Mr. Eccles' Young England Mr. David Eccles, M.P., has a
personal policy which the Con- servative Party might, with great benefit, swallow whole. Having disposed, in a recent speech in Dorset, of the notion that the Conservative. Party is the party of reaction and narrow privilege, he went on at Tynemouth last Saturday to outline a policy under which enterprise could get its due reward. He did not loose his hold on the political talisman of the social services, but he ,did make the salutary point that those services fall naturally into place as part of a national minimum, and that anyone who can earn more than that minimum has -g- full right to his reward, whether he gets it in the form of wages or profits. This is good straightforward doctrine and it is very much to be hoped that Mr. Eccles will not make the mistake of watering it down for the purpose of reassuring the more hesitant members of his party. He has nothing to gain by that, and the country has a great deal to lose. For that reason he would do well to mention even such dangerous words as " competition " without always qualifying it with the adjectives " orderly and fair," for in the past orderly and fair competition has tended all too easily to become rigid and unfair restriction—which Mr. Eccles- assuredly does not want. If his policy is as successful as it deserves to be it will swing a million Liberal votes to the Conservatives and clinch their success at the next election. But, once won, those votes must not be lost by a reversion to that restrictionism which did so much damage to the Conservative Party before the war. The fact is that the Conservatives in incorporating a large element of liberal thought into their programme would be on a much more profitable, as well as a sounder, proposition than they were in February, 1950, when they went toa far in an attempt to outdo the Socialists in promises of State benefits.
Previous page
