A view from the bridge (1)

Wilfrid Sendall

For some odd reason, possibly biological, a man who has done more than twenty-five years in a job gets a licence to tell his colleagues that "things ain't what they used to be. Of course, they never are, So, having done the qualifying service, I am exercising my right to say this to those Parliamentary Lobby journalists who continue to toil patiently at the oar, and to anyone else interested.

I do not propose to offer opinions as to whether things are better done now, or worse. That is best left to erudite fellows who have never done thejob, but who may pick up a research grant from somewhere for pontificating about it.

I start by mentioning something which has not changed in the course of my twenty-six years. The Lobby was, and still is, the hardest stint a newspaperman can take on. Having done several other stints over the last fortytwo years, I feel some duty to make this point, because many who have written or broadcast about the Lobby tyeat it as if it were some kind of journalistic soup kitchen, at which sturdy but idle beggars hold out their bowls for news ladled out to them by kindly Government or Opposition spokesmen.

On the contrary it is the one arena of competitive news-getting in which one can be scooped any day right under one's very nose, As in the jungle, the price of survival is eternal vigilance. Any moderately experienced Lobby correspondent can predict accurately enough 98 per cent of what can happen in politics. Unfortunately it is the odd 2 per cent which makes headlines.

Apart from the great increase in numbers, the biggest change is that the Lobby nowadays is written about and talked about. This is partly due to the gossip of politicians, partly to the researchers who can pick up a guinea or two for investigating it, and partly to those envious ones who, feeling that they have been excluded from a good racket, have set out to bust it.

The other big change is really a change in the character of the House of Commons itself. Nov.sadays the House seems mainly popu lated by earnest, industrious chaps who are righteously convinced that some project which interests them must necessarily interest the millions of readers of the popular press. They shower on Lobby correspondents they seldom see an endless succession of hand-outs which start "Mr William J. Blank, MP for Nether Wallop, said today colon quote." These pieces of paper emanate from scores of little rabbit hutches, which have been constructed all over the sprawling Palace of Westminster, in which WJB and his kind appear to live much of their lives, with only their secretaries for company. Occasionally the pallid hermits venture out to call a press conference, if they feel they have a chance of getting anyone to attend it. What is lacking is that old-fashioned kind of disillusioned MP, who has long abandoned hope not just of office but even of getting his name in the national press, but who has retained a passionate interest in finding out what the government or his own party leadership is up to. These rare characters were the natural allies of 'the Lobbyman. It was essential to have one or two among one's acquaintance.

They could be primed with a hint, a clue, a bit of gossip, whereupon they would disappear into the labyrinthine corridors to return later triumphantly bearing a succulent morsel of real, printable news. Oh, where are they now? It is to be hoped that their virtual disappearance is a temporary phenomenon, for the shortage of them has made the Lobby job infinitely more difficult and frustrating.

The power of a modern executive to conceal, or even to mislead, is enormous. The huge army of Whitehall press officers would be genuinely shocked to be told that they were employed in that task. But in general they cannot escape their duty to extol and magnify the virtue and infallibility of their ministerial masters. It is not for them to uncover, the warts and blemishes, though quite often a bit of truth does escape, usually as the consequence of departmental friction. But the relative weakness today of the old alliance between the Lobbyman and the inquisitive Seta backbencher is tomy mind against the41:11:1 interest.

I believe that the most insidious and haps the most common form of news agement is to feed the press a good story intent to divert them from the real storl• relate that to what is possibly the best dell° tion of news, that it is something which so one does not want published. It calls for great hardihood in the rerl0r! to discard that which everyone is eager to' him bearing in mind that the soup ladle is quite often good soup in order' concentrate on that which nobody wants tell him.

Another contemporary deficiency is a Ii co-operation between the Lobby and official Opposition, When I started this 'II. provided by the incomparable Rab But' Rab offered us an immense political el, perience, a vintage brand of calculatec" discretion and a wit which, of all pOss audiences, the Lobby was best able to preci ate.

It is hard to explain to the younger geo,., tion in the Lobby just why we all adored s Perhaps I had best leave it in the words Pitt, reproving a supporter who dispat9. Charles James Fox: "You have never under the wand of the magician." Mind you, in the golden period when he came known as the best leader of the OpP tion we ever had, Mr Harold Wilson WasL slouch. In those days Mr Wilson's most`' dearing characteristic was candour. Whl on earth has he mislaid it, and how sad is absence? Nowadays Mr Wilson appears 01 intent to prove that he was the best Pri,, minister we ever had, a title to which ' claim is less convincing. It would be churlish in this recherche temps perdu to pass over Herbert Morristrl" is a distortion to judge him by his r wretched phase as Foreign Secretary, 9 which only a malicious fate would Ilk wished on him. How much better if he ' left it to Nye Bevan. Then we could remegt Herbert as the superlative political mall he was, piloting through the parliamen shoals, a prodigius and unprecedented 01 of legislation. Among his talents was an stinctive understanding of the press. He Nol' supreme master of the calculated leak.

Nothing crude about Herbert's hints. I would drop on the waters of the LobbYj delicately as trout flies. It was necessary t0 wide awake to interpret them. If questio, too deeply he would blandly answer: "DP haven't said anything, have I?"

Life, of course, still had its frustration, lee, both as Prime Minister, and Leader the Opposition, was accessible. But I ca° recall anyone ever getting anything out him. Those laconic answers, uttered betv./4 pipe puffs "Doubt it," "Pure speculatw' "Could be" were about as daring a5„ opening partnership in the Roses match difficult Old Trafford wicket. The one ti Attlee always would and could tell yoU the latest Test score.

Anyway, we were welcome at 10 Dow' Street in his day. It was Winston who kJ us out, and Anthony Eden who brougo,'„ back in again. Anthony started the trad!," of occasional. hospitality which Harold W" extended and Ted Heath has further proved. But none later has produced dry in tinis of the Eden quality. These social eve have made life more agreeable in the 1,-.0 without, so far as I can detect, dulling, Lobby's critical faculties. • There are those who profess to deplore decline in the standards of political rerloll,,1 I wonder if they give fair allowance to a me in the quality of the material the reP° has to work With, Of that, more anon.

This is the first of three articles by tv Sendai', who until last week was LobbY respondent of the Daily Express.