These were days of intense manoeuvring between the parties and their Whips. But I refused to engage in it. David Steel, the Liberal Party Leader, had already indicated that he might be prepared to keep Labour in power if the terms and conditions were judged right. Legislation for direct elections to the European Assembly on a proportional representation basis, ‘industrial democracy’ and tax reform were the topics publicly mentioned, but no one believed that the Liberals’ decision as to whether or not to support the Labour Government would be determined by secondary issues. For the Liberals there were two large questions they had to answer. Would they be blamed for keeping an unpopular Government in power? Or would they be credited with moderating its policies? I did not myself believe that they would sign up to a pact with the Government — certainly not unless there was a formal coalition with several Liberals as Cabinet ministers, which it was difficult to imagine the left of the Labour Party being prepared to tolerate.
In fact, my calculation of the political equation was broadly correct; but I left out the crucial element of vanity. Although the Lib-Lab Pact did the Liberals a good deal of harm, while doing Jim Callaghan no end of good, it did allow Liberal Party spokesmen the thrilling illusion that they were important.
After the vote on the Opposition Motion of No Confidence I was attacked in some quarters for not having been prepared to offer some kind of deal to the Liberals. But I was untempted by this beforehand and unrepentant afterwards. The undignified attempts to gain Liberal support for a minority Conservative Government after the February 1974 defeat conclusively showed the dangers. Moreover, it would be hard enough to drag the left wing of the Conservative Party and sections of the present Shadow Cabinet into supporting the measures which I knew would be required in government to set Britain right, without the burden of arrangements with the irresponsible eccentrics of the Liberal Party.
There was, of course, even less prospect of winning the support of the Nationalist parties, now that we had turned our back on devolution. The conservative-minded Ulster Unionists should have supported us. In Airey Neave and me they knew that they had strong supporters of the Union. Their demand for extra parliamentary seats at Westminster to make up for the Province’s under-representation was likely to be supported by any Government, because the case on grounds of equity was so strong. But the Unionists’ general resentment of the Heath Government’s abolition of Stormont — the devolved government that ran Ulster from 1920 to 1972, which they had dominated — and the personal bitterness of Enoch Powell, who was now representing South Down for the Unionists, meant that we could not in practice rely on their support.
In fact, there was very little that could be done by us to influence the vote. The minority parties would decide where they stood according to whether they thought that a general election was in their interests or not. In assessing that, each would look to the opinion polls. These suggested that a Conservative Government with an overall majority would be elected, which would greatly reduce the ability of a few disparate individuals to influence Government policy.
I was told some hours before I was due to propose the No Confidence Motion in the House that the Liberals would support the Government. I was astonished that they had signed up to such a bad deal. The pact would apparently last initially for the rest of the parliamentary session. The Liberals would not be members of the Government, but would liaise with individual ministers and send representatives to a joint consultative committee chaired by Michael Foot, the Leader of the House. The Government gave undertakings on direct elections to the European Assembly and devolution (accepting free votes on PR), promised to find time for a Liberal Bill on homelessness and agreed to limit the scope of planned legislation on local authority direct-labour organizations. It was a lacklustre shopping list. But, knowing that we were looking at certain defeat, with all the recriminations which would follow from the press and our supporters, it drained me of inspiration.
Angus Maude had helped me with the drafting of the speech. We decided to make it very short. In fact, it was too short. Moreover, it had been drafted when it seemed that we might be facing an immediate general election, so that positive statements of our policies had appeared preferable to detailed attacks on the Government’s. It received the worst press of any speech I have given. Of course, if I had read out the Westminster telephone directory and we had won at the end of the day no one would have bothered. But in politics, as in life, the ‘ifs’ offer no consolation. As I drove back to Flood Street later that night it was not my poor reception in the House or even the Government’s majority of twenty-four which most depressed me. It was the fact that after all our efforts the chance to begin turning Britain round seemed no nearer than before.
CHAPTER X
Détente or Defeat?
Foreign policy and visits 1975–1979
EUROPE
The first major political challenge I faced on becoming Leader was the referendum on Britain’s membership of the European Economic Community, promised by Labour in Opposition as a way of keeping their party together. For a number of reasons I would have preferred a challenge on some other topic. Europe was very much Ted’s issue. He considered that his greatest achievement was to take Britain into the EEC and, now that he had lost the leadership, it was only natural that he would engage even more passion in the cause. As had become evident during the leadership campaign, there was some suspicion that I was less enthusiastic. Compared with Ted, perhaps, that was true. But I did genuinely believe that it would be foolish to leave the Community; I thought it provided an economic bond with other Western European countries, which was of strategic significance; and above all I welcomed the larger opportunities for trade which membership gave. I did not, however, see the European issue as a touchstone for everything else. Although I thought it best for Britain to stay inside the Community and make the best we could of it, I could equally well understand others who, on balance, took a contrary view. It did not seem to me that high-flown rhetoric about Britain’s European destiny, let alone European identity, was really to the point, though I had on occasion to employ a little on public platforms. For all these reasons, I was more than happy for Ted to take the leading public role on our side in the referendum campaign and for Willie to be the Conservative Vice-President of ‘Britain in Europe’ — the ‘Yes’ campaign organization which was set up in cooperation with pro-European Labour MPs and the Liberals, and of which Con O’Neill and later Roy Jenkins was President.
This arrangement had two advantages and two disadvantages. The advantages were that, though I would make some high-profile public appearances at the beginning and end of the campaign, I would have time for other things; and secondly, that the most committed Europeans of the Party would be able to throw all their energies into the front line. The two disadvantages, which perhaps I should have foreseen, were that Ted’s appetite for a return to power would be whetted, and that the forces inside and outside the Conservative Party which were determined to get rid of me would seek to use the all-party coalition campaigning for a ‘Yes’ vote as the nucleus of a movement for a coalition of the ‘centre’.