ANOTHER VOICE

We think we say what we think, but we don't think what we say. That's what I think about Mr Hattersley

MATTHEW PARRIS

D), want to know what Mr Roy Hat- tersley earns? You bet. Do I have a right to know? Hmm. Last week I peered over fel- low-commuters' shoulders to read their London Evening Standard reports of the great man's earnings with that itch to know which I remember so well from boyhood perusal of rude magazines. In the Times room at the Commons I found myself glancing sideways at the new Register of Members' Interests, open on our desk, as one might at a postcard addressed to some- body else.

A couple of us sniggered at the pathos of an entry against the name of Mr Toby Jes- sell, MP for Twickenham and secret musi- cian, who had recorded his sponsorship by British Telecom to play the piano at a char- ity concert. Though unpaid, he noted, this might have affected his attitude to the com- pany. While laughing you feel a bit sorry for Mr Jessell, a patently sincere man obliged to submit himself to the indignity of sharing with us this speculation.

Is it any business of mine what the Daily Express pay Mr Hattersley to review televi- sion programmes? Searching for an answer, I find myself asking whether it is any of Mr Hattersley's business what I am paid for this column in The Spectator. I do feel it isn't.

And here endeth the lesson on Members' Interests, a subject on which, morally con- fused, I have no commentary to offer.

My theme is a different one: that instinc- tive 'how would I feel if they did it to me?' which I found myself asking in an attempt to decide my right to know about Mr Hat- tersley's finances. We ask it in so many situ- ations, for Mrs Do-as-you-would-be-done- by is never far from our left shoulder. The mistake made by many social and political analysts is to assume that Mrs Do-as-you- would-be-done-by is on the side of the police. My experience is different: the advice whispered by Mrs Do-as-you-would- be-done-by has often been that I should think again before casting the first stone, or, indeed, lift it up to see what might lie beneath.

Most people have something to hide, now. Almost everyone has had something to hide, once. Absolutely everyone contem- plates the possibility that they may have something to hide, one day. The conceal- ment of guilt and the fear of exposure haunt the dreams and bubble beneath the psyches of even the blameless: perhaps par- ticularly the blameless, for a virtuous man and a nagging conscience can walk side by side.

Walk up to a stranger and whisper 'All is revealed!' and more men than you might suppose would blanch. Terror of discovery and fear of reproval slip into our uncon- scious minds during infancy and remain there forever, always potent, usually unac- knowledged.

And so we find ourselves able to mean with only part of ourselves the things we think we do believe and know we ought to say. We say: 'I don't object to the idea of a compulsory national identity card. Only people with something to hide will object.' We say: 'Isn't it dreadful the way the family is under threat?' and we mutter abut the sanctity of marriage and the scandal of Home-Alone kids. We say: 'Of course I'm in favour of more police speed cameras on our roads; of course I'm in favour of closed circuit television in public places; of course I deplore drink-driving . . . ' And we mean it, or nearly.

We say: 'Why shouldn't MPs be forced to declare all their earnings? Surely only those with something to be ashamed of will com- plain ?' We say: 'I'm all for plans to give the Inland Revenue better access to our personal financial records: it will help crack down on benefit cheats and tax-dodgers.' We say all these things. We say them to journalists, we say them to our MP, and we say them to 'political attitudes' opinion pollsters. We say them confidently enough, but we think Imm. Well, probably.'

Or perhaps we don't even allow ourselves to think hmm; but the inner man — the guilty child, the man forever in his dreams on the run — thinks hmm. The outer man thinks 'jolly good idea'. And some time later he wonders why he has not warmed to the government minister or party leader or columnist or clergyman whose opinion he so applauded and whom he really ought to like. Somehow he just doesn't. And that `I'm in the Territorial Army - I'm only straight at weekends.' bewilders the opinion pollsters who ask him: 'Why?' He doesn't know why, so he casts around for reasons . . . 'Oh, I don't like Mr Blair's teeth'; 'There's something shifty about that Michael Howard'; 'Yes, I read that Guardian expose on MPs' second jobs. They're a disgrace, those MPs. But I don't know about the Guardian as a news- paper. It grates, doesn't it? And I'll never get used to the new typescript'.

We say all these things, and we confuse the opinion pollsters mightily, who report that we do support Lord Nolan's recom- mendations but we don't like Mr Blair's smile. They report that we're in favour of ID cards, but not Mr Howard; in favour of family values but doubtful about Lady Olga Maitland; in favour of investigative journal- ism but doubtful about the Guardian's typescript. And all along it isn't Mr Blair's smile at all which bothers us, but the smile on the face of sanctimony. We prefer not to tackle sanctimony head-on, so we go for the messenger, which is hard on the messenger. He was only telling us what we said we wanted to hear.

This, then, is my message to the messen- ger. The English do not entirely like the police, whatever we may say to the Daily Mail. We do not entirely warm to the word `disclosure', however we may excoriate politicians in our saloon bar conversation. We hear the words 'community values' and we duly applaud, but we inwardly think `neighbours' and 'twitching net curtains' and the English don't like neighbours, or other people's net curtains. And the word `values' has a Sunday school ring and we didn't like Sunday school and we don't actually send our children to Sunday School and we don't — if the truth be told — like religion, real religion. No, not at all. The English are a very, very agnostic nation and love Good Queen Bess for her remark about having no window into other men's souls.

In our hearts, the sound of a police whis- tle subtly alarms, lest it be for us. In our hearts the sound of Mr Hattersley counting banknotes subtly comforts, for we too like banknotes. So we say, 'What a disgrace all that money for reviewing a television programme!' and we think, 'You know, Hattersley doesn't irritate me like he used to. The old boy's mellowing.'

Matthew Parris is parliamentary sketchwriter for the Times.