THE ULTIMATE HELPLESSNESS
Sion Simon knows from experience that the countryside marchers only demonstrated their weakness
IN COMRADESHIP and solidarity we marched. Young and old, rich and poor, from every corner of the land we came. The sense of purpose, of belonging, of strength through unity was awesome. Standing up for what we believed, 200,000 voices spoke in one powerful roar as we chanted the slogans of our insuperability, `The miners/United/Will never be defeat- ed'; 'Maggie, Maggie, Maggie/Out, out, out.'
I did not join up with last Sunday's cor- duroy army, but as a time-served Labour type I know all about marching. We marched for the miners, protested against the poll tax, and marched and marched and marched against the bomb. It some- times seemed that barely a weekend went by in the early Eighties without people from all over Britain converging on Lon- don to protest about some Tory outrage or other.
As a party, indeed a movement, Labour was lost. It had replaced the (unfairly) dis- credited pragmatism of the Callaghan years with a stupid, reflexive Bennism that alienated the moderate majority of the electorate. Crazy policies were accompa- nied by an emphasis on sectarian internal politics of no relevance or interest to the voting public. Devoid of purpose, focus, leadership and direction, Labour was never further from power. But we marched like Romans.
The parallels with the modern Conserva- tive party are obvious. The Tories are still riven by fundamental disagreement over Europe — which may have gone quiet but has not gone away — in spite of the voters having never given it a high priority. For the first time this century, the Conserva- tive party has lost sight of the democratic bottom line, that if something is not important to the voters, it is not important.
There is also too much dead wood in the shadow Cabinet. How can the Conserva- tives make a fresh start with Michael Howard, Brian Mawhinney, Peter Lilley and Norman Fowler, who joined the Tory front bench when Harold Wilson was prime minister, holding the top four jobs? But the indications are that William Hague lacks the muscle to sack them. Of itself that is worrying for the Tories, but the real problem is far worse. In Labour's private tracking polling, Hague apparently scores consistently lower than that indefatigable marcher Neil Kinnock ever did. Perhaps Hague is still suffering from residual antipathy towards the previ- ous Tory administration, and will recover. But I think it more likely that the Labour polling confirms that he, like Kinnock, suf- fers from the worst possible affliction for a political leader: there is just something about him that people do not like. Neil Kinnock was a superb leader of the Labour party and would have made a fine prime minister; but he could not get elect- ed because, for quite arbitrary reasons, ordinary voters just did not like him. More than anything else it is this dislike and lack of respect which will consign Hague to the same fate as Kinnock.
Meanwhile, in the absence of any lead- ership from him, Hague's natural Conser- vative supporters in the shires have resorted to the ultimate expression of political helplessness, the protest march. Deep down, Sunday's extravaganza was not really about fox-hunting or protecting an ancient way of life: it was a cry of pain. They did not realise it at the time, so tired were they of the Major administration, but the election of the first Labour govern- ment for almost two decades was a thump in the solar plexus for the middle-class Tories of middle England.
Perhaps it would make no difference, though. After all, Tony Blair is basically a Tory, isn't he? Well, actually no. He is basically a conservative, but he is certainly not a Tory. You can tell he is not a Tory because he is so utterly urban.
Now suddenly England is governed by Jolly well done. Super effort. Keep it up!' aliens. The Cabinet is full of avowedly fem- inist women, chippy working-class men with beards and Guardian-reading teacher types — obvious urbanites every one. Of course Labour's metropolitan elite does not understand 'country ways'. Of course these urban liberals do not care about the countryside, and they positively dislike the Tories who live in it. Tony Blair may repre- sent a fairly rural constituency, but he has lived in London all his adult life. He may write for Country Life, but he certainly doesn't read it.
Nor can country Tories exert pressure through the ballot box. Even though Labour now boasts 170 seats with some claim to be rural, only four of Labour's top 50 marginals feature in the list of the 100 most rural seats. And Labour is resigned to losing up to half of its 170 country seats at the next election anyway. Furthermore, the Countryside Alliance is a distillation of all that is most Tory about the countryside. Except for the Welsh — who are a special case — the fox-hunting, cock-fighting, gun- toting classes who manned the barricades at the weekend are Tories.
I cannot say it is admirable, but even the purest New Labourites have been amused by the way impotence, anger, disenfran- chisement and fear have driven the tweedy Tories of the shires onto the streets. We recognise this unpleasant cocktail because we spent most of the Eighties in exactly the same position while everything we cher- ished — trade unionism, worthwhile employment, the manufacturing base, the welfare state, the NHS and so on — was laid waste by the Conservatives. I know how angry country Tories must get watch- ing Labour townies sound off about hunt- ing, because I remember how I felt when Douglas Hurd — a country Tory if ever there was one — came to Handsworth after our riots and gave us his views on how we should live in our inner-city ghetto.
But now the lunatics have taken over the asylum, and country Tories are terrified that we might wreak the same havoc on their pretty provincial towns and villages that they did on our sprawling urban home- lands. In fact, it is a fear without founda- tion: everything New Labour says about wanting a new, inclusive style of politics and governing on behalf of the whole coun- try is sincerely meant and will be strictly adhered to.
But that does not mean that country Tories will get everything they want — why should they? And it does not prevent urban Labour from privately savouring the exquisite ironies of the moment. As the squidge of green wellies resounded through London, a single refrain kept swirling round my head: 'The miners/United/Will never be defeated'. I'm told Arthur Scargill — long booted out of New Labour — was even on the march.
The author writes a weekly political column in the Daily Telegraph.
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