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PROFILE: EDWARD HEATH A TORY LEADER BRIT AIN ' S PUBLIC DOES NOT WARM TO

(By

SIMON KAVANAUGH)

“Ted’s a fellow I’d go tiger-hunting with,” approved Prime Minister Harold Macmillan after the then Chief Whip Edward Heath had somehow managed to prevent the British Tory party from tearing itself apart over Suez.

Since then Ted Heath has taken Macmillan's place as Tory party leader. Since then, too, he has tried to convince the rest of the nation that he is a tiger-hunting man. The venture has been one of his rare failures. Partly because whatever sterling qualities Heath possesses showmanship is not one of them; largely because he just is not the exciting, electnfyingly adventurous man that Macmillan’s description might suggest.

Edward Richard George Heath is, as his solid Christian names and his plump, healthy features suggest, an honest, hard-working, goodwilled middle-class Englishman. He is a conservative as well as a Conservative. He is, at 54, the sort of man with whom the majority of Britons would feel comfortable were he in power. It is television that has pushed Heath into contortions of tough and thrilling public adventures—his recent ocean racing victory in Australia being the most triumphant of them—and caused the public to wonder uneasily whether they can countenance the man they see on their screens as their next Prime Minister.

Personality Contest For television politics—party political broadcasts and eyeball to eyeball interviews —have plastered Heath’s (toothy smile, plummy voice (and measured bonhomie across the screens of every (sitting room in the country, j His actual policies get pushed into the background;; (they are not radically differ-; ent from those of the present government. His straightforward personal qualities are ignored: they do not show on the screen. What ;does show is that as a television personality he falls short of Simon Dee: as the embodiment of tough sincerity he cannot measure up to David Frost. The opinion polls may point unwaveringly to a Tory victory at the next election, but what sort of entry will Britain then have for the Eurovision Premier’s Personality Contest? It would be different if Heath were married. A family man is warm and empathetic. While he is slapping sixpence on the price of beer and cigarettes and [freezing our earnings for 12 months we can be sure he is 'kind to his children. But a bachelor has to be a Pierre Trudeau to get by, a hint of the playboy, a dash of the; lady-killer. It just is not Ted; Heath's bag.

Cultural Activities Where Ted falls short as family man and playboy he! has tried to make up as; sportsman and culture vul-l ture. It is not a pose. Heath is an outdoor type and looks it, and he won an organ scholarship to Oxford. But he [has used these interests—unwillingly one suspects to make himself appear more [interesting, more human. Unfortunately rather than (making him appear more relaxed and outgoing, his activities —his annual conducting of a small Kent Christmas choir, the couple of days spent sailing in Newport when visiting Washington “to recover from the air journey”—look more like publicity stunts than the less spontaneous activities of slicker politicians. Heath has come a long way since his childhood as a builder’s son in Broadstairs, Kent, and he has travelled conventionally. Perhaps he has not come far enough to feel entirely at ease among the complacent, slightly arrogant element that is still a strong minority among his party’s supporters. Heath went to Chatham House, a worthy Grammar School in Broadstairs. He was clever, devout and serious, a schoolboy to be admired and respected but not. perhaps, | easily befriended. Throughout his life he has never appeared to have any really! close friends. Shadow Dispelled At Oxford he swiftly established himself as a solid Con(servative. Chairman of the (Oxford Conservative Union (and President of the Oxford

Union in 1939, everything pointed to a successful political career—except his lower middle-class background. “He is a fine boy, unspoiled and clever,” said his schoolmaster at the time. “I can only hope the snobbery of this age in which we live, will cast no shadow on his! career.” The outbreak of war dispelled the shadow and provided Heath with the chance ( to succeed on merit. This he! did, rising to the rank ofi Lieutenant - Colonel in the classless artillery, winning an M.B.E. and mentions in despatches on the way. After the war Heath donned bowler hat and dark suit and entered the Civil Service with the top examinations pass of his year. As a city gent and, off-duty, a tweeded country rambler, Heath looked then to have reached his spiritual zenith. Beneath the reserve lay a keen mind and an ambitious professionalism. He left the Civil Service to join a leading merchant bank and, in 1950, he entered Parliament as Tory M.P. for Bexley, a solid stockbroker-belt (London suburb, next-door to Macmillan’s similar seat of I Bromley. Political Successes

Within five years he was his party’s Chief Whip. During the Suez crisis, he proved his strength by shackling the Tories together, telling one “rebel” Tory, with uncharacteristic venom: “You know what you are? You're nothing but a bloody Fascist.” Instinctively deploring provocation and extremes, Heath has been an unswerving Conservative since his Oxford days. But he is not blindly loyal. Whilst Chairman of the Ox-ford Tories he canvassed for an Independent Socialist against the official Tory candidate for Parliament. Quintin Hogg, now a shadow cabinet colleague. Heath could not stomach the Tories’ appeasement at Munich. Heath underlined his toughness, and began to be mentioned as a future Tory leader, when as Labour Minister in 1960 he averted a rail strike and won the gratitude of several hundred thousand i commuters. In 1965 he was elected Con-

servative Party Leader, his steady undespairing spadework on Britain's future entry to the Common Market fresh in his party’s minds. Like Mr Harold Wilson, he is a meritocrat. He mistrusts the more flamboyant elements (of Conservative politics: the eccentricities and arrogances. He is a professional and (trusts professionals, j Like Wilson, Heath has (little private life. On his (yacht, Morning Cloud, he has a ship-to-shore radio on which he makes contact with his central office several times a day when sailing. Unlike Wilson, he cannot appear to the public to be just like them. Edward Heath’s bachelor flat in the Victorian-flavoured Albany off Piccadilly; his organ playing; his membership of the Carlton and Bucks, “Establishment” clubs; (even his yachting and the “Royal” yachting clubs to which he belongs: these tend to set him apart from his voters far more than the aristocratic extremes of Macmillan and Sir Alec DouglasHome. ( The bulky sailor’s jersey sand shorts he wears sailing, and his ready, if uneasy, friendliness contribute less to his image than his avowal that he structures his leisure and refuses to think of poliItics while he sails; that he prepared for his ocean racing victory by painstaking and thorough planning. Heath has no ’identifiable human faults or weaknesses. A recent poll showed that over threequarters of all British voters approved of a political leader playing some sport. But only one in ten thought any the better of Edward Heath for it.

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Permanent link to this item

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19700205.2.69

Bibliographic details

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32214, 5 February 1970, Page 10

Word Count
1,197

PROFILE: EDWARD HEATH A TORY LEADER BRIT AIN'S PUBLIC DOES NOT WARM TO Press, Volume CX, Issue 32214, 5 February 1970, Page 10

PROFILE: EDWARD HEATH A TORY LEADER BRIT AIN'S PUBLIC DOES NOT WARM TO Press, Volume CX, Issue 32214, 5 February 1970, Page 10