Best of his bad job
Geoffrey Rippon, naturally and sensibly enough, is making the best of a bad job, trying to make good news out of what is becoming very bad news. He smiles all around, as if he had no doubts whatever. Since he is no fool, he must certainly have plenty of doubts. He cannot but know of the uncommitted nature of the Cabinet; of the notable coolness of virtually the entire sub- cabinet-level Administration; of the marked and growing hostility towards the Common Market within the Conservative party re- search department; of a wobbliness (putting it no higher) in Central Office itself; and of spreading disenchantment among the erst- while eager pro-Common Marketeers.
Rippon himself, I gather, has now effec- tively abandoned all hopes he may once have entertained of securing the crucial favour- able parliamentary decision about his terms before the summer recess. It is a bit of a toss-up whether Rippon (who is in danger of emerging, much to his political discom- fort, as the biggest arch-marketeer of them all, except perhaps for Roy Jenkins, who hardly counts) would really prefer the public to take a good look at his final negotiated terms before the recess, or after the TUC and Labour and Tory party conferences. Per-
haps he wants the terms to appear in be- tween, hoping that thereby they might sink without perceptible trace, lost in the midst of the silly summer season.
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