The Great Manny Mystery POLITICAL COMMENTARY By ALAN WATKINS Y ou

say this fellow Roebuck was involved,' said Sherlock Holmes, as we sat dozing in front of a speech by Mr Anthony Barber. 'Tell me, what kind of man is he?'

I described the young Member for Harrow East, and his well-known devotion to the Prime Minister of the day.

'He sounds a dangerous customer, and no mistake,' mused my friend. 'Is anything known of his associates?'

'Why, Holmes,' said I, 'I do believe he was once seen disembarking from a ship in Tunisia or some such place in the company of Colonel Wigg.'

Holmes's expression changed, as he absent- mindedly tapped out his pipe on Miss Alice Bacon, who happened to be passing by.

'These are deep waters,' said he. 'Clearly, we arc dealing with desperate characters who will stop at nothing. We must watch our step.'

And so, indeed, we must. The explosion in last week's party meeting was one of those phenomena of nature which periodically engulf and overwhelm the parliamentary Labour party, leaving things very much, but never quite, the same. Thursday's row raises questions about the Common Market and about the proper rale of the party meeting; in more personal terms, it raises questions about Mr Brown, Mr Shinwell, Mr Richard Crossman and Mr John Silkin, to name only the major actors. In trying to analyse what happened, it is essential not to see the con- flict in over-simple terms.

Some members of the left wing, for instance, now take up a very lofty position: the row, they say, was about whether the Government was keeping its word over Europe. Other MPs, again, profess to see the dispute as one between Executive and back-benchers, with Mr Shinwell cast in the role of some intrepid seventeenth- century parliamentarian, telling the King that he is not all-powerful. Government spokesmen naturally enough are inclined to play down these more apocalyptic interpretations. A conflict on policy or principle? Nonsense, they say.

All these versions, as we shall sec, do less than justice to the complexity of the affair. In par- ticular, they fail to take account of the question whether there was a plot. If there was a plot, was it directed against Mr Brown on the one hand, or against Mr Crossman and Mr Silkin on the other, or against the three of them? And did the plot emanate from inside or from outside the Government? Before suggesting answers to these questions—for we can de no more—it may be as well to try to piece together what actually happened at the meeting.

The story begins with Mr Stanley Orme, who asked Mr Shinwell whether it was in order for Mr Brown, as a minister, to address a rally organised by the British Council of the European Movement. Mr Brown is, as it happens, not the only minister who is well-disposed towards this organisation. The Executive of the Council in- clucks Mr Arthur Bottomley, Mr Maurice Foley, Mr Roy Hattersley, Mr Denis Healey, Mr Roy Jenkins, Mr Fred Mulley and Mrs Shirley Williams. Mr Orme had all these in mind when he asked his question. His object was to find out —or, if not to find out, at least to provoke a dis- cussion about—whether such ministers as Mr

Patrick Gordon Walker, Mr Douglas Jay and Mr Fred Peart could be similarly zealous in the anti-Market cause.

Now Mr Orme is one of the most straight- forward of left-wingers. That open countenance, those wide blue eyes, are innocent of guile. He was, no doubt, trying to embarrass the Govern- ment in a general kind of way: but that is all. However, in the Government at least it is be- lieved that Mr Shinwell knew that Mr Orme was going to ask his question. There is nothing neces- sarily sinister in this: it is common practice for a chairman of a meeting to know beforehand what questions are coming up. Yet Mr Shinwell, it seems, omitted to inform Mr Brown: this is the first official criticism of Mr ShinwelL Another criticism made inside the Government is that Mr Shinwell should have answered Mr Orme on the spot, saying, either that every minister had exactly the same rights as every other minister, or else that he would find out.

And a further criticism of Mr Shinwell—one hears this from left-wingers also—is that, having decided to permit some discussion, he ought not to have allowed Mr Brown to intervene im- mediately following Mr Orme. The debate should as it were have been thrown open to the floor, with Mr Brown being invited to say his piece at the end. Mr Brown, however, said his piece at the beginning: the burden of it was that Mr Orme had made the disgraceful imputation that, at the rally, he was going to deliver a speech contrary to Government policy. In fact, of course, Mr Orme had imputed nothing of the kind. The opinion of many who were at the meeting was that Mr Brown knew this perfectly well and was merely performing his well-known party piece of pretending to be angry.

After Mr Brown, Mr Roy Roebuck delivered what was described as 'a right-wing anti-Com- mon Market speech.' Mr Roebuck has for some months been acting as a kind of parliamentary private secretary to Mr George Wigg, which may or may not turn out to be of some significance. Following Mr Roebuck came Mr Carol John- son, a former secretary to the parliamentary Labour party. Mr Johnson can on most occasions

be relied upon to reduce the liveliest meeting to a condition of abject and stupefied boredom. On this occasion, however, his special brand of oratorical magic failed of its effect. The sleeping- spell did not work. On the contrary, Mr John- son literally brought the meeting to its feet by observing innocently that all Mr. Brown was doing was supporting agreed Government policy. There were cries of `No, no,' Mr Crossman tried to point out that someone had already moved 'next business' and Mr Shinwell shouted that 'I am not going to be dictated to by you, Cross- man,' or words to this effect.

So much, then, for what happened. And it should already be clear that one story, assiduously propagated during the past week, does not bear serious examination: this is the story that Mr Shinwell courageously 'raised' the Common Market question. Mr Shinwell did nothing of the kind. The question was raised by Mr Orme. Mr Shinwell's contribution was so to handle the meeting as to cause the maximum embarrassment to the Government, in particular to Mr Crossman and Mr Silkin who are to some degree held responsible by Mr Wilson for what goes on in the parliamentary party. Mr Shinwell is, surely, too old a hand to allow this kind of occurrence to come about by inadvertence or even solely by indignation, however righteous. Why did he do it? It is, I suggest, necessary to separate two subjects—the Common Market, and the new, liberal, Crossman-Silkin regime at Westminster.

Mr Shinwell's views on the Common Market are well known. There is no secret about them. What is not so widely known, however, is that Dr Thomas Balogh, the Prime Minister's economic adviser, is also against British en-try into the Market, and that Dr Balogh was first introduced to the mysteries of British politics, which have exercised such a fascination for him ever since, as speechwriter to Mr Shinwell. Again, Mr Wigg is opposed to the Market, and Mr Wigg is also a close friend of Mr Shinwell.

Oddly enough, Mr Crossman and Mr Silkin are also dubious, to say the least, about the Common Market. However, they have collided with Mr Shinwell over party discipline and con- nected matters. Last summer, it will be remem- bered, there was much talk of expelling from the parliamentary party the rebels on the Prices and Incomes Bill. Mr Shinwell was one of those who wanted blood. Mr Wigg, an old soldier, was also insistent that something should be done in the interests of good order and parliamentary dis- cipline. Mr Silkin would have none of it. And this is not all. For in the past few months it has become apparent that Mr Crossman has been exercising rather more influence with the Prime Minister, and Mr Wigg rather less; and, naturally enough, Mr Wigg has come to resent this.

Certainly all this is not to say that there was any plot or conspiracy by Dr Balogh, Mr Shin- well and Mr Wigg to embarrass Mr Crossman or Mr Silkin, or to make things difficult for Mr Brown. As far as I know, the three of them have never sat down to plot anything. Yet it remains possible to see the events of a week ago as an aspect of the battle for the ear of the Prime Minister. At Westminster, Mr Crossman and Mr Silkin have superseded Mr Shinwell; in White- hall, Mr Crossman is gaining over Mr Wigg.

'And now,' said Sherlock Holmes, 'I see we have a visitor,' as an old gentleman with a large nose and a double-breasted suit of old-fashioned cut was shown into our sitting-room. 'Mon general,' said he to our strange guest, 'I take it you wish to discuss re:flake Shinwell. Pray be seated, and I will tell you all I know.'