Chapter 27 First happy and confident morning

On Tuesday, June 23, 1970, at about 11 o'clock in the morning, I came to Downing Street in the new minister's car. My colleagues and I were interviewed by journalists and TV reporters at the gate of No. 10 Downing Street.The waiting room of the Prime Minister's Mansion was filled with enthusiastic laughter.We walked into the cabinet meeting room one after another at a pleasant pace.Ted Heath, with the Cabinet Secretary Sir Burke Trend beside him, was waiting for us there, and I took my seat at the Cabinet table.But the Ministry of Education and Science is still on my mind, at least as much as the big strategic questions facing the government.As I'm going to say, I can't get rid of these problems, maybe they occupy too much place in my mind.But it's not just because it's my first Cabinet meeting, I think, I think we all agree, that it's a defining moment in the life of the country.

One felt that Ted himself was doing everything in his power to justify.His tone was impulsive when he announced his intentions for a new type of administration and a new way of doing business, as did he when he introduced our election manifesto, the foundational document of our campaign, before the elections just past.He emphasizes deliberation and avoids haste and recklessness.This is to make a clean break with the past and start everything again. Moreover, the new official took office three times, and he proposed many new measures. The tone of Ted's speech was exactly what we all expected.He firmly believed that as long as the government adopted the right procedures, the organization was sound, and the people made appropriate, high-quality professional advice and adopted it properly, politicians with open minds were able to solve fundamental problems. sexual issues.Based on this point of view, the Central Policy Review Department headed by Victor Rothschild was established in the autumn of that year, which enabled the government to reorganize more rationally (including the establishment of a huge Ministry of Environmental Protection), and also established a program analysis and review system. .More comprehensively, he said, it inspired confidence in the government's ability to steer and control the situation, which turned out to be too much.

Of course, this perception of mine is largely an afterthought.I am not a member of the key agency economic policy committee in the cabinet, although I do sometimes attend meetings when teacher salaries and school spending are discussed.When the most austere and complicated policy of statutory prices and incomes was in place--which our Manifesto called for to shun--I frequently attended and addressed the special committee on wages, chaired by Terrence Higgins.Of course, I wasn't part of Ted's inner circle who made most of the important decisions.After a year of the Heath government until its conclusion, the role of the cabinet itself was generally less important.The details of these years, therefore, await Ted Heath's own memoirs.

However, I say this to illustrate the situation and not to shirk responsibility.As a cabinet member, I must take full responsibility for the work I do under the authority of the government.When I look back on this experience 20 years later (including more than a decade when I was Prime Minister), I can see more clearly that Ted Heath - an honest man, rightly or wrongly, he The strength of his personality made him indomitable and walked the path he wanted to go.Over time, he made mistakes not just once but many times.His mistakes - our mistakes, because we all followed him - have done enormous damage to the Conservative Party and the country.But it's also easy to understand the pressure he's under.

It should not be forgotten that between the spring of 1972 and February 1974, Ted pursued policies strongly advocated by the most influential commentators and widely supported by the public.The Nixon administration in the United States took a broadly similar approach, as did other European countries.There were courageous and far-sighted critics who proved to be correct, but they were surrounded by enemies and alone.Despite my growing reservations, at this stage I am not yet one of them. However, some of us have learned from these mistakes (although Ted probably never has).Only after I became leader of the Conservative Party did I understand why Enoch Powell and a few other brave Conservative backbenchers protested the successive U-turns in government policy.They claim: "If you're looking for someone to pick up principles that have been trampled in the mud, you shouldn't be looking for those who have trampled them." But Enoch was wrong.In the words of Rudyard Kipling, Keith Joseph and I "had countless lessons":

Let's honestly admit, as a plea as actual nations ought to do; We have countless lessons; These lessons will be of great benefit to us. In this sense, our subsequent success is due to our knowledge of the inside and recognition of our early failures.The Heath government in particular teaches us that the socialist policies pursued by Conservative politicians, if anything, have been more disastrous than those pursued by Labor politicians.Collectivism is an unattractive creed if it is not compensated by the idealistic scent of egalitarianism. How could this happen?I've briefly set out some background.Although we are credited with the Selden Park Declaration, our policies are far less thoughtful than they appear.This is especially true when it comes to economic policy.We have no clear theory of inflation and the role of wages in inflation.Without such a theory, we are blinded to the idea that inflation is a direct consequence of higher wages and union power.Thus, we are relentlessly pushed to control income and prices.

And Ted was impatient.I also have this characteristic, I am often impatient with people.But I know — partly, of course, from seeing what happened under Ted — that, broadly speaking, it will take patience to develop an effective policy that leads to long-term change.Patience is especially needed if you insist on a non-interventionist economic policy that focuses on developing a mechanism rather than a plan. This was the case under Ted's administration in 1970 and my administration in 1979.Since the implementation of new policies takes a long time to see results, a sudden change of direction will have a devastating impact on the credibility of the strategy. To be proud, on the one hand, it left some embarrassing problems, including a large number of strange 180-degree turns. What Ted said in 1970 when he introduced his campaign manifesto came back to haunt him:

Once a decision has been made and a policy formulated, the Prime Minister and his colleagues should have the courage to carry it out with determination.Nothing in the world is more harmful to the UK than the constant rollback and tinkering of policy that we have seen in recent years. On another level, however, from day-to-day experience in government, the explanation for what happens is to be found in the things themselves, in the forces that beset us and our reactions to them.We used to think we were prepared enough to face these problems.But this is not the case.We were gradually blown off course by the wind, until, struggling in despair, we tore up our maps, threw away our compasses, and sailed under a new flag, but the helmsman remained the same, and he still believed in his voyage, and set sail again to Uncharted, reef-strewn seas.

The turbulence came very quickly.Plagued by a national dockworkers strike, the government was forced to declare a state of emergency within weeks of taking office.A court of inquiry was also established to find a costly solution.While the strike resolved it within two weeks, it's hard to say whether it was a victory. Next month's crisis is international. On Sunday, September 6, terrorists from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine hijacked four planes (none of which were British) and demanded that they fly to Jordan.Three of the planes were successfully hijacked.But on the fourth plane, which was flying from Israel to London, the hijackers were overpowered by security personnel.The surviving hijacker, Leila Khalid, was arrested at Heathrow Airport.

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine demanded her release.Just before the cabinet meeting on Wednesday 9 September, they hijacked a British plane to apply more pressure.The plane was on its way to Beirut when we were meeting.It was stated to the Cabinet that we had acquiesced to the US proposal to release Leila Khalid in exchange for the release of the hostages.During the next few weeks, while negotiating, the cabinet discussed this issue many times.During this time, Jordan itself was caught in a war at home, as King Hussein fought against the Palestinians for control of his country, and the Syrians invaded and occupied large swathes of their northern land.Ted refused to side with King Hussein and get involved, affirming that we were right to negotiate with the PFLP.Although the release of Khalid was something we didn't want to see, a deal was finally struck and all the hostages were released, although the hijacked plane was blown up by terrorists, King Hussein reluctantly It has successfully withstood the "Black September" event again.

But by then our government had taken a blow from which we may never have fully recovered. In mid-July, Ian McLeod was admitted to the hospital due to minor abdominal surgery.The operation was successful and he returned to the 11th to rest for a few days after the operation. At midnight on Monday, July 20, my phone rang. It was Francis Pym, the Tory parliamentary warden.He said Ted told him to call all cabinet members that Ian died that night of a heart attack.He was only 56 years old. I personally feel devastated.Because I have always felt that Ian is a generous and kind person when I work with him.I know that he gave me the opportunity to show my talents, so that I entered the shadow cabinet and then entered the real cabinet.But at the same time, I also realized immediately that we had lost our most astute and intelligent politicians and our best communicators.I don't know how Ian would behave if he were Chancellor of the Exchequer.But if one admits, as I have and do, that the biggest mistakes in economic policy have come from Ted's repression of the Treasury; one can reasonably assume that things might have been better if Ian had been alive.Tony Barber succeeded him.Tony Barber was a man of great ability, but his time at the Treasury was, on the whole, not a pleasant one.The economic problems of the ensuing years arose from this change of office.While Tony may have good financial flair, Ian is far stronger politically. The cabinet meeting after Ian MacLeod's death was dull.The Cabinet table was filled almost exclusively with my colleagues for the next four and a half years.Their personal qualities will be severely tested.Tony Barber was an old friend of mine as a lawyer, though not particularly close.He's a capable tax lawyer, but he's not the type to stand up against Ted.Reggie Modlin served as Home Secretary until his resignation in 1972 due to the Poulsen incident.He has always had an interest and distinct views on economic policy.By contrast, he is less than happy with his new role.He's still extremely competent in business, but he's unlikely to rise up against any backtracking toward increased government intervention in economic policies.In fact, he has always advocated this policy. alec.Douglas-Home was restored to his former post at the Foreign Office without difficulty.Before long, however, the Foreign Office will have to go to great lengths to deliver on the promises we made as the Opposition to lift the arms embargo on South Africa and to find a way we can afford to keep the British garrison east of Suez .He can no longer be as involved in domestic politics as he was in the shadow cabinet.Quentin Hailsham got his wish and became Speaker of the House of Lords, a position he held for a long time under Ted and after me.During his tenure in the role, he managed to combine his usual sense of mischief and showmanship with the House of Lords' tradition of decency.Peter.Carrington was Secretary of State for Defence, and he took up the office which suited him with aplomb.I knew he was close to Ted.Their relationship became even closer after he became party chairman and energy minister.He played a key role in dealing with the final miners' strike.The strike led to early elections in February 1974.He is a core member of Ted. On the contrary, although Keith Joseph is a senior member of the cabinet and his opinions have always been valued, he is certainly not a member of the cabinet core.And, as far as I know, he was never invited to the Inner Circle.After his appointment as social affairs minister, it was the side of compassionate social reform that first came to his mind, rather than his more conservative economic convictions, although he remained profoundly distrustful of totalism of any kind.Because of his enthusiasm.It was his task to tackle the cyclical poverty that impoverished generations.Like me, Keith was in charge of a high-spending social sector, so there was a natural conflict between spending on his (like me) priorities and demands for austerity in public spending.Whether by accident or design, Ted excluded the two most conservative members of his cabinet on economic issues from decision-making on economic issues, leaving economic decisions to those with whom he could exert the most influence. John Davies, ex-Director General of the Confederation of British Industry, (who knew nothing about politics when he was called up as Technology Secretary after Ian MacLeod's death) must have been in economic policymaking circles people.I liked John, in fact I later appointed him to a position in the shadow cabinet.But even his most ardent admirers find it difficult to defend his handling of the turbulent industrial politics that is now his job.John also represented the business community, due to Ted's underlying totalist sense that business had a role to play in government. Robert Carr, the employment secretary, is the third key figure in charge of economic strategy under Ted after Tony Heber and John Davies.He's a lot older than me, and we have different perspectives and personalities.He was rigid, but a decent, hard-working guy.He has the difficult, and reasonably impossible, task of trying to make flawed industrial relations laws work.He has the reputation of being on the left of the Conservative Party, but that hasn't helped as much as it might have been thought.Trade unionists think the Tory left is not more sympathetic, but less outspoken.As Employment Secretary during the First Coal Miners' Strike (1972) and Home Secretary during the Second Coal Miners' Strike (1974), few people have faced greater hardship during these events. One man who had more difficulty was Willie Whitelaw.He went on as Leader of the House of Commons, Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, and finally Employment Secretary during the three-day week.Willie belonged to the war generation, and there seemed to be little in common between the two of us, and certainly neither of us imagined that our political lives would be so closely linked.Because the Ministry of Education did not need to make many legislations at that time, we had little contact at work.But I've come to realize that Willie is an intelligent and convincing character.His manner and ability made him an excellent leader of the House of Commons.At the end of that administration, his judgment and quality made him second only to Ted in his role.However, Willie's candid public image belied his astute political skills and gift for manipulating people. After the untimely death of Ian McLeod.Geoffrey Ripon was in charge of negotiating the accession to the European Economic Community.Although we appeared to have similar backgrounds — we had both been presidents of the Oxford Conservative Party Society, we had both been lawyers — the two of us were never close.I always get the feeling that he manages to overwhelm his opponents with the strength of his personality rather than with the strength of his arguments.This may be due to the fact that Ted gave him the task of trying to get the best quid pro quo with the EC - a quid pro quo that is not always in our best long-term interests, and over time As time went on, we became more and more aware of this problem. It was my impression that two of Ted's most trusted cabinet members were Jim.Pryor and Peter Walker.They were all loyal to Ted.Jim was Ted's parliamentary private secretary when the Conservative Party was in opposition, while Peter was the organizer of Ted's 1965 Conservative leadership election and Jim was Secretary of State for Agriculture.His farm roots and ruddy complexion helped him get the job.Thereafter, in April 1972, he served as Deputy Chairman of the Conservative Party under the leadership of Peter Carrington.Peter Walker's passion for modernizing British institutions brought him closer to Ted.He soon became minister of the huge new Ministry of the Environment.At this point he was aggressively pushing his most unpopular local government reforms until I introduced the community tax.His reforms created even worse bureaucracy.He later moved to another large institution, the Ministry of Trade and Industry.Both Jim and Peter are younger than me, and Peter is younger.But both had far greater influence on the general direction of government, and although their political views were very different from mine, I admired both their loyalty to Ted and their political energy. Other members of the cabinet are Scottish Secretary Gordon Campbell, Lord Seal and Lord Lord George Jericho, Welsh Secretary and party chairman Bird.Thomas was my close neighbor and friend in Parliament, and Michael Nobel was for a time Secretary of State for Trade and Industry.These members did not play a significant role in Cabinet discussions.So I found out that there was only one political friend in the Cabinet - Keith.Although my relations with other Cabinet members were generally polite and pleasant, I knew that we were not congenial friends.No doubt they also understood this.This often manifests itself more clearly in casual conversation and inspired responses than in debate.I don't want to occupy a lot of strategic positions in the cabinet because of the huge difficulties I'm having in the Ministry of Education. Ted took full control of the cabinet and was unchallenged.He won the 1970 election against everyone's expectations, and in large part on a campaign of personal character.We understand this, and so does he.Furthermore, it was against his nature and out of character to argue on the basis of fundamental principles.Until 1972-1973, and until the U-turn, Ted's cabinet remained united, at least in part, simply by acknowledging that, as prime minister, he had the authority to exercise the program. Count on support.However, once the program itself was abandoned in favor of general interventionism, the atmosphere deteriorated.This deterioration does not manifest itself in dissent but in occasional complaints.We know we're in trouble.