Breaking the Code (42 page)

At 11.45 I returned to the Treasury. Stephen was in his room – surrounded by the team, the officials, John K.,
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Culpin – champagne glasses in hand.

‘Congratulations Secretary of State,’ I said. ‘What is it?’

‘I’m not allowed to disclose it for the time being – but it’s the Cabinet.’

‘Yes,’ sighed Culpin. ‘Yet another Financial Secretary moves on without reforming CGT.’

Glasses drained, the crowd departed. Stephen closed the door. ‘You were right.’

‘Well done.’

‘It’s ghastly. What on earth can he have been thinking about? I know nothing about the arts. Anything would have been better. Agriculture. Anything.’

‘The PM takes the view that this is the department that helps us deliver a nation at ease with itself.’

‘Oh God!’ He laughed.

‘Did you discuss junior ministers?’ I already knew the answer.

‘No, no. He just said I’d like you become a Privy Counsellor, join the Cabinet and it’s the DNH. And I just said, “Thank you very much”. What else could I say?’

I had to go back to the House, to be in attendance upon V. Bottomley at the official opening of the Samaritans exhibition I’ve sponsored (!), but then I met up with Stephen again and, with John K., in the ministerial car we drove over to Beauchamp Place. Over the pasta, he simply kept repeating how he couldn’t understand how the PM could have given him the job – ‘it’s a non-job’. He’s clearly of the view that the concept of the department is pretty laughable and he can’t bear the thought that he’ll be away from ‘real politics’. When I returned from the telephone (again) and reported that there was no summons for me, he sweetly said, ‘But I’m going to need you more than ever. I know nothing about it, absolutely nothing.’ It’s true.

The reshuffle gets a good press. And I have to say that, apart from one lapse in judgement
and good taste at the lowest echelon (the inexplicable exclusion of yours truly), the PM hasn’t done a bad job. The upper reaches of the Cabinet are unchanged. Patten goes (of course), Wakeham goes (past his sell-by date),
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Brooke goes (ditto), MacGregor goes – which is the one surprise: a year ago he was going to be Chancellor, now it’s all over. I thought him impressive and,
pace
some of the buffeting on rail privatisation, a safe pair of hands. (Round here that’s almost the highest accolade one fellow can bestow on another: ‘a safe pair of hands’.) David Hunt (my friend) moves up to be Chancellor of the Duchy, Cabinet Office spokesman and behind-the-scenes Mr Fix-It; Gillian goes to Education (exactly right); William to Agriculture (I’ve not seen mud on his boots, but then I wouldn’t have thought he often gets out of the Range Rover); and Portillo gets Employment. The newcomers: Stephen; Brian Mawhinney
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at Transport (well…); Jonathan Aitken as Chief Secretary (excellent); Robert Cranborne
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as Lord Privy Seal (the Cecils are back – all’s well with the world); and, of course, Jeremy as Minister without Portfolio and party chairman.
The Times
looks forward to ‘a period of competent and confident government at last’.

At 9.00 a.m. Stephen and I arrived at the DNH. It’s next to Canada House, just off Trafalgar Square, a vast modern interior like a Manhattan bank. The Secretary of State’s suite is impressive: a spacious office (light wood furniture, comfy sofas), an airy outer office, a proper bathroom and even (if I want it) a reasonable sized office for me. The private office team were welcoming – young, fresh-faced, friendly, the private secretary unaware that Stephen is already planning to replace him with John K. The Permanent Secretary
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was shorter, smoother, less-Mandarin-like than I’d expected. He greeted me with excessive effusion: ‘I have heard so much about you!’ I realised that how he appeared to me must be how I appear to many people – which is depressing.

The junior ministers are Iain Sproat, whom I like enormously (but I’m told is ‘impossible’), and William Astor,
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whom I don’t know at all, who was very charming but in whose manner there was something that made us (Stephen and me) think (doubtless irrationally) ‘Is he lightweight and lazy?’

Photographs were taken, coffee was had, we agreed that the ministerial team should meet up on Monday to decide ‘who does what’.

It’s an extraordinary system. Twenty-four hours ago Stephen was Financial Secretary,
doing a job he understood, for which he had a feeling, where he felt he could make a difference. He is summoned by the PM and, without discussion, without briefing, without even a line about why he’s been given the new job or what the PM hopes he may achieve, he’s translated from one end of Whitehall to the other, or as Stephen sees it, from one world to another, from the centre of the universe to the realms of outer darkness. The moment you get promotion, the moment you get the sack, that’s it. You don’t sign the letter you were about to sign, you don’t complete the paper you were reading, you clear your desk and you go.

We’re just in from dinner at Quaglino’s, crowded, clattery, like eating on the refurbished concourse at Waterloo Station, so noisy we just shouted at one another. Stephen generously took us to celebrate his elevation to the Cabinet: he is very generous, very sweet, but his dismay at his predicament is rather disconcerting. It was us, Annette [Dorrell], the Luffs, Tom and Jane Strathclyde (Tom
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is the newly appointed roly-poly Captain of the Gentleman-at-Arms, aka as Chief Whip in the Lords. He’s about fourteen but I guess will be rather effective.) We’d come on from the Buckingham Palace garden party (the usual form, two hours going round in circles nodding at bishops) and the PM’s reception at No. 10 – a peculiar affair: the promoted trying not to look smug, the demoted looking brave (I thought John MacGregor, though, looked bruised – he can’t have been sacked, can he?), the regularly overlooked looking resigned (and drinking steadily), the freshly ignored (
moi
) attempting to appear devil-may-care and perky. The PM was relaxed, friendly. ‘What do you think?’

‘Looks good. Jeremy’s going to be excellent.’

‘Yes. And Stephen?’

I didn’t say, ‘You tosser – Stephen’s in the wrong job – and what about
me
mate?’ I said, ‘I think Stephen sees the DNH as the department that can help deliver a nation at ease with itself.’ The PM grinned and patted me on the shoulder.

Tony Blair is the new leader of the Labour Party.

A week in and Stephen is no happier. He can’t see what it’s ‘about’. I’ve suggested he leaves
sport entirely to Sproat, let’s Astor (a Viscount, a proper lord, a chap with a castle) look after ‘the heritage’ in all its glory, so that Stephen can concentrate on three or four areas where there’s ‘profile’ and where he can make an impact: tourism, the arts, the lottery, broadcasting. He just doesn’t see it. And because the whole vocabulary of this world is foreign to him he feels insecure. That’s why he’s frantic to get John K. over here – even though he knows, if John comes (and he will), he’s sacrificing the certainty of life in the fast-track at the Treasury for the uncertainty of life in a cul-de-sac here.

But there’s good news too: Stephen has taken his first decision – he’s going to save [Canova’s sculpture]
The Three Graces
for the nation (or at least delay the export licence for three months more while Mr Getty junior coughs up) and Jeffrey [Archer] has been cleared of ‘insider dealing’. The DTI will take no further action.

Benet has set off for China, Saethryd is in Venice (en route for Florence, Sienna and Pisa), we have just seen Aphra off for her holiday on Cape Cod, Rhode Island and Manhattan.
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It certainly beats a week in Broadstairs. (Michèle claims she only had one holiday as a child. I say, ‘The world has changed’. She says, ‘That’s the one thing to be said for money. It keeps you in touch with your children.’)

Long letter from Portillo: ‘I loved the work at the Treasury. But already I feel few regrets other than for missed colleagues and staff. It does make a difference having your own command and the interest of leading a team will compensate for a loss of influence which does undoubtedly result from leaving the Treasury. My new department is very welcoming and they welcome being told what I want. That is quite demanding but I shall try always to know it!’ Even longer letter from the Chancellor (a good and kind man): ‘If I was starting with a clean slate I would invite you to be my PPS, but Stephen is a friend of mine! I have no doubt you are disappointed not to be a minister and I think he is a little unhappy with National Heritage. Both of you are rather impatient but your time will come! … Let us both ensure that we keep Stephen an ally in our duty of cheering the country up! He has every other talent and he needs to be good at that.’

Given that in my experience the Chancellor’s PPS sweeps into government (Hague, Oppenheim), I recommended Seb, Garnier, Hendry
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or Trend to Ken – but, on advice from the whips, he’s gone for Angela Knight. (‘I hope that you do not now produce some killing reasons against A. Knight – you will be too late!’)

These handwritten letters make a difference. I’ve said this to Stephen time and again. He knows I’m right, but because he thinks it’s fundamentally absurd he can’t bring himself to do it. I replayed to him a story he’d told me about Helmut Kohl. Apparently, the German Chancellor has a list of the thousand most influential people in the country, and whenever he has an idle moment, being driven from A to B, he picks up the telephone and speaks to one of them, just touching base, just letting them know that the Chancellor knows who they are and values them. I suggested to Stephen that he might try the same trick with some of the DNH constituents – call the director of Opera North, introduce yourself, say you’re new to the job, ask his advice … Stephen agrees with the theory, but I know it won’t happen. He’s conceded that I can organise some sandwich lunches so he can meet ‘key players’ in assorted fields. ‘Oh God,’ he shook his head despairingly, ‘lunch with the luvvies!’

We’re on our way to Toulouse. We’re meeting up with Simon and Beckie and going on to Jill [Simon Cadell’s mother] at Le Vigan. Fatty Mowlam has put her pudgy foot in it. She is suggesting the royal family move out of Buck House and that we build an ultra-modern ‘People’s Palace’ for them, with a ‘designer kitchen’. I trust Stephen will have some fun with that – though I’m not sure he’ll want to make the effort. He’s still sulking. Michèle is not impressed. We had lunch yesterday with the Hanleys. Jeremy, by contrast, is exultant! ‘I blame you entirely,’ he boomed happily, ‘and I’m having my revenge. At the party conference, I want you to do the financial appeal and speak on the Friday, just before the PM. Okay?’ Okay, of course – but I’m not going to think about that now, I’m forgetting Westminster, I’m forgetting Whitehall, I’m forgetting Chester. I am going to drink some fine French wine and read
Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont
.

We are going for a strawberry tea at Strawberry Hill House, the home of Horace Walpole. The news is that the IRA has declared a ‘ceasefire’. If this can be made to last, if we can inch our way towards some sort of constitutional settlement, this will be the PM’s great achievement. For over a quarter of a century, there has been bloodshed and terror within the United Kingdom. Over 3,000 have died, tens of thousands have been wounded … and now it’s stopping.

I am returning to the Chester fray at the weekend (it’s the Pimm’s party on Sunday!) and pulling together my new stump speech: with the PM in Northern Ireland, with Douglas Hurd ‘a uniquely respected figure on the world stage’, with a Chancellor who is delivering sustained growth with low inflation, with a Home Secretary whose instincts go with the grain of our supporters … I am even convincing myself we’re getting it right!

Suddenly it’s all going wrong again. ‘Hanley gaffe knocks Tory fightback bid’. Last week the PM told us he wants to root out Britain’s ‘yob culture’. Shown a clip of it in action on
Frost on Sunday
– film of a near-riot at a boxing match in Birmingham on Saturday night – poor Jeremy dismissed the scenes as mere ‘exuberance’. Within the hour he realised his mistake and started frantically backtracking and in the process made matters worse, a) by overdoing the apology (‘I’m new in this game. I was caught on the hop. I’ve made a mistake. I apologise. It’s entirely my fault.’) and b) by describing his answer as ‘incompetent’. Now it’s Jeremy ‘by his own admission “incompetent”’ Hanley.

We had our first weekly planning meeting at the DNH. I tried not to chip in
too
often – but when I think I know all the answers and the Secretary of State knows none it is a little bit
difficile!!

Breakfast with Stephen at the Ritz. He is in much happier form. He likes Hayden [Phillips, the Permanent Secretary] (entirely
trusting
Hayden of course is quite another matter – the Treasury was never quite
Yes, Minister
: the DNH under Hayden in
Yes
,
Minister
in spades), he likes his private office, he’s got John K., he’s got me. We are going to do without a Special Adviser. I’m going to have his office.

Over properly poached eggs and mushrooms and
brilliantly
grilled bacon, we agreed that the summer hadn’t been too bad – ‘But’ – Stephen grinned from ear to ear – ‘your friend Mr Hanley…’

It’s got worse for Jeremy. The papers are producing full fat features listing the litany of gaffes – being in Scotland and muddling up which party thinks what on devolution; inviting Jeffrey [Archer] to make a full statement on the Anglia shares business just when we’d all forgotten about it; telling the Chancellor he’s had his last
interest rate hike; telling the PM that’s he’s got the job as party chairman for at least two and a half years … They’re all tiny, trivial trip-ups – exactly the kind I know I’d make (admittedly the kind Ken Clarke wouldn’t) – but coming like this, one on top of another, and what do you end up with?