Notebook

Nobody in his senses would wish the nationalised industries to operate at a loss for ever and a day, accustomed though we are to their melancholy record. But what is the value of profits achieved at great social cost, even hardship?

Sir William Ryland and his board may take pride in the Post Office. No one else can do so. The Post Office has made a profit by slashing its services and increasing its charges—the prerogative of any monopoly. The Gas and Electricity boards are no more commendable. Given a monopoly in the provision of essential services or supplies, of whatever sort, any fool could avoid a loss— and ostensibly make a 'profit'—by these means. What they are in fact producing is a national loss in another sense.

In his own interests, Mr Roy Mason really ought to cultivate restraint, and learn to behave with the dignity appropriate to—and expected of—a Secretary of State. Instead of rising at once—the selfsame day—to Mrs Thatcher's occasional speeches on détente and defence (those outside Parliament, that is), he would be better advised to wait, and then reply in a rather more substantial and measured way.

As it is, he tends to sound off immediately (he did so last Saturday) with such trite aspersions as 'cold war warrior' and exhortations to Mrs Thatcher not to 'screech' at the Soviet Union, however reasoned her argument may have been. This may do well enough for his own constituency party in Barnsley—but Mr Mason is no longer a backbench MP. He is a Cabinet Minister— and should be speaking on a level commensurate with his rank.

It has been said before, and will continue to be said by informed listeners until there is a noticeable improvement, that the BBC often displays a strange sense of priorities in its selection of news. In the Radio 2 bulletin at six o'clock last Saturday night, there was not a word of (or about) Mrs Thatcher's important speech on détente some hours previously. True, it was reported in other bulletins—but that is scarcely the point. Why was it excluded from this particular broadcast ?

Although every garden is suffering from the continuing drought, some things have flourished splendidly in the heat of recent weeks. Apart from the profusion of ladybirds and butterflies, nuts are ripening in unusual quantities, in particular the filberts. As any countryman will know, a good crop of nuts foretells a hard winter., Good news for those who write or publish books, and for those who buy them. With a little luck, Marks and Spencer may become booksellers on an appreciable scale. After a trial last Christmas with a handful of books of the coffee table variety, they are to renew and extend the experiment this year. If it is successful, books are likely to be sold in many, though perhaps not all, of their stores.

This would be a splendid development in a country that has too few bookshops. Any addition is to be welcomed. Given a good response to the innovation, it would not be surprising if M and S eventually decided to become publishers themselves—under a St Michael imprint, no doubt. Since they seldom fail in anything, there is every reason to feel confidence in the venture. ,

Sir Richard Marsh's qualifications for the chairmanship of the Newspaper Publishers' Association are not at once apparent. Although Lord Goodman, whom he will succeed, was not exactly of the newspaper world, he had strong links with it as a lawyer (one might say super-lawyer) and as chairman of the Observer Trust. Moreover, he had long been established as a formidable man of affairs.

The same cannot be said of Sir Richard Marsh ; nor has his chairmanship of the Railways Board been one of striking achievement. Surely the large newspaper managements who make up the NPA could have found a suitable chairman within their own ranks. Was there nobody both competent and available ?

You can't win (or so it seems) in what might be called the fractious world of professional race relations. As chairman-designate of the Commission for Racial Equality, Mr David Lane, MP, is no sooner welcomed, indeed acclaimed, by some immigrant leaders than he is beset and assailed by others.

This is likely to be his lot for some time. To please all the immigrant groups, while satisfying the indigenous community as well, can be no easy task. Small wonder that there was no rush of candidates. Mr Lane is evidently a bolder man than his manner may suggest.

Ever since the IRA's bomb outrages in London, most of the capital's theatres, cinemas, hotels, stores and other public places have adopted the practice of checking the handbags, briefcases and packages of everyone entering their premises. This is an eminently sensible precaution. We cannot say, though, that we care for the way the Savoy Theatre is handling the problem. At this theatre, no one checks the bags, but there is a notice making it mandatory that all such items be deposited in the cloakroom. There is no security precaution in this, but there is profit in it : patrons are obliged to pay for the cloakroom facility they are only using at the insistence of the management. A postcard on sale in Dallas, Texas, shows a view of the city accompanied by a smiling photograph of President Kennedy. It carries the words: 'Scene of the Assassination'.

At a time when cultural life in this country has, as a result of the activities of the Arts Council, become a branch of the Welfare State, where minor novelists and poets can freely dispense money to their peers, it is not surprising that the trade unions should want to join in. A TUC working party has just published a document, The Arts, in which the language of corporate socialism is used in a plea for the unions to 'intervene' in artistic activity. 'The Arts' are constantlY invoked throughout the report, but the term is never defined, although sometimes described as 'cultural activities in workingclass communities'. According to this rigmarole, it is imperative that the TUC, that sensitive and civilised organ of the state, should hold 'views' on those cultural values which are in opposition to 'eletist' (sic) values. The argument is a simple one : since public money is being dispensed by the bureaucrats of the Arts Council, the arts themselves should cease to be 'highbrow' and become public property.

All this is, of course, very much a part of our defeated and standardised culture. But the TUC working party takes matters one insidious step further with such remarks as 'The Arts must become an integral part of the normal processes of social development'. There will be no room in a unionised culture for any artist who refuses to accept, or even recognise, such 'normal processes'. Indeed there may not be any room for the unique artist at all, since this absurd manifesto also calls for a fight to promote 'cultural equality', more state subsidies for creative writers, more attention to 'popular poetry and prose', and more films on the history of trade unionism.

Two members of our staff had their houses burgled in the last fortnight—a common enough misfortune nowadays, but none the less tiresome for that, even if the loss Is trivial. In both cases the police turned UP eventually when summoned, but there was a lengthy delay before the experts arrived to take fingerprints. By contrast, two different locksmiths arrived almost as soon as they were telephoned. A comparison between the 'public and private sectors' ?

One of the most popular dolls in the Soviet Union is a replica of that ghastly figure, the uniformed member of the KGB, clad In black jerkin, pale blue trousers, pistol In hand. This dreadful artefact was first issued (which seems to be the right word) some years ago, on an anniversary of the KGB s foundation. Soviet dissidents now living abroad have rather taken to it. As one of them remarked the other day, he had onlY t° look at his sinister doll to be relieved of anY incipient nostalgia.