GOING TO THE COUNTRY MR HEATH FACES RISKS IN CALL FOR EARLY ELECTION

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33423, 3 January 1974, Page 8

GOING TO THE COUNTRY MR HEATH FACES RISKS IN CALL FOR EARLY ELECTION

'Reprinted from the "Economist" I December 22] by arrangement. I

Mr Heath is being urged to call an early General Election. He may have to, but it would be taking quite a risk. The talk among M.P.s this week has been as much about an early, or emergency. General Election as about the country’s economic and industrial problems. The possibility that Mr Heath might eventually have to hold an election on the who-governs-Britain issue has existed ever since his Government began to enact its industrial relations legislation, and each subsequent confrontation with the union militants has intensified that worry.

For an increasing, al-' though still fairly small,: number of M.P.s the possi-• bility hardened into near-1 certainty when Mr Heath had to announce a three-day 1 working week for industry and commerce as a result of the miners’ and train drivers’ overtime bans last week. And when Mr Barber’s' financial statement proved much less rugged than many! had feared, and some had hoped, on Monday, even the more level-headed in all three parties were looking up their diaries for the first practicable date for polling day after the new register of electors comes into force in February. It is Thursday, February 28. But it is not yet worth a bet — either way. [Even the postponement of 'Mr Heath’s visit to China [next month is no indication 'that he has set his mind on going to the country instead. Union domination Among sensible Tories.' the argument for an early! election is basically that it' will bring forward, and make more likely, the most desirable result of the election irrespective of its date. That result is not that the trade unions should be humiliated, or that the Labour Party should be shattered as it was in 1931. What the best Tories would like to see — and so, in their hearts, would some on the Labour, benches also — is a Labour; defeat, which is both bad enough to shake the party

and is manifestly because of the actions of the militants who now dominate the largest, and some of the most important, unions, and the irrelevant Left-wing policies they have inflicted on the Labour Party. It is that domination which must be broken, not the unions themselves, and it is as much in the interests of social democracy as it is in the interests of the country and the Tory Party that it should be done. As Mr Jim Conway, the general secretary of the Amalgamated Union of Engineering Workers, who'is in a position 10 know, wrote earlier this month:

I have never known a militant progressive socialist with an original constructive idea in his head. At all times destructive policies flow from them. One idea permeates their thinking — destroy ... where militant progressives take over, the destruction of the Labour movement follows as night follows day . . . the time has come when to serve the Labour Party we must challenge the arrogance and hysteria of this minority.

The militants have obtained their positions of destructive power through the apa[thy of the overwhelming , (majority of ordinary trade ' union members, and through ! the timidity, and often the mediocrity, of the more; moderate leaders. They will not be easily dislodged, and a Tory government, even one which had the backing of a majority of the electorate, could not do it alone. It is a task primarily for the moderate men and women in the Labour Party, and even given the will, and a change of leadership, it will take at least a Parliament for the moderates working at all levels in the trade unions and the Labour Party to ;have a real effect. It may be [ that not enough Labour poli-I ■ ticians will find the determi-1 to fight until the[militants have wrecked a Labour government itself, as (they came very close to; doing to Mr Wilson’s Government over trade union reform in 1969. The country ■ itself would then have to be mobilised, and that would be a depressing prospect for de- ; mocracy. It would be better' for Labour to cure its own ■ sickness before it is too late. |1 Public reaction ,

But it is arguable whether an early General Election, even if unavoidable, would do very much to help. Of course, it depends on whether the miners and the engine drivers continue their industrial action and force the country into a three - day week in the New Year, and on what the public’s reaction will be if they do. Neither the miners nor the enginemen have won much sympathy for their claims or their actions, but it does not follow that the public is pre-. pared to fight them. Mr Barber may well ask — following Churchill — the national television audience: “What sort of people do they think we are?” If anyone really knew the answer the problems would be considerably simplified. The fact is that' no one can predict with any-, thing approaching assurance in the pre - Christmas period whom the country will turn against, the miners or the Government, after how many weeks of short - time working, bankruptcies and growing unemployment. But that public reaction is precisely what would decide the timing of the election; it is a decision which always has to be taken some weeks in advance. Yet it is not inconceivable that if the miners are still obdurate by, say, mid - January, Mr Heath might feel he has no other course but to hold a real emergency election before the new register come; into force. Even if a clear j majority of the electorate is; willing to fight the miners,! it is a nice question how; long the country could af-i ford to. Certainly, if the; Government fights the!

miners for five or six weeks and then caves in the electoral consequences will be even worse than the economic ones. So there are Tories who would argue for mid - January, particuarly if they think the Government cannot afford to be as resolute as the miners. If Mr Heath has to go to the country at all in the New Year that would be the time to do it: the short-time working would have begun to bite but it would not have inflicted intolerable personal hardships. Long-term cost But there are two dangers in that scenario. The first is that in the weeks of the election campaign, as the short-time working became progressively more dam aging, Mr Wilson would claim that he could get everyone back to work at far less immediate cost to the country than Mr Heath's obduracy; Mr Gormley, Mr Jones and Mr Scanlon would back him up, without doubt. That was why Mr Heath put the question to Mr Wilson on Tuesday: “How much?” He got no answer.

’ Of course, the long-term cost of a Labour victory on Mr Wilson’s terms would be appalling, but it might well prove attractive, and not only to a bemused electorate. For undermining Mr Heath all the time would be those industrialists, led by Lord Kearton, who believe the miners can never be fought but must always be bought off at the lowest price possible. An emergency election could give the result the country needs: the breathing space of another five years for Mr Heath to make his economic and European strategy work, and an opportunity for Labour’s moderates to decide their future. Even so, the result of such an election could also be very destructive. : But if the worst is never (to happen in British politics (it will not come to that. The (miners could decide Mr ; Heath is not bluffing this ■ time and respond to Mr Willson's: appeal and to pressure from the General Council of the Trades Union Congress. They could decide to hold a ballot on the Coal Board’s offer and stop their overtime ban before an emergency (election could be called. If ■ they did that without [breaching Stage three what would be the Government’s excuse for an early election? Risk of freeze Some Conservative leaders [very close to Mr Heath still [argue forcefully that the l country invariably sees through the motives of a government which calls a General Election far earlier than necessary. And how would it be necessary if the miners went back to work and Stage three was viable? There was nothing in Mr Barber’s package to require a fresh mandate. On the other hand, if Mr Heath passes up his mid - January window, the miners are brought back to work and Stage three is destroyed the demand then would be for a total freeze. To go to the country for a mandate for another freeze would be a breathtaking risk.

Of course, all these considerations discount the Lib eral presence. The Liberal Party has little to say in the present crisis, and the only way Mr Jeremy Thorpe makes the front pages is by being forced by his non - parliamentary colleagues to give up all his directorships in the immoral world of business. It makes the Liberal revival and the party’s by-election victories of the past year more irrelevant than ever to the solution of Britain’s real problems. But perhaps the British people, like the Danes, want to be irrelevant at this time; in the absence of concrete evidence to the contrary it would be running a very fair risk to assume that they do not. It might, therefore, be rather more sensible all round to hold the by-election in South Worcestershire first.