watson, he is 'the one fixed point 111 a changing world'.
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