Notebook
Is God a Tory after all? Awaiting the May Day Holiday not even the most vengeful reactionary could have expected such divine retribution to be visited upon Mr Foot's impudent Prolefest. It had been a nasty enough spring already. On Saturday on Marlborough Downs we picnicked off pork pies and quiches: in the climatic conditions it would have seemed more appropriate to be eating the last of the pemmican after Captain Oates had gone. But Monday's weather was something else. Even during the brief interludes from heavy rain an opaque mist covered the land. It was in keeping with the spirit of the holiday that the toilers of NUPE decided to shut all the museums and galleries. More vexatious to me was • Yet another day without newspapers. Within living memory there were only two no-paper days, Christmas and Good Friday. (Once there was even a postal delivery on Christmas Day.) Now I have lost count: between Christmas and New Year there scarcely seemed any papers at all.
It used to be said that we had too few Public holidays compared with other countries. Even the Conservatives who Put down motions — none debated — at last year's Party Conference calling for the repeal of the May Day Bank Holiday Wanted it replaced by a Holiday on the Queen's Birthday (or was it Primrose Day?). The argument loses its appeal When public holidays mean a complete Shutdown. In fact, the Bank Holiday is an anachronism. A century ago many people simply did not have holidays, ever. It is difficult to imagine the horror of a fifty-two week working year, six days a week, in a grindingly tedious job. For these people — the urban lower-middle class, clerks and sh0P girls, were sometimes even worse off than the industrial proletariat the Bank Holiday was a great social benefit. Today, When working people rightly enjoy longer and longer holidays there is no purpose in these nation-wide black-outs. And by the W, ay, my by now routine thanks to the Asian 'Intnigrants who keep open their shops and restaurants. Long may their their alien culture of industry and enterprise continue to s‘vamp us.
What's to be done with Ted? has been a Tory problem ever since Mr Heath's u,?Pusition. Finding a job acceptable to Mr Heath and in which he would be acceptable to the parliamentary party is not easy, even in hypothetical terms: the second consideration rules out not only
the Treasury but probably the Foreign Office also. Some time ago Mr Heath was, in fact, prospectively offered the FO by Lord Home, but ill-temperedly rejected the offer. The latest inspired rumour is that if Mrs Thatcher wins the election she will offer Mr Heath the Ministry of Defence. This has several advantages. Mr Heath's dignity can be soothed by the claim — a claim which would be reality — that by such an appointment the Government was taking Defence very seriously. And indeed, it is the one portfolio to which Mr Heath's qualities of stubborness are well fitted. The appointment would, I hope, have an additional happy result: Sir Ian Gilmour at the Home Office.
A recent visit to Brighton reminded me how much I love the town. On Saturday, Tottenham Hotspur drew away to Southampton and I sighed with relief. You do not see the connection? If Spurs had lost, Brighton and Hove Albion would have passed them in the Second Division and won promotion. Brighton in the First Division would mean regular invasions of the town of Prinny and Pinkie by Manchester United and Chelsea supporters. What the sociological origins are of football hooliganism, and what may be done about it, I do not know and do not care. I know that I no longer enjoy watching football. What little pleasure is afforded by good play is outweighed by the brutality on and off the field. The turning point came when I saw a grafitto outside the Chelsea stadium: 'North Stand boot boys kick to kill'. It is said that people
living near a football ground have been able successfully to appeal for a rates reduction on the grounds that their local team will next season be in the same Division as Manchester United. Whether my local team, Arsenal, wins or loses at Wembley — I am not sure which I want —I shall stay well clear of Highbury on Saturday.
The Kennet and Avon canal is one of the prettiest canals in the country. It is also — at least between Pewscy and Great Bedwyn — part of one of the lines of defence erected in 1940 in anticipation of a German invasion. Walking along it the other day I was puzzled, not for the first time, by these fortifications, which can be found in many other parts of central southern England. They seem to have been built in such a hurry that little thought went into their siting. Why, for example, build tank traps alongside a canal? The canal itself ought to be enough of an obstacle. And few of the pill-boxes seem to cover much open ground. Perhaps it is as well they were not put to the test. At any rate they should delight the military archaeologists of future centuries.
How odd London eoneert-goers are. (In the circumstances 'music-lovers' is not quite the phrase juste.) On Thursday a concert at the Festival Hall, given by the London Symphony Orchestra and James Gallway, the flautist who makes those ear-piercing noises on the radio at twenty to eight, was completely sold out. On this coming Monday there is, also at the Festival Hall, a marvellous programme — Haydn, Mozart A Minor rondo, 'Les Adieux'. Schubert B Flat Minor — given by Rudolf Serkin, the greatest living pianist. And there are apparently tickets available at all prices. Strange. Nothing would keep me from a Serkin recital, of which we only manage to get about one a year in London. Not even an all-Haydn recital by the Chilingirian Quartet (since I'm in a hyperbolic mood, they are the best string quartet in the country, not excluding the you-know-who). Such a recital is given at Wigmore Hall, annoyingly enough also on Monday evening.
ThecaseofJohnBanks has been well chewed over in the racing press, but a nasty taste remains. As the hearing was in secret there is no way of telling whether justice was done, but it was not seen to be done. If Banks was guilty as charged — guilty of procuring information — his punishment was absurdly severe, especially in the comparison with Francome's. If he was guilty of worse offences they should have been named. From time to time the JockeyClub can be the despair of those who would like to defend it from State interference.
Geoffrey Wheatcroft
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