"I had two heroes in politics: Macmillan and Roy Jenkins. Macmillan, because he controlled to a very great extent Britain’s decline in power and was responsible for our adjustment in straitened circumstances – something he managed despite a party of fools.
"My admiration for Roy Jenkins was based on the fact that as a young Labour MP he would advocate the cause of Europe in cross-party meetings, and he advocated brilliantly."
One way of seeing the whole Brexit episode is as the fools' revenge on Macmillan.
The average Conservative MP has not an ounce of Macmillan's statesmanship or his realistic view of Britain's place in the world.
Or at least, that MP has learnt not to get on wrong side of colleagues with these negative qualities.
Nor does that average Tory MP have any of Macmillan's concern for the poor. They believe that the good things of the earth should be kept for them and their neighbours and that is about as far as their political philosophy goes.
No doubt the Tories have always had dozens of MPs like this, it's just that they used to have the sense not to have too many of them in positions of power.
As Julian Critchley died 20 years ago and is now largely forgotten, I had better introduce him to younger readers.
He was Conservative MP for Rochester and Chatham between 1959 and 1964, and for Aldershot between 1970 and 1997. He became a sort of internal dissident under Margaret Thatcher, winning him admiration from people in other parties but from few in his own.
There was a good obituary of him in the Guardian by John Biffen.
It is also worth reading Critchley's autobiography, "A Bag of Boiled Sweets" which shows him overcoming childhood polio - and also spotting Ernie Marples as a wrong 'un quite early on. He also comes across as a bit of a snob IMO, but we could do with more of his kind of Conservative.
ReplyDeleteYes, it's one of my favourite political biographies. Back in the 1990s I stayed in a little hotel in Salcombe that was run by the granddaughter of Critchley's prep school headmaster - she is in the book.
ReplyDeleteLife throws up some odd little quirks One being that Critchley finished up living in Ludow when he retired. The MP at the time was a fellow Conservative Christopher Gill and you can read in his biography that they hated each others guts. not much changes in the con party does it !!
ReplyDelete