Breaking the Code (62 page)

Yesterday was our 23rd wedding anniversary. The sun shone and we had a happy day. We took Aphra and Julian Slade to The Ivy for lunch and then went to the matinee of
Salad Days
. It still works. I said to Aphra, ‘Julian is the Andrew Lloyd Webber of his generation.’ She didn’t believe me, but it’s true.

The
News of the World
have got Rod’s moll to kiss and tell. He is in a very bad way. And the rest of the press (more legitimately) are having fun with Portillo. He hosted a party in Admiralty House on Thursday night (to which we were invited but didn’t go) and, as happens at these parties, the guests talked and drank and then talked more loudly and paid no attention at all to the Beating Retreat taking place on Horse Guards Parade below. The noise of raucous revelry from the Defence Secretary’s open windows was such that ‘complaints were made’ and poor Michael has been obliged to issue a grovelling apology.

My ‘shit of the year’ has lived up to his billing. Sir John Gorst of the poisonous breath has teamed up with another unfathomable soul, Hugh Dykes, in an attempt to blackmail Stephen into saving the casualty unit at Edgware Hospital. This has been bubbling up for months, but it came to a head on Monday when they sent Stephen a letter saying that, as of last night, they wouldn’t vote with the government unless they got their
way. Stephen had come up with a compromise on the hospital that predated their threat, but Gorst and Dykes proceeded to go public and claim the compromise as a personal victory – leaving the government open to the charge that it’s now so enfeebled that any two-bit threat and the PM instantly succumbs. Blair put it alarmingly well at PMQs: the PM’s policies are now ‘determined solely by the imprint of the last person who sat on him.’

The Chief (in his crimson-with-anger mode) hauled them in and gave them a bollocking – a terrifying experience for most normal mortals, but as Gorst is arrogant and deaf and Dykes is strange the effect on them may not have been as harrowing as it would have been for your average colleague. That said, their post-meeting demeanour suggests they got the message – more or less. The Chief, of course, is frantic that everyone else gets the message too – which is why two things have happened: we discreetly ‘inspired’ denunciations of the would-be blackmailers at this afternoon’s 1922 Committee and an account of the Chief’s ‘unpleasant encounter’ with them has been fed to the press. (This is very unusual. The Chief believes absolutely in the golden rule that Chief Whips are silent and invisible, neither heard nor seen, never photographed, never quoted. And even in an emergency like this he won’t have talked directly to the press. What will have happened is that either the Deputy or Andrew [Mackay] will have slipped into Members’ Lobby and whispered what we want to say into the selected correspondent’s ear. It’s an extraordinary system: the licensed tip-off. It can be on the record or off, as you please. And it’s a service that’s available round the clock. In Members’ Lobby, immediately outside the Upper Whips’ Office, there are lobby correspondents loitering hopefully at all times of day and night. When there’s a division on they’re shifted from the lobby itself to the corridor that runs past the Tea Room to the Library and there they line the walls, lounging up against the panelling likes tarts beneath the lamppost plying for trade.)

The PM is ‘incandescent’. Yesterday the Chief hauled in Bill Cash to tell him that his ludicrous ‘European Foundation’ should either stop accepting funding from Sir James Goldsmith or Bill should step down as the Foundation’s chairman. Bill agreed ‘on reflection’ that it was probably ‘inappropriate’ to be taking money from a man who will be putting up candidates against Conservatives in the election – and we thought that was that. But no. It turns out that Mrs T. has now called Bill to offer him some of her money. She is going to make ‘a substantial donation’. Of course, the official line is that it’s up to her how she spends her money, but the PM is white with anger.

Sometimes, like yesterday, when I get in I’m simply too weary for the diary. I should be more disciplined, do it at the same time each day, like Douglas Hurd. Fifteen minutes in the dressing room, every night, before saying one’s prayers. But Douglas is more organised, more certain, (more impressive) than I am. I imagine he wears a wine-coloured dressing gown, and striped pyjamas with a cord like we had at prep school. On Friday nights as a rule I stumble back to the flat around eleven, half-past, and have half a bottle of wine collapsed in front of the box (if there isn’t
The Word
I make do with Jools Holland). Last night I crawled straight into bed and curled up with comfort reading (the Sherlock Holmes that Saethryd gave me). Between twelve and one, I say ‘goodnight’ to Michèle’s picture (out loud), turn on the World Service and switch out the light. I’m asleep in less than ten minutes.

Yesterday: another ‘listening session’ with the farmers. The scheme isn’t working. There’s queue-jumping, the renderers can’t cope, it’s chaos out there. I gave them copies of the latest letter from Tony Baldry.
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It contains his home number. They won’t use it, but I wanted them to know I’m on their side. I ended the day at Chester Castle – Beating Retreat, generous hospitality to follow. (Never mind Options for Change – the mess budgets seem happily unaffected.) I took the salute – and this time I had a hat and knew what to do with it.

The papers tell us that the PM has had ‘a bellyful’ of Euro-rows. (Who comes up with these phrases? Howell, I suppose. ‘Bellyful’ is a perfect Major word.) Hilariously, Hugh Dykes is on the rampage: ‘The Whips’ Office behave like hysterical children and if they try any dirty tricks over the weekend I will be having strong words with them on Monday.’ We’re quivering in our boots to be sure. What a tosspot. (And the Chief was right. He didn’t over-react. If every disobliging backbencher with a grudge thinks he can to hold us up to ransom, we’re doomed.)

The Birthday Honours are really dreary. The knighthood for George Martin is spot-on, but that’s about it. There are Ks too for some of our harmless old boys (Roger Sims,
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Robert Hicks),
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but nothing for Nick Winterton, who will not be amused. In the office we’ve taken Nicholas’s recent egregious grovellings at PMQs as a sure sign that the poor man thought his overdue recognition was imminent. Certainly he’s served more than his time (a quarter of a century, as he regularly reminds me) but I’ve a feeling (fair or unfair) he won’t be getting his knighthood under the present dispensation. He
claims
he was as
good as promised it a year or two back. The prospect may have been wafted loosely in the air, but I can’t believe anything was said ‘in terms’. When colleagues come to see the Chief, as they do, ‘to discuss the workings of the honours system’ as he puts it (he’s very funny), he may twitch and gobble at them in such a way as to give them hope, but I’m sure he never
says
anything. He’s a brilliant operator. (And
his
knighthood is assured.)
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We discovered at this morning’s meeting that the PM planned to announce this afternoon that the Stone of Scone is to be returned to Scotland. After 700 years, it is to be yanked out of Westminster Abbey and carted off to Edinburgh – swirling bagpipes and wee Michael Forsyth in his tartan trews doubtless leading the parade. This is a Forsyth scam, a brilliant coup from his point of view, but the news of it provoked ruffled feathers and a fair degree of tut-tutting at the meeting a) because we’re not sure how well this will go down in England and b) because we knew nothing about it. The office
hates
not being in the know. Clearly Forsyth thought this up and nobbled the PM direct. He’s kept it entirely under wraps. I don’t know how much advance notice the Chief got. The Deputy, Mackay, Conway, looked distinctly miffed. Michael Bates, as ever, played the
faux naïf.

We’re also not too happy with the PM because of his proposed Holy-Joe response to the recommendations of the Senior Salaries Review Body. It looks as if the SSRB are wisely suggesting a £9,000 hike for backbenchers (up to £43,000 from £34,000) and what amounts to a sweet £17,000 more for Ministers. This is 26 per cent plus-plus. The PM wants us to settle for 3 per cent. We say ‘give us the money’. We want the money – we particularly want it
now
because it’ll mean enhanced pensions when we all lose our seats. It’ll be a free vote, but the payroll [Ministers and PPPs] will be whipped to support the government’s line and Blair and his acolytes will vote for restraint, so it’s touch and go.

Nothing has been said, but smirks and nudges from Conway and the Deputy in the upper office just now suggest that we needn’t worry too much about the salaries’ vote.

Forsyth has had a triumph. Townend and his ilk are in the Tea Room touting him as leader-in-waiting.

I’ve been over at 7 Millbank recording my contribution to Prince Philip’s obituary. I wasn’t nearly as good as I would have liked to be. I am cross with myself because I should have thought it through more carefully, prepared the right sound bites. He is a remarkable man and I would have liked to do him full justice. I may phone them and ask if I can do it again.

At around ten past midnight the deed was done. Five divisions, each one going the way we wanted. I am now £17,000 better off. There’s a feeling in the office that Derek may have over-egged the pudding. The government lost the main vote by 168 to 317. It says in
The Times
: ‘Around fifteen of the government’s 126-strong “payroll vote”, who had been told to support 3 per cent, did not register a vote, but the whips insisted they had good reasons for being away.’ According to my reckoning, the figure’s nearer forty than fifteen. The PM is seriously displeased. He’s been undermined by the office and he knows it. But now we’ve got what we wanted, the Deputy is sending out the signal: no grinning, no hurrahs, straight faces, don’t refer to it, move on. (I wonder if this would have happened under Thatcher or Churchill. Under Thatcher, possibly. Under Churchill, probably not. They all had private incomes in those days.)

This morning’s other excitement has been the visit by Nelson Mandela. Westminster Hall was decked in all its glory: red carpets, gilded thrones, state trumpeters, Yeoman of the Guard, gentlemen at arms (none too steady on their feet). The hall was packed: Lords, Commons, the great and the good – even Jeremy Thorpe,
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bent and pathetic. The sun filtered through the west window. There was a palpable sense of expectation, and when the trumpets sounded and the great man made his entrance I doubt there was a completely dry eye in the house. He is tall and handsome, but he’s frail. He tottered down the steps. The Speaker had to hold his hand. I imagine it was the proudest moment of her life – and why not? In her speech – just a touch too much me-me-me for my taste – we learnt that Betty in her day had been at the heart of the anti-apartheid movement, one of the white sisters of Black Sash protesting in Trafalgar Square. But, in fairness, if she said too much, she did at least say all the right things. Mandela said too much, too. His speech was rather long, rather ponderous and, from where we were sitting (about halfway back) difficult to hear. But it didn’t matter. It was the presence we
had come for – and the presence we got. And when he’d finished and we stood to cheer, he teetered down the steps and made his way out along the central aisle. Curiously, close to he looked less frail. His smile is enchanting. As he passed he shook hands on either side. I was on the end of the aisle and he came right up to me – and then clasped the hand of the bugger behind. It was General de Gaulle all over again.
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We had the full cast for prayers at the DoE: Gummer, Curry, Robert Jones,
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Robin Ferrers
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(it really is like having Osbert Lancaster in the government), Beresford,
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Clappison, Douglas French, Matthew Banks.
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It’s not a bad team. In fact, it’s quite impressive. Gumdrops is outstanding – he has defused the green lobby, indeed he’s claimed ownership over a range of the green issues – unthinkable five years ago. Curry is on tenterhooks hoping that the reshuffle will see him into the Cabinet. I now think it won’t. Any changes will be minor – not just because we know that ‘refreshing’ the look of the government only has a twenty-four-hour effect, but mainly because reshuffles leave bruised souls and we daren’t risk any more unhappy bunnies. This means Beresford is safe – though in fairness he has been trying quite hard to be more emollient. He has learnt at last that when one of our side introduces an adjournment debate, the minister is not supposed to duff him up and put him straight: he’s supposed to butter him up, woo him, praise him to the skies. And Douglas French is a decent guy. He’s been here ten years and deserves a break. But he won’t get it. He’s one of those: always in the frame, never in the picture.

Speaking of which … I was saying in the office how jolly Jeffrey Archer has been being in recent days – and there was a lot of chortling from Conway and Tim Wood: ‘There couldn’t be a reshuffle coming up by any chance, could there?’ Anyway, I met up with Jeffrey for coffee in the Pugin Room (I was three minutes late, Jeffrey was tapping his watch when I arrived, ‘I am
never
late!’ he barked) and he took me through the key ingredients for making a successful novel – the shape of the book, the number of pages,
the quality of paper, the type size, the number of lines on a page. It was both ludicrous and compelling – and he’s done it, damn him, he’s a world-class best seller.

But that’s not what he wants. He wants to be in the government – Minister of State, nothing more junior, and actually as Arts Minister or Sports Minister he’d give it energy, commitment, brio. But it won’t happen. The activists would welcome it; the parliamentary party wouldn’t wear it. The office would regard it as ‘a risk’ and risks are not what we’re taking this year.