Westminster Corridors
As any chap who ever sipped a drop of porter well knows — which I imagine includes almost every reader of these pages — Puzzle is wont to look on the cheery side of things and leave gloom to the professional wailers, the priests, temperance people, and what have you. Put him in a graveyard (as they will one day) and he would seek out the cheeriest corpse, or at least one that passed away from some interesting disease.
But try as Puzzle did to find some optimistic corner of the Palace of Westminister, after the Skipper had dismayed the lieges with his dreadful threats of austerity last Thursday, there was no joy or comfort to be found. True the Scotch laird, Ian McArthur, did offer the share of a hackney carriage, and a drop of the water of life which was a civility much in keeping with this splendid fellow's character. And Roundhead Heffer let it be known that he was pleased with something Puzzle had written which leads Puzzle to the conclusion that he has now exhausted the Yuletide charitable spirit. But there was little comfort elsewhere.
Frankly, Puzzle is a little depressed. And it not simply at the prospect of sacrifice and frugality alone.
It is the prospect of an assault upon democracy which depresses; and Puzzle holds that more dear than the best of claret or worst of bawds. It seems to him that neither side of the House has overmuch respect for this most noble of virtues any more. They would rather seek the magnificent myth, the noble lie, Of Plato, to convince the whole of our society to aquiesce in their schemes. The Socialists would have us believe that since they are imbued with the desire to ad vance the brotherhood of man they have a special voice with which to address the trade unions. Indeed some romantics are reminding us that the Labour Party grew out of the trade union movement. True enough, but Puzzle finds the unions only marginally less willing to trust the Parliamentary Socialists than the Tories.
The unions have not forgotten that it.was Mister Midshipman Wilson, and Dame Bar bara Castle, who wanted to discipline them in the first instance. There is therefore much depression in the backbench ranks of the Labour people because they say that the unions do not trust them and make little effort to use them to further their ambitions.
Now, of all people the Prime Minister, with his fears for democracy, should desire to have his arguments across the floor of the House.
But far from it. He publicly upbraided Midshipman Wilson for daring to ptit forward a scheme by which Secretary Whitelaw would go. with a new package to the unions saying that PhaseThreewas no more, and a new deal was in sight. The Skipper told Mr Wilson that the unions did not like it. What impertinence! Where did young Heath obtain these extraordinary ideas ? Has he been spending too much time supping with some ill-informed fellow like Chancellor Hogg? , The Prime Minister seems to have a most curious idea of democracy which says that Parliament will pass tight Socialist-style legislation on how much people earn, and having obtained a narrow majority for their policy, set off to talk with the trade unions.
But before arriving to talk the parameters of negotiations are fixed as if by Moses of old, let alone a body as fickle as Parliament. The Kentish Sea Dog then proudly announces that he is willing to talk to anybody, and has elaborate parleys with the unions, but without the remotest prospect, it would seem, of him changing his views.
Should the Opposition dare question his ideas outside of Parliament then they are accused of encouraging illegality, and if they raise the questions inside Parliament they are told it is the province of the trade unions. And all this whilst the lieges are anxiously buying tallow,candles and laying in smoked ham and the like. What manner of fellow is this in Downing Streer? Has he forgotten that it was he who set out to confront the unions with much vaunted legislation? But now when the Republican Hamilton asks him in the Commons whether he will use a tiny part of it to have a ballot in the thineworkings he confesses he cannot use it. And has he forgotten how often he said that a prices aind incomes policy would not work? That could be the only one of his sayings which proved correct.
As for the Opposition leader Puzzle has watched him flounder around like an hysterical guinea fowl. Does the nation have one ounce of trust to place in him? There is little evidence of that. Yet he can only speak of obtaining an understanding with the unions by his many pointed plan. Why has this not been presented with the unions' approval before now? It is simply that there is little evidence that the unions would pay much attention to him.
Is there any wonder that Puzzle is gloomy? We have an unworkable, outdated, Socialist creed, administered by a discredited nineteenth century Manchester Liberal, being harried by a tired opposition leader whose greatest success was the sinking of the Torrey Canyon. Puzzle sometimes thinks the country would be better rid of the pair of them but the reality is that Midshipman Wilson, save some act of providence, is with us till the next..election.
The position•of the Skipper is now not so secure. Therelg always likely to be a mutiny by the Prophet Powell, and almost certainly there will be some action from that strange fellow during the next election campaign. But that is for days ahead. In the meantime Irish Willie Whitelaw has come home covered in laurel leaves, and whilst Labour people despair of replacing their little man in the near future the prospects for Irish Wille rise each day as the Prime Minister's pledges flutter to the ground like snow flakes.
And as these dire thoughts cross our minds at Westminster waiting in the wings are the Madame Tussaud alternatives: King the newsvendor, Alf — where there's muck there's brass-Robens, Whining Wyatt, Flash man Taverne, Banker Thorpe, Chef Freud, Epileptic Fit. The Demon Doctor Paisley, unknown Scotsmen and unintelligible Welshmen. Is it any wonder that Puzzle is weary ? A barren yuletide awaits us all.
Tom Puzzle
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