AND ANOTHER THING
The Death Wish on a collision course with the Selfish Gene
PAUL JOHNSON
THE MAJOR Government serves no pur- pose, except in one respect. It illustrates the psychological principle of the Death Wish and the physiological principle of the Selfish Gene. So it may be said to have a certain educational value. Take the Death Wish first. Really bad governments, those which plumb new dimensions of ineptitude, which raise failure to an art form and lov- ingly hone their incompetence into a preci- sion tool, do not die naturally: they wish to die, they conspire to die.
Hence the Government's Easy Divorce Bill, called with characteristic mendacity the Marriage Law Bill. This Bill runs against every Conservative principle, how- ever you define them and whatever kind of Conservative you are. It is change for the sake of change. It constitutes a frontal assault on the family. It makes divorce easi- er, cheaper, quicker. It is absolutely certain to increase the number of one-parent fami- lies in Britain. So its ultimate cost to the taxpayer can be reckoned in billions. It will add immeasurably to the sum total of human misery. By introducing the principle of no-fault divorce, it is an insult to all the traditions of English law and the Christian doctrine which underpins it. For all these reasons it is splitting the Party wide open. Apart from a handful of 'experts' and lawyers, no one wants it. There was no pressure of public opinion to bring it in, let alone any demand from Conservatives. Quite the contrary. Most Conservative sup- porters in the country either do not under- stand it or, if they do, recognise it for what it is: a meddlesome piece of social engi- neering, exactly the sort of thing a Conser- vative instinctively hates. So why is the Government lacerating itself and testing the loyalty of even its most craven lobby- fodder over this idiotic piece of legislation? It is the Death Wish. There is no other explanation.
Or take the case of Ali Baba — or what- ever his name is — the Saudi dissident whose bearded, triumphantly grinning mug has been adorning our newspapers. This man is here for only one purpose: to over- throw the friendly legal government of our ally Saudi Arabia and replace it by a revo- lutionary one which will be unfriendly to us and turn Saudi Arabia into an enemy and haven for terrorists. Quite apart from our undoubted right to deport this dangerous man, there is every conceivable reason why we should do so immediately. The Saudis are one of our best customers. Their pur- chases are responsible for maintaining thousands of British jobs. Nor is there any public demand for this man to remain here. If Conservative voters in the country were asked their opinion, my guess is that every single one of them would answer, 'Boot him out.' The only people who want him to remain are a tiny group of professional trouble-makers, not one of whom has ever voted Conservative or would dream of doing so. So why has the Government turned an undignified somersault on this issue and allowed All Baba to stay? It is the Death Wish.
The Death Wish now runs through almost every action the Government takes, or does not take. It impelled them to alien- ate the farmers, first by trying to suppress the evidence about Mad Cows, then by screaming out 'Don't panic!', and it disgust- ed public opinion by threatening the Conti- nentals one minute and apologising to them the next. It is alienating the self- employed by introducing a new, harsh and totally unjustified tax regime. There is no group of natural Conservative voters in the country it is not determined to infuriate. It refuses even to listen to the anguished appeals of the deep-sea fishermen. It mad- dens the Tory traditionalists by dithering over a referendum. It funks a reform of social security, legal aid or any other of the major abuses which make taxpayers rage. It weekly predicts a return of the feel-good factor while daily giving us reasons to feel bad. It seems so determined to destroy itself that one wonders why it doesn't sim- ply climb onto the funeral pyre like a Hindu widow or, like A.J. Balfour in 1905, steal silently from the scene like a bedrag- gled tom-cat. The reason it does not do so is the Selfish Gene. I mean, of course, the Prime Minis- ter. If a gene had two legs and a face, I imagine it would look like John Major. The great thing about a gene is that it has no personality. It does not stand for anything. It has no purpose other than to exist and perpetuate itself. It has no principles, polit- ical or otherwise, no opinions, no faith, hope or charity, no likes or dislikes, other than a fear of extinction, no views, no beliefs or convictions, no creed or ideology, not even a prejudice. What it is depends on the conditions which surround it, and varies from day to day. It is protean, osmotic, chameleon-like. What does Norma Major do with the Prime Minister at night-time? Put him on a coat-hanger in a closet? Lower him gently into the gene-box? These things are mysteries. There is indeed some- thing gnostic about Mr Major, a touch of the hieroglyphs. He defies not merely polit- ical analysis but categorisation by species. When we finally get rid of him we ought to put him in a glass case with one of those delightful handwritten labels found in the Cairo Museum: 'Artefact of unknown purpose'.
In the meantime, he is the Selfish Gene. He has raised selfishness — that is, his own personal survival in No. 10 — to a principle of government. It is the only one he has. At any cost to his colleagues, to the Party, to the country, Major is determined to stay on. It is the sole thing he knows about, is interested in, is good at. He is the original barnacle, an oyster-eyed mollusc whose one function is to grip tenaciously, a political Old Man of the Sea whose bony legs are firmly locked round the British Sinbad. Major does not know what he is doing in Downing Street or why he wants to stay there. There is nothing he actually aims to do with power, other than to prolong it. With every day he hangs on, the chances of a Conservative electoral catastrophe increase. That is nothing to Major. I looked through the list of our prime ministers to see if there were any who came within mea- surable distance of Major in smug selfish- ness, self-regarding egotism or serene Bovaryism. Walpole? A model of self- abnegation by comparison. North? A paragon of altruistic generosity. Liverpool? High-mindedness personified. Heath? Dis- interested magnanimity made flesh. Major's rhinocerine obstinacy in putting his personal political survival before any other consideration is sui generic — a mere epiphenomenon. It is so remarkable that it raises him to the dignity of a scientific foot- note. But what happens when the Death Wish and the Selfish Gene finally collide? We shall soon know.
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