Westminster Commentary
Closed Doors
By MARK BONHAM CARTER, MP WHILE the cat has been away enjoying bowls of cream in Florence, the mice have been at play in his column. But their play has bCen strangely joyless, overwhelmingly
still on holiday)
articles that has been
published in Taper's ab- sence has been in its way an apologia, an explanation of why MPs are not more interesting or more interested, of why the House of Com- mons is so dull and lifeless, or, in Mr. David Price's case, an appeal, a eri de cautr—if only people knew they would recognise in their MPs not only the best House of Commons they have but also an assembly of men of character, dedi- cated to the service of the people. None of these explanations of our present discontents seems to me altogether satisfactory. In many ways the most unsatisfactory, because the most plausible and the most convincingly argued, was the piece by M r. Roy Jenkins.
He concluded that parliamentary vitality could be revived only by a conjunction of two events— a general election and a Labour victory. While the first is inevitable, the second seems less likely. But in any case, is it true? Suppose the Labour Party is returned to power, will we get, as Mr. Jenkins supposes, a Parliament as lively, as im- portant and as interesting as that of 1909, which was his standard of comparison?
Last week I was talking to a friend who had just returned from Nyasaland, where he had been appearing before the Devlin Commission. He was deeply impressed by the Commission and equally depressed by the Central African Federation; but he added, 'What a relief it is, after political life in England, to be in a country where the issue is simple and clear, where you are either liberal or conservative.' It is not the first time that one has heard this kind of comment on politics in this country. Mr. Jenkins referred to this Par- liament's moment of vitality during the Suez crisis and old hands speak of the great debates of the 1930s at the time of the Spanish Civil War and appeasement. But today no issue is made simple or clear and it seems that the object of the politi- cal parties is to blur rather than clarify the issues. No one can really tell you what the Con- servative Party stands for. Just as the Institute
of Directors is launching a campaign on the sanctity of free enterprise, the Government inter- venes to decide where a strip mill is to be sited, considers a grant of £25 million towards the building of a new Cunarder, offers £30 million to the cotton industry and Of million to horti- culture. Conservatives attack the Labour Party for wanting to nationalise steel, on the grounds that the industry is already effectively controlled by the Government, and they defend a pension scheme which is in principle Socialist. As to the Labour Party's beliefs, they at present, in spite of a confetti of policy statements, are equally ob- scure to friend and foe alike; not only on the fundamental issue (for a nominally Socialist Party) of nationalisation and the 600 companies, but equally on important issues in the foreign field. A party which seriously believes that the development of the underdeveloped countries is of the first importance would in most circum- stances find it difficult to call for the compulsory limitation of imports into this country from Hong Kong, India and Pakistan. Not so Mr. Harold Wilson. And how can a so-called pro- gressive party which believes in an expanding economy bring itself to express the kind of Luddite sentiments that we hear in every debate on unemployment and coal? As for de- fence, I defy anyone to tell me what the Labour Party policy will be the week after next.
Compare these issues with those of fifty years ago; the Lloyd George budget, Ireland and the House of Lords. On all these issues, as no one knows better than the author of Mr. Balfour's Poodle, there was a clear and distinct idea for which the Liberals fought and against which the Tories fought (to the limit of Curragh). Moreover, the last was a genuine issue of power on which the future of English democracy depended. It does not require a Bowden or a Heath to get MPs to vote 'on issues which they understand and where they have passionate convictions, MPs would, I am sure, willingly have taken part in
twenty-three divisions in one evening on Suez had.they been asked to and if they had believed that it would have affected the issue.
The doubt which lies at the back of many minds and which is the source of the malaise of the present Parliament is whether the House of Commons is any longer the ultimate source of power. Today, as many critics from Michael Foot to Angus Maude have pointed out, most issues are decided before they reach the House of Commons. They are decided by consultations between the Ministry concerned and interested bodies, and after these consultations there are further consultations behind closed doors with members of the party in power. Only when a decision has been reached at both levels does the matter come before the House. It is hardly sur- prising if the subsequent debate is somewhat lifeless or that the subsequent vote has been de- scribed by a number of those who have partici- pated in such rituals as a rubber stamp. 1.ct me give an example. The White Paper on the Small Farmers Bill was published on October 30 and the debate took place on November 10. It was with the greatest difficulty that I managed to arrange to meet some of my constituents whom this measure affected most directly between the publication of the White Paper and the debate, yet confidential discussions had being going on between the Ministry of Agriculture and the NFU ever since the spring of that year. The last people to be consulted or to be given an opportunity to have consultations were the MPs. Secondly, politics has become a dirty word. Last week, for instance, the Minister of Education made a state- ment on religions education. This is what is called a non-party measure : i.e., one which was agreed between the leaders of ,the three parties in a series of confidential discussions before it was announced to the House of Commons. It was then discussed by the various parties in their private committees, and finally it was formally announced to the House of Commons. By that time the battle is over; the pass, if there is one, is lost. As a Liberal I Lind it difficult to disagree with this particular measure in principle, but to my certain knowledge there are a number of people in the House of Commons and in the country who disagree with it. Religious education k still a live issue, but this was not apparent in the reception of the Minister's statement to the House. It may or may not be a good thing to keep religion out of politics, but if everything about which, people feel deeply is kept out of politics, politics and the Commons will die.
And this brings me to the mystery of Mr. Gaitskell. The situation which Taper's substitutes have been discussing for the last few weeks is tailor-made for the Conservative Party : blurred issues, policies made behind closed doors, and massive propaganda from a press which nation- ally, and even more locally, is largely Tory. The Left has drawn the wrong conclusions from Mr. Roosevelt's success in the 1930s and the Labour victory in 1945: both won despite a hostile press. When there are big issues clearly understood Lord Kemstey and Co. cannot keep back the tide. But when the issue is marginal, as it has seemed to be since 1950, the weekly panegyric of the leader of the Tory Party, the weekly drop of poison about the Leader of the Opposition,
the suggestion that 'the Tories are the only patriots, the innuendo that the others are not—
all this has its effect. In a Freudian lapse the other day, Lord Hailsham said, believe we are beginning to get it across that in Mr. Macmillan
we have a statesman who is a veritable giant in the Free World.' The operative words are 'get it across.' They got it across with Mr. Baldwin, Mr. Chamberlain and Sir -1:bony Eden. It Look events to dispel the
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