'No case
for secrecy In the midst of increasingly wild and mysterious surmise about standards of public life which currently prevails at Westminster and in the press, one thing must be made absolutely clear: there is no serious case whatever for resistance to the idea of a compulsory register of all financial interests of Members of Parliament; but equally the creation or existence of such a register is by itself an insufficient response to or solution of the situation in which we now find ourselves.
The cases against a compulsory register are many and various, and those made by Conservatives have some colour of conviction about them. Conservative Members of Parliament are usually richer than their Labour colleagues, but their wealth is frequently in an inherited form, or consists in land, or some other form of durable asset. Those fortunate enough to possess wealth fear that the disclosure of details about what they own could be used as propaganda against them, even when their wealth can be shown to have no influence whatever on their political or public conduct. It is more difficult to see why Labour Members of Parliament should object to a compulsory register; and more and more revelations about albeit petty and trivial amounts of money exchanged between Labour politicians and their business associates is most likely to increase the stridency and force of demands for one. It is hard indeed to explain why it is that Labour politicians do not see this fact: Mr Short's hysterical behaviour eludes, where it does not beggar, explanation — it is amazing that a former schoolmaster renowned for his belief in stern discipline should so resemble, in his behaviour, a particularly spoiled and over-indulged schoolchild — and his attempts to squash discussions about his past relations with Mr Smith and Messrs Crudens will only the more certainly ensure an eventual and very full investigation. Better by far that Mr Short should now resign, and that such investigation as still seems necessary should be followed by the establishment of a full and complete register of interests.
However, so far as our present knowledge extends, Mr Short's behaviour has been essentially a matter of carelessness and lack of thought: there is no indication that he, or any other of the politicians named publicly or privately as having relations with business which they would prefer not to be revealed have done anything which is against the law. The cloud of suspicion is, nonetheless, now so thick that it is hard to avoid the conclusions that some politicians, local or national, some councillors, some businessmen involved in local authority affairs, have been, or are behaving in a criminal fashion. Because of this cloud of suspicion Mr Wilson has set up a Royal Commission, but that action, as we argued last week, is more likely to aid the concealment, rather than the revelation, of abuse and crime. The most practical step is greatly to increase the funds and the manpower available to the police; and the creation of a nationally organised special body of investigators ought also to be considered.
The local elections in London added to the general confusion of the current political situation but it was above all clear, with a poll reaching a record low of 22 per cent, that the public has little trust, confidence or hope in its governors at local authority level. It is imperative that energetic steps are taken to create hope, confidence and trust; and the first such step must be the resolute and ruthless pursuit of a police investigation into possible criminality in public affairs.
French lessons
The humiliation of M. Chaban-Delmas in the first round of the French general election had been inevitable for so long that its consequences may well now be ignored. They are substantial, nonetheless, and if M. Giscard d'Estaing wins the final contest, as seems probable, very serious problems will arise in his relationship with the Gaullist majority in the National Assembly. They are nothing compared with the problems that would arise in the evert of a victory by M. Mitterand, but they deserve careful consideration.
At issue are two things — the power of the Presidency under General de Gaulle's constitution, and the nature of the conservative wing in French politics. So supreme as politicians were both de Gaulle and his successor that the inherent difficulties of the President's position under the constitution were obscured. Save for a few months at the outset of the General's reign a ruling President has never been confronted by a hostile or critical Assembly majority. Thus M. Giscard — if it is he who is the victor — will face an unprecedented situation and he cannot expect, at least initially, to enjoy the kind of authority possessed by either of his immediate predecessors. Nonetheless, it is to be hoped that he will eventually enjoy such authority, for the power of the President under the Gaullist constitution is the best guarantee the French can have of political stability, and their best defence against a return to the-chaotic parliamentary life of the Fourth Republic. It is therefore encouraging that so many Gaullist leaders behaved in a statesmanlike fashion after Sunday's poll, and proffered their support to M. Giscard.
The re-alignment of the French right which has now become necessary also raises urgent and important questions. Gaullism, even without the General, enjoyed (at least until recently) something of a remarkable appeal which transcended class and ideology. M. Giscard and such new allies of his as M. Lecanuet — who once fought a respectable Presidential battle against de Gaulle himself — are much more definably conservative and bourgeois. They have added in the past a necessary and practical element of right-wing interest to the vaguer and less easily defined Gaullist myth; equally they can — and now must — learn something of the reasons for the enduring appeal of Gaullism to the French. M. Giscard succeeds, lessons will have to.be learned on all sides: it is best that the learning should begin now.
Private university
At Buckingham on Friday an event of 0,3' si.derable, and perhaps momentous, 51F ruficance for the future of higher education 01 Britain took place, when Lord Hailsham veiled the foundation plaque of the Indepen: dent University — or, as it has been rathoe unhappily dubbed by its governors, lb University College at Buckingham. The college has grown out of an increasing conviction 0,r! the part of scholars and university adminl.s trators that the dominance of state finance 11; modern universities warps the purPOsethe university education itself, and leads to steady and corrosive decline of acaderril standards which is being increasingly -'113ekse recently by a number of dons from !"t University of York, who wrote on the sublekce to the Daily Telegraph — recognised. 14 Independent University is thus intended ln "„, entirely self-supporting and, as Lord Halls' but put it in his speech, not only does not seek PP positively rejects support from the state.
The whole whole project has met with manY d ficulties in the years since it was first moote; and those difficulties are far from over, sincere great deal more money is needed to ens.1 future success and prosperity. In a paradorcle°, way, however, the existence of a Laboinr Government utterly determined — aS Prentice recently made clear — to do Wna`,, can to strangle educational standards and 3,4 pirations in Britain should help the pioneers .."t Buckingham. For Mr Prentice has i brought °-.... into the open that attack on academic freedo! and ambition which has been a covert featil7 of educational politics — with the singleanre shining exception of Mrs Thatcher — for r than a decade. There is now no excuse !leo thinking people not to realise that everYl,111 British education, and particularly Brit's t higher education, has stood for in its fil!e5,4 periods is under attack; and that the prine.11): line of defence against such attack is Pcvshe tely-financed educational institutions. "",,, Buckingham experiment must thus be ported enthusiastically — morally, finanela ' and politically.
Brandt goes
The general belief of politicians in this 000115 as manifested in recent weeks that a ne-e story can be concealed or distorted to set he their own interests has been disproved bY 0 resignation of Herr Brandt. Some weeks ilagao, we were told that one of the German Ccast cellor's closest advisers was a WY for Germany: we were also told that Herr fora-00 knowing this fact, kept the man in questi°13i,j0. his. private staff in order the better to traP.st It is now clear that the infiltration of the w`od German government was far more widesPrend than the outline of that story allowed.; a of wHeldrerssprraneaddtesnocuargehert.o mean the destructl°11
