The Labour programme as laid down in the Queen's Speech, as in their election manifesto and elsewhere, is not necessarily a wholly accurate guide to what the Government will do...

Sir: Without wanting to express any opinion one way or the other as to whether Mr Heath ought to resign as Conservative leader, I should like to suggest that the shrill tone of...

Mr Heath (March 9). After the U-turns of 1970-1974, the old slogan of "Edward Heath: man of principle" has turned sour in our mouths. If the task of the Conservative Party is...

Sir: Thank you for giving us in your post-election editorial concerning the 'Squatter at No. 10' a concise summary of the true significance of the country's decision. Mr Carr...

Sir: Words cannot express how deeply I agree with every word of the leader in The Spectator, - in ,which you say what a disaster the wretched Mr Heath has been, not only for the...

anything an understatement but one phoenix has arisen from the ashes of his incendiary orgy and that is the renewed right of the British people to determine their own future....

Sir: I gratefully accepted your offer of The Spectator at a reduced rate for clergy — for which I thank you. However, the writing about Mr Heath on the front page this week is...

Sir: What has become of you — a proudly fair-minded journal — jeering at a man when he is down? You may not agree with Mr Heath but, at least, please give him rare praise for...

which John Stokes and David Mudd (both of whom ought to know better), and David Crouch attacked Patrick Cosgrave and The Spectator for his article and your editorial. What a lot...

journal's view that Edward Heath should be replaced as leader of the Conservative Party, I should hardly have thought it either necessary, nor a mark of good journalism, to be...

Sir: 1 wish to place on record as a Conservative, my utter rejection of the vitriolic views expressed in your current editorials concerning Mr Edward Heath, which subsequently...

Sir: That the Conservatives lost the election has not stunned me half so much as their obvious surprise in having done so! This lack of even an elementary knowledge of...

9), I Wonder, as a floating voter, if the sorry Position of the Conservative Party has arisen because, whatever his professed a llegiance, Mr Heath is certainly not a co...

P,roni Miss Barbara Reid 1 must disagree with your leader in Lois week's issue in which you claim th e non-existence of a Communist s pectre. As you rightly say, ComI ntinists...

Sir; 'The, lion and the unicorn were When for the crown, when up jumped a little dog and knocked them both down." h. ,Who governs Britain? Why not a L trInvirate? I envisage...

National Coalition government than at the present time, when the welfare of the whole nation is in grave peril. Now is the time, not for all good men to come to the aid of the...

Sir: At a time when North Sea oil is only one of many reasons why people south of the Border should have a better understanding of what makes Scotsmen tick, it would be a pity...

Sir: In his article on March 2, Clive Jenkins says that there are too many small errors and misunderstandings in my book. He then goes on to write about a trade unionism of the...

a wretched non-review of Arthur Schlesinger's Making Presidents that I was moved to pen some words of protest; and I was forced to ask the question (which it is the reviewer's...

Clive Jenkins' reference to coal (in his review of Innis MacBeath's book on the Unions) as being a 'cheap fuel' is yet another instance of the slipshod thinking which seems to...

The new team and the snags Patrick Cosgrave On the whole Mr Wilson's new team has been received extraordinarily well. This is partly because commentators and journalists look...

If , we are to have another general election within a year, a long-suffering public should T end the next few months clamouring loudly c at TV and radio belt up a bit during...

The American example Mark Bole - at In the 1950s and early 1960s the uniting of Europe was a visionary concept that fired the imaginations of politicians and, to a lesser...

Reforms needed Tom Ponsonby What is a charity? It is not possible to give a satisfactory answer to that question, nor has any comprehensive definition of a charity as a legal...

No massacre but a waltz Nicholas Richardson At mid-day on February 27, Pierre Messmer Presented the resignation of his government to M. Pompidou; at 6 pm he was reappointed...

Professionals wanted Clement Cave It is not just public contrariness that puts communicators at the bottom of th e , popularity polls. Apart from a mistrust and envy of the...

As I was sitting in my chamber and thinking . on a subject for my next Spectator, I heard two or three irregular bounces at my landlady's door, and, upon the opening of it, a...

Religion's Henry Ford Roy Wallis I want to argue three not uncontentious points. First, that Henry Ford and L. Ron Hubbard, Scien tology's founder, have some important...

The public interest Bill Grundy Last week Mr Harold Evans, the editor of the Sunday Times, delivered the first of this year's Granada lectures at the Guildhall (he will be...

Polls apart fhilip Kleinman The Market Research Society is holding its seventeenth annual conference at Bournemouth this week (March 13-15), and the eggheads of the Persuasion...

Man and nature • Martin Sullivan There is a notion whose origins seem lost in antiquity suggesting that natural powers or natural objects suffer some interruption or decay of...

Resistant bacteria Bernard Dixon A fortnight ago in this column, I argued that Man could and should harness to a far greater extent than at present the ingeniou s abilities...

St. Patrick Denis Wood At this time, just before the vernal equinox, increasing soil temperatures encourage plants to make use of the lengthening light. The growth of plants...

Richard Usborne on whatever happened to the likely lads After the publication of Clubland Heroes in 1953, I gave away, or lost, most of my copies of the books about which I had...

Patrick Cosgrave Serpico Peter Mass (Collins £3.00) No Medals for the Major Margaret Yorke (Geoffrey Bles £2.40) On another page Mr Richard Usborne recalls the parade of...

Peter Cotes The Trial of Ruth Ellis Jonathan Goodman and Patrick Pringle (David and Charles £3.50) Poor Ruth Ellis. Nobody was to call her Mrs Ellis. Not for her the posthumous...

Peter Ackroyd Exterminator! William Burroughs (Calder and Boyars £2.85) A Sense Of Survival Kevin Casey (Faber and Faber £2.75) There are'no flies on William Burroughs, he...

Kay . Dick Ivy When Young: The Early Life of I. Compton-Burnett Hilary Spurling (Gollancz 0.80) This is volume one of Hilary Spurling's biography of the late Ivy...

H.J. Eysenck The Hope of Progress P. B. Medawar (Wildwood House 90p). Great scientists are not usually good writers; there are a few who write decent English, and manage to...

Snark-hunting Benny Green I apologise for harping on the subject of Lewis Carroll, but since this week is crime-andmystery week, and by far the most sinister and inscrutable...

Bookend The sad saga of Barrie and Jenkins, publishers to P. G. Wodehouse, continues to unfold. Ever since last November when the Hon Tony Samuel made it known that he was open...

My attentive interest in the career of David Hare, and the sporadic enjoyment I derive from his plays, are not unmixed, I fear, with a regretful touch of despair. Of all our sad...

Import licence Christopher Hudson — — It is an odd thing that the French, who are resolutely anti-American in so many spheres, should have fallen so indiscriminately under the...

Waspe Perhaps chafing under the frequent accusation that Television Centre is a hot-bed of left-wing trendiness, the BBC's Light Entertainment Department is making encouraging...

Large white Rodney Milnes _ I may not swear on the day of judgement that Madam Butterfly is a great opera, but I will defend its brilliant though repellent craftsmanship to...

Confidence trick Evan Anthony Confidence, as Barrie never said, is a kind of bloom on an artist. Take the Roger Hilton tribute at the Serpentine Gallery as an example. This...

Nicholas Davenport With industrial profits bound to fall substantially in 1974 and with the near-certainty of a world trade recession I have been amazed to see the industrial...

No one claiming the faintest connection with or interest in horses will need telling that we're into Cheltenham week, and at the risk of incurring the wrath of readers in...

The fringe banks should, I suppose, have been saved by the intervention of the Bank of England but a condition that may or may not have entered into the 'secret treaty'...