Margaret Thatcher: The Authorized Biography (161 page)

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As so often in Tory politics, there was a class issue lurking in all this. Old Etonians, like Boyle, tended to feel rather guilty about the question and therefore to side with the progressives. Mrs Thatcher, though she retained her liking for Boyle, observed this sharply: ‘The trouble with Edward is that he has never got over coming from a good home and having a good education’ (Correspondence with Professor David Dilks). Grammar school pupils were more robust. It is interesting to find the left-wing Peter Walker, Heath’s blue-eyed boy and later an opponent of Mrs Thatcher, criticizing ‘the degree of acceptance … of the comprehensive formula’ in the Shadow Cabinet (Conservative Party Archive, LCC 1/2/13, 15 July 1968). Walker was a grammar school boy.

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Circulars were important, because they were the Secretary of State’s only method of urging a national policy upon all the local authorities.

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The title says much about attitudes of the time.

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On 18 October 1970 Mrs Thatcher attended a memorial service at Finkin Street Church in Grantham at which a lectern was dedicated in memory of Alfred Roberts, half the cost being subscribed by the congregation and half by the Rotary Club. At the ceremony, according to Muriel Cullen, her sister complained to her: ‘They don’t know how to treat a Cabinet minister, do they?’ Muriel replied, ‘This service isn’t for you.’

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John Izbicki, then education correspondent of the
Daily Telegraph
, found Mrs Thatcher almost tearful in her ballgown after the press assault on her for nearly depriving them of their story. He danced with her at the NAHT Ball, and then took her out along the promenade by the Grand Hotel to admire the sea lit by the moonlight. He was struck with her charms. According to his colleague, Brian MacArthur, then education correspondent of
The Times
, Izbicki said: ‘Do you know, if I’d made a pass, I’m sure I would have been successful.’ Charming though John Izbicki was, it is hard to believe that he was right.

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Mrs Thatcher’s predecessor, Edward Boyle, summed up the status of the education secretary in an interview given in 1971, when she held the post: ‘You’re quite right if you think of the people since the war who have been most associated with Education. It isn’t a department which has enhanced one’s career in politics’ (
The Politics of Education: Edward Boyle and Anthony Crosland in Conversation with Maurice Kogan
, Penguin, 1971, p. 100.)

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Mrs Thatcher’s sympathy with Tory grass-root sentiment brought some rather snobbish criticism on her head. Christopher Price, a Labour MP with an interest in education, wrote in the
New Statesman
(6 July 1973) that these rank and file ‘are the bourgeois tradesmen like her father, who would not dream of touching a comprehensive with a bargepole. They use the local grammar school if their offspring are coachable into it, and turn to Miss Pringle’s Academy for Young Ladies if they’re not.’

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Oddly enough, Mrs Thatcher was quite a frequent customer of a left-wing bookshop at this time. Collett’s, the avowedly Communist bookstore, also sold Chinese pottery, which she collected. The Education Secretary could therefore be seen inspecting the top floor where the pots were displayed (THCR 4/4).

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At this time, a series of education ‘Black Papers’, published by academics, teachers and writers, including Kingsley Amis, who were worried about the trends in progressive education, caused a great stir. Mrs Thatcher was sympathetic to the Black Papers, and always gave their authors a friendly hearing, but there is little evidence that she tried to apply much of their thought to her action in government. The prevailing orthodoxy was strong in the opposite direction, and she did not feel ready to defy it.

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Lord Belstead (1932–2005), educated Eton and Christ Church, Oxford; born John Ganzoni, succeeded father as Lord Belstead, 1958; Leader of the House of Lords, 1988–90.

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Perhaps the only people who, for the most part, did not share the outrage were the children themselves. The bottles of milk supplied at elevenses were unpopular with pupils partly because few schools had the necessary refrigeration in those days and the milk, delivered early and often sitting for hours in crates beside radiators, was warm and semi-separated. The present author’s generation felt liberated from the age of compulsory milk.

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Mrs Thatcher herself believed that only her admirer John Izbicki, of the
Daily Telegraph
, would give her a fair hearing.

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One of the threats made to Mrs Thatcher was nastier still. A man approached her at a meeting and said that he was from the Angry Brigade, a minor terrorist grouping of the period, and she would be blown up in twenty minutes. He was lying, but she had to start thinking about the threat of terrorism for the first time. From the period of the milk dispute, and for the rest of her life, she was subject to the attention of extremists and mobs of protesters. This probably did her more political good than harm, but it was a heavy personal burden for her and her family to have to bear. In February 1972, she raised the matter in Cabinet, asking if government ministers were insured against terrorist attack (Cabinet Secretary’s notebooks).

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Mrs Thatcher was always a ‘quick study’, and amazed people by how rapidly she made up for her pre-existing ignorance of a subject like state education. Dame Kathleen Ollerenshaw, chairman of the Manchester Education Committee when Mrs Thatcher came into office, expounded the history and development of further education to her, and noticed how fast she picked it up: ‘If she’d had to learn Hebrew from scratch by the end of the week to save the nation, she’d have done it and been word perfect’ (letter from Dame Kathleen Ollerenshaw).

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The phrase ‘a new style of government’ was taken from a Conservative pamphlet of that name by David Howell, later Mrs Thatcher’s Energy Secretary, published shortly before the election with Heath’s blessing. It was a very free-market document. It is thought to be the first British publication to use the word ‘privatization’, a policy that it advocated. See David Howell,
The Edge of Now
, Pan, 2000, pp. 341 ff.

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Robert Armstrong (1927–), educated Eton and Christ Church, Oxford; joined Treasury, 1950; private secretary to R. A. Butler (Chancellor of the Exchequer), 1954–5; joint principal private secretary to Roy Jenkins (Chancellor), 1968; principal private secretary to the Prime Minister, 1970–75; Permanent Under-Secretary, Home Office, 1977–9; Cabinet Secretary, 1979–87; created Lord Armstrong of Ilminster, 1988. The two Armstrongs were not related.

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Douglas Hurd (1930–), educated Eton and Trinity College, Cambridge; joined FCO, 1952; political secretary to the Prime Minister, 1970–74; Conservative MP for Mid Oxon, February 1974–83; for Witney, 1983–97; Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, 1984–5; Home Secretary, 1985–9; Foreign Secretary, 1989–97; contested Conservative leadership unsuccessfully, 1990; created Lord Hurd of Westwell, 1997.

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Working to rule is a union tactic of minutely following the office or factory rulebook so that normal service is disrupted.

†
John Davies (1916–79), educated St Edward’s School, Oxford; Conservative MP for Knutsford, 1970–78; director-general, CBI, 1965–9; Minister of Technology, July–Oct. 1970; Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, 1970–72; Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, 1972–4; Shadow Foreign Secretary, 1976–8.

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Arthur Scargill (1938–), educated White Cross Secondary School and Leeds University; President, Yorkshire National Union of Mineworkers, 1973; President, NUM, 1981–2002; Honorary President from 2002.

†
This was not
the
‘three-day week’, a formal arrangement imposed by the government from 1 January 1974.

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Edward Du Cann (1924–), educated Woodbridge School and St John’s College, Oxford; Conservative MP for Taunton, 1956–87; Chairman, Conservative Party, 1965–7; Chairman, 1922 Committee, 1972–84. A leading figure in the City, he was ultimately discredited by his controversial financial record.

†
The 1922 Committee consists of all Conservative Members of Parliament. Its executive is drawn from the back benches. Its private meetings provide a forum for backbenchers and the chance to discuss matters with frontbenchers.

‡
It is true, however, that
The Times
reported that Mrs Thatcher was among those ministers who objected to the Industry Bill when it was published in May (
The Times
, 17 May 1972). The report is likely to have been correct, since David Wood, the paper’s political correspondent, was one of Mrs Thatcher’s few journalistic contacts at that time. He had known her father in Grantham.

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Nicholas Ridley (1929–93), educated Eton and Balliol College, Oxford; Conservative MP for Cirencester and Tewkesbury, 1959–92; Minister of State, FCO, 1979–81; Economic Secretary to the Treasury, 1981–3; Secretary of State for Transport, 1983–7; for the Environment, 1987–9; for Trade and Industry, 1989–90; forced to resign after a frank interview criticizing Germany and the EEC in the
Spectator
, July 1990; created Lord Ridley of Liddesdale, 1992.

†
John Biffen (1930–2007), educated Dr Morgan’s School, Bridgwater and Jesus College, Cambridge; Conservative MP for Oswestry, 1961–83; for Shropshire North, 1983–97; Chief Secretary to the Treasury, 1979–81; Secretary of State for Trade, 1981–2; Lord President of the Council, 1982–3; Leader of the House of Commons, 1982–7; Lord Privy Seal, 1983–7; created Lord Biffen, 1997.

‡
Jock Bruce-Gardyne (1930–90), educated Winchester and Magdalen College, Oxford; Conservative MP for South Angus, 1964–74; for Knutsford, 1979–83; Minister of State, Treasury, 1981; Economic Secretary to the Treasury, 1981–3; created Lord Bruce-Gardyne, 1983.

§
John Nott (1932–), educated Bradfield and Trinity College, Cambridge; Conservative MP for Cornwall St Ives, 1966–83; Secretary of State for Trade, 1979–81; for Defence, 1981–3; knighted, 1983.

¶
Cecil Parkinson (1931–), Royal Lancaster Grammar School, Lancaster and Emmanuel College, Cambridge; Conservative MP for Enfield West, 1970–74; for Hertfordshire South, February 1974–83; for Hertsmere, 1983–92; Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, June–Oct. 1983; for Energy, 1987–9; for Transport, 1989–90; Chairman, Conservative Party, 1981–3 and 1997–8; created Lord Parkinson, 1992.

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Walter Annenberg (1908–2002), businessman and philanthropist; US Ambassador to Britain, 1969–74.

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Robin Butler (1938–), educated Harrow and University College, Oxford; principal private secretary to the Prime Minister, 1982–5; Second Permanent Secretary, Public Expenditure, Treasury, 1985–7; Cabinet Secretary, 1988–98; created Lord Butler of Brockwell, 1998.

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The European Treaty required a common form (though not amount) of indirect taxation to raise revenues for the Community.

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A knighthood for a Conservative backbencher after twenty years’ service had been considered almost automatic, but Neave had not received one.

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The Thatchers continued in Lamberhurst at weekends, renting a flat in Scotney Castle.

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Peter Walker (1932–2010), educated Latymer Upper School; Conservative MP for Worcester, 1961–92; Secretary of State for the Environment, 1970–72; for Trade and Industry, 1972–4; Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, 1979–83; Secretary of State for Energy, 1983–7; for Wales, 1987–90; created Lord Walker of Worcester, 1992.

†
William Waldegrave (1946–), educated Eton, Corpus Christi College, Oxford and Harvard University; younger son of 12th Earl Waldegrave; Conservative MP for Bristol West, 1979–97; Secretary of State for Health, 1990–92; Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, 1992–94; Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, 1994–5; Chief Secretary to the Treasury, 1995–7; created Lord Waldegrave of North Hill, 1999.

‡
Peter Carrington (6th Baron Carrington) (1919–), educated Eton and Royal Military College, Sandhurst; First Lord of the Admiralty, 1959–63; Leader of House of Lords, 1963–4 and 1974–9; Secretary of State for Defence, 1970–74; for Energy, 1974; for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, 1979–82; Secretary-General, NATO, 1984–8; created life peer, when hereditary peerages were partially abolished, 1999.

§
Ian Gilmour (1926–2007), 3rd baronet; educated Eton and Balliol College, Oxford; Conservative MP for Norfolk Central, 1962–74; for Chesham and Amersham, February 1974–92; owner (1954–67) and editor (1954–9) of the
Spectator
; Secretary of State for Defence, 1974; chairman, Conservative Research Department, 1974–5; Lord Privy Seal, 1979–81; created Lord Gilmour, 1992.

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Willie Whitelaw, whom Heath had just recalled from his post as Northern Ireland secretary to help sort out the miners’ dispute, was drinking very heavily at this time. The word ‘emotional’ is partly a code-word for drunk.

†
Mrs Thatcher was among those who wanted an early election, and she told Heath this when he summoned his ministers in small groups to give him their views on the subject. Her voice would not have been persuasive to him.

‡
So great was the uncertainty about the election date, and the extent of rune-reading that preceded the choice, that Cabinet Office officials claimed to have seen a copy of the popular astrological work
Old Moore’s Almanack
at Heath’s place at the Cabinet table (interview with Ralph Baxter).

*
The phrase, indicating an appeal to voters on non-ideological grounds of professional competence, originated with Stanley Baldwin.

*
John Hunt (1919–2008), educated Downside and Magdalene College, Oxford; served RNVR, 1940–46; joined Home Civil Service, 1946; Cabinet Secretary, 1973–9; chairman, Prudential Corporation, 1985–90; created Lord Hunt of Tanworth, 1980.

†
It is a reflection on the more gentlemanly mores of the time that throughout the campaign of February 1974 the Conservatives were in possession of information about the homosexual scandal involving Jeremy Thorpe which was later to bring him down. Lord Carrington, the party Chairman, ordered that it be locked away and not used in any form. It is hard to imagine such a policy being followed today. (Information from Lord Waldegrave.)