The Benn Diaries: 1940-1990 (14 page)

Tuesday 22 September

Left by car for Bristol before breakfast and drove like a madman to be there for a lunchtime factory-gate meeting at Strachan and Henshaw.

Canvassing all afternoon in the car, and it works like a dream. I have recorded a ten-minute speech on the issues of the Election (the Summit, pensions, housing, education, and Africa) and this lasts just long enough for
me to go round to the houses with window bills. I got lots of them up completely single-handedly.

To the Colston Hall where Hugh Gaitskell is addressing a big meeting. 600 were turned away. The size of the crowd and the tremendous reception given to Gaitskell surprised us all. He was on top of his form and made a really grand, clear, forceful speech. It included a most friendly reference to me among the other Bristol MPs. Afterwards police with linked arms had to hold back the crowd to let his car go back to the Grand Hotel.

I had dinner with Hugh and Dora, John Harris (Hugh’s political adviser), and the regional organiser, Ted Rees. We are now frankly much more optimistic about the outcome of the Election. The trememdous meetings, the successful TV, and the Gallup poll showing a shrinking margin, have got us to the point where we think that the Liberals holding the balance with us only just behind the Tories is now a distinct possibility. Walked round Bristol talking to John Harris until very late. His appointment is the best thing that has happened to Hugh for years.

Thursday 24 September

Herbert Rogers had brought a black woolly cat and arranged for some kid to give it to me to make a good publicity picture. But the kid screamed so hard that its mother had to give it to me instead.

Lunch with the six Bristol candidates and immediately drove back to London. To Israeli Embassy for goodbye party to the Ambassador Eliahu Elath and his wife, who are returning to Israel.

Thursday 1 October

Transport House this morning. The pledge that there would be no income tax increases that Hugh gave in his speech, coupled with the purchase tax pledge released by Morgan, has upset us all. We feel the Tories have now got us on the defensive. This is partly true but partly a question of counter-attack. They are now attacking and we are bound to feel the effect of this. Of course the purchase tax thing is just a muddle by Morgan and stems from old material that was hanging about the office. The income tax pledge was done to forestall an anticipated scare that there would be 2s. 6d. on the income tax to pay for Labour’s programme. Neither of these was discussed with Crossman before release.

Saturday 3 October

Liverpool. To the Adelphi Hotel and breakfast with Hugh, Dora and Harold Wilson in Hugh’s room. Dora in her nightie is quite a sight. Hugh was a bit frowsy and looked like the man who used to be on the Bovril bottle in his pyjamas. We were all cautiously optimistic about the outcome of the Election. Hugh has had a gigantic reception everywhere (20,000 people at
Trafford Park yesterday) and the Gallup poll still suggests that we are on the up-grade.

Spend the morning writing Hugh’s broadcast, which he then rewrites and I rewrite, etc. We then walk to the BBC studio and record it.

Thursday 8 October

Up early and a perfect day. The Gallup poll suggests that the enormous ‘don’t know’ group may be inclining to the right.

The usual senseless and exhausting visits to 36 polling stations and 30 committee rooms. Shaking hands with the policemen, asking the returning officer how many people have voted, nodding at the clerks, and heading off for the next.

Finally the usual loudspeaker ‘knocking up’ and a rather quiet end to the day. People were voting earlier. Then to Unity House when the polls closed to remove all the Election equipment from the car, and to the Grand Hotel for a bath and tea and sandwiches.

Just about 10 the first results begin coming out and it is clear within a short while that the Tories have won and increased their majority. We have gained a bit in Lancashire and Scotland, but otherwise are out. The count is thus very depressing with the Tories crowing and our people very dejected. Indeed my result looked like being in the balance at one stage, and I thought I might have been beaten. But my vote is up 1,000 even though my majority is down 2,000 with a 3 per cent swing.

The arrangements for the count were appalling, inefficient, long-drawn-out. Back to the Grand Hotel too depressed to watch TV.

Sunday 11 October

To the Gaitskells’. Hugh was tired but mellow and said he wanted a holiday, which he deserved. He says it would be a good idea to have a meeting next weekend to review the work of the Election and this will presumably take place under Dick’s auspices. I then proposed that a number of changes should be made, including a political permanent vice-chairman, a new Secretary, a Shadow Leader of the House, new Whips and John Harris on a permanent basis.

I said that I thought Harold Wilson would be the obvious Shadow Leader of the House if that wasn’t an insuperable difficulty – taking him away from finance. ‘Oh no, not at all – in a way it would suit me nicely,’ said Hugh. He said he intended to appoint younger men to the Front Bench but thought I would get elected to the Shadow Cabinet anyway.

He also said several times, ‘I’m not prepared to lose another Election for the sake of nationalisation.’ He laid great stress on the disadvantages of the name Labour, particularly on new housing estates, and said, ‘Of course Douglas Jay is going to urge us to adopt a new one.’ I reminded him that the prune had been resuscitated without a change of name by clever selling.

Hugh also thought we must review our relations with the trade unions, especially the need for greater freedom and in local authorities.

Dora was bubbling with hate of left and right. She is game!

Monday 12 October

To Manchester for a Granada ‘Searchlight’ programme on the next five years with Keith Kyle (who was Liberal, was on the Tory candidates’ list until Suez, campaigned for Liberals in this Election, and joined the Labour Party last week), and journalists Bernard Levin and Paul Johnson, a very defeatist, rootless young man who was saying that we must drop nationalisation, end links with the trade unions and join up with the Liberals. I said that morale was high and that what we wanted was to revitalise the Labour movement by modernising its constitution, driving its policy thinking forward, creating a new Youth Movement, and making the Opposition more effective.

Flew home to London and saw Roy Jenkins on ‘Panorama’ advocating very modestly that you should drop nationalisation, watch out for the dangers of the union links and not rule out an association with the Liberals.

He dropped in here with Jennifer on his way back home and we had a flaming row. As a matter of fact I was very calm and collected and he got into a semi-hysterical state. Usually it’s the other way round. ‘We must use this Election shock to drop nationalisation entirely at this forthcoming Conference,’ he said, and I concentrated on the dangers to our integrity if we were to be so reckless. In the end he half apologised for his temper and went off.

Wednesday 21 October

Tea with Harold Wilson, who is extremely bitter. Hugh certainly has failed to keep us together.

Tuesday 10 November

Peter and Liz Shore, Gerald Kaufman and Ivan Yates came to dinner tonight and we discussed the idea of a 1964 Club to be based on the simple objective of doing to the Party what we know has to be done – modernise and overhaul and make it a vehicle for progressive action in our society. We would include in it only those who were young and also had some contribution of a positive kind to make – by virtue of their position in the Party. It’s a sort of colonels’ revolt, with no objects save that of revitalising the movement.

We thought we might include in the Club: David Ennals, Peter Shore, Tony Howard, Ivan Yates, Gerald Kaufman, Shirley Williams, and Reg Prentice and Dick Marsh as trade union MPs.

Saturday 28 November – Labour Party Conference, Blackpool

Nye and Jennie came to dinner at our hotel with Shirley and Bernard
Williams. Nye turned to me most viciously at the beginning, attacking the campaign, TV, and the idea of surveys of public opinion. He was really a bit touched, thought Bernard Williams, who sat opposite me. Unfortunately I am like a red rag to a bull to him. Perhaps he knows that I don’t trust him at all. Or is it because I am young and middle-class?

Couldn’t sleep much tonight for nightmares about the National Executive election. I got elected to the Executive in bottom place – ousting Ian Mikardo. My vote had risen from 483,000 to 566,000 and Mikardo had dropped from 646,000 to 554,000. I am sorry it was Mik, and he said at lunch, ‘I’m glad it was you’, which was very sweet as he has lost the chairmanship, his seat, and this, all in two months.

In the debate Shirley Williams made a brilliant speech and won universal applause. Nye’s speech this afternoon was witty, scintillating, positive, conciliatory – the model of what a leader should do. He didn’t knock Hugh out but he gently elbowed him aside.

Monday 30 November

Heard from Sir Winston Churchill, to whom I wrote for added support in my latest plea to Macmillan for a change in the law to permit me to get out of my peerage. He won’t write me a new letter but has given me permission to make further use of his earlier one written in 1953. Today is his eighty-fifth birthday. He certainly is a wonderful old boy.

Saturday 19 December

Dinner with Pam and Enoch Powell.

The Powells relaxed a bit about politics and I learned that they really cannot bear Macmillan, which is interesting. There may be more discontent with him in the Party than is generally realised.

Wednesday 20 January 1960

We heard that Nye is critically ill and it looks as if he may not last.

Thursday 21 January

To the House of Commons to talk to the 1944 Association – a group of Labour businessmen. It’s also known as the queue for peerages. I gave them a talk on ‘The Future of the Labour Party’ and it really got a pretty frosty reception as they were all welcoming the spread of unit trusts. I’m afraid I didn’t go down very well.

Saturday 23 January

To Bristol where I spoke at the Republic Day celebrations run by the India Society. There were lots of Indians there and lovely dances performed by dance groups and singing Hindu songs. There must have been nearly a
thousand altogether and it was certainly the most colourful and enjoyable do I have been to in Bristol for ages. Britain is far too inbred and what we need is some foreign influence to make us more interesting. American culture has detribalised us to some extent and we shall be better off still when we get the full blast from Russia and China.

Thursday 18 February

Had forty-five minutes’ talk with Hugh Gaitskell this evening in his room. He was very cordial and we discussed transport problems, for which I am Front Bench spokesman, broadcasting, and then finally Clause 4. This argument is raging in the Party at the moment as we approach the National Executive meeting on 16 March. Hugh asked me what I thought about it and I told him I was 100 per cent in favour of modernisation and additions but I had a strong feeling we should not delete the famous phrase about ‘common ownership of the means of production, etc’. He was a bit surprised. I explained that I thought the whole thing had been represented in a very negative way from Blackpool onwards. However, it was a perfectly cordial evening.

Wednesday 16 March

Left early for Transport House for the long-awaited meeting of the National Executive at which we are to rewrite Clause 4. Got there so early I had a chance to look in and see the folks at the flat round the corner. It’s so very nice to be able to get Dad’s advice with all his tremendous experience of political rows over sixty years. Caroline said, ‘Keep your mouth shut today.’ Dad said, ‘Don’t get involved.’ I think it is all very sound.

Walking to Transport House I saw an enormous crowd of journalists and photographers. There were even ten or fifteen Trotskyites carrying placards announcing that they were from ‘The Clause 4 Defence Society’. The flashbulbs popped as I approached and it really was extremely funny to see – I couldn’t help laughing.

We were in the tiny committee room on the fourth floor and as I arrived Bessie Braddock looked out of the window and claimed to have spotted a journalist on the roof so we pulled the curtains.

There was some question raised about the leakages of Gaitskell’s draft, which had appeared in
Tribune
last week.

Finally Gaitskell opened. I kept my notes written at the time in my book. He really went over the ground of his Blackpool speech again. In the subsequent discussion it was clear that nobody wanted a great row. The tone was extremely good and it was a very interesting debate. Walter Padley gave an impassioned defence of Clause 4 as it stands and Sam Watson reminded us of the two Irish labourers arguing about the ownership of a cow which was standing quietly in the corner being milked by a lawyer.

It soon became dear that people were looking for some way of bridging
the gap and Jennie Lee suggested that the words ‘commanding heights of the economy’ might provide such a bridge.

Dick Crossman suggested we wanted an amplification and somebody said surely it was a clarification too. Finally Charlie Evans of the NUR said, ‘Why don’t we reaffirm it?’ So that’s how the three key words – reaffirms, clarifies and amplifies – came into Gaitskell’s draft. We accepted this by 22 votes to 1 with one abstention – Harry Nicholas of the TGWU on Frank Cousins’s orders. I said it was like saying that we ‘accept, reject and explain . . .’. We then paused for sandwiches before we went on to discuss the detailed amendments to Gaitskell’s draft. This went through fairly smoothly with some toughening up. I tried to get World Government specifically written in. It was defeated. But I did succeed in getting in explicit repudiation of colonialism with the words ‘rejecting the exploitation of one country by another’. This is in line with the Tunis Resolutions, and I felt was well worth while doing.