by Roy Jenkins
SUNDAY, 2 NOVEMBER. East Hendred.
Tavernes, who had organized James Meade72 to come over from Cambridge, to lunch. Meade is a slightly other-worldly, very nice, distinguished man, who is extremely anxious to be helpful to some new radical party, particularly in the formation of economic policy. He is also very keen on electoral reform and pretty close to the Liberals, saying that if the new party did not come off he would almost certainly join them.
MONDAY, 3 NOVEMBER. East Hendred and London.
With Crispin to what was, in effect, the first of my farewell visits: to Mrs Thatcher. An hour and a half’s conversation—not I think of particular note. She showed little desire to look forward and discuss the European future beyond the end of my term. Justin Cartwright, a television producer who wants to do a dialogue between David Steel and me for Panorama, to see me in the early evening. I am not too keen to commit myself to do this early on my return. David Steel himself to dinner. I found him very good and sound, not unduly discouraged by continuing hesitancy, and understanding of my desire to wait some time, but not indefinitely, for the Gang of Three.
TUESDAY, 4 NOVEMBER. London and Brussels.
Home to rue de Praetère at 7.00 to hear the result of the Labour Party first ballot. A remarkable result: Healey in the lead but not at all strongly so, and a real possibility of his being beaten by Foot on the second ballot. A rather exciting prospect. A bitterly cold day.
WEDNESDAY, 5 NOVEMBER. Brussels.
Listened to the news of Reagan’s landslide victory as we drove to the Bois (for my run). No newspapers, however, for some reason or other. Dined with Jennifer with the Dick Leonards: an agreeable conversation with them, mainly reminiscence about Tony Crosland, on which subject Leonard is easy to talk to, because, although he was so close to Tony, and therefore very well informed, he is also objective without being at all cold either towards Tony, or towards me. He is a very nice man.
FRIDAY, 7 NOVEMBER. Brussels.
Ivor Richard,73 newly appointed to be the next British junior Commissioner, to lunch rue de Praetère. Found him intelligent and agreeable but somehow slightly detached and complacent, and rather misconceiving his job I think, seeing it as far too much a propaganda job to be done in England with the object of reconciling the Labour movement and the trade unions to Europe. This admittedly would be a wonderful objective, but not I think achievable, and certainly not by a Brussels-based Commissioner.
SATURDAY, 8 NOVEMBER. Brussels.
Hayden, Laura and John Harris arrived for the weekend about noon. Crispin came in to settle the placement for his great party—or our joint great party—in the evening. We lunched at Ohain, and then walked on a beautifully fine clear cold day in the grounds of the Château de la Hulpe on the way back. At just after 8 p.m. we went to Crispin’s for his dinner and dance for sixty-four people, which went on until about 3 a.m. I enjoyed it a lot. It was certainly a success, and as good a way as any of celebrating (?) one’s sixtieth birthday.
MONDAY, 10 NOVEMBER. Brussels.
An official visit from Nordli, the Prime Minister of Norway, for nearly four hours from 11.45.1 liked him, as I had in Oslo in July. I went home at 6.40, eager to hear the Labour Party election news, which came through at 7.00. Sensational result: Foot elected by ten votes. I cannot pretend that I was other than elated, as it clearly opened up a much greater prospect of political realignment. Dined with Jennifer at home, discussing this urgently and excitedly.
TUESDAY, 11 NOVEMBER. Brussels.
My sixtieth birthday has arrived at last; like so many things discounted in advance it did not therefore seem as bad as it might have done. Went into the office, not intending to do too much work, at 10.30. Saw Roland de Kergorlay (head of our mission in Washington) at 12.00; a brief drink with the immediate staff at 12.45 or so. Then with Jennifer to lunch at the Villa Lorraine. Excellent lunch and enjoyable occasion. Office from 3.30 to 4.45. Tickells and Michael Jenkins’ to dinner.
WEDNESDAY, 12 NOVEMBER. Brussels.
At 4 o’clock I addressed a meeting of about 120 senior staff (Als and A2s) on the Spierenburg Report—what he had done, what we intended to do, and what they had to do if they were to improve management, etc. A good speech, written by Nick, which I delivered firmly and forcefully, and they took with a mixture of enthusiasm (fairly limited), resignation, and some complaint; but worth doing, although a lot of them (not all) hate doing anything which in any way shakes them out of their ruts.
FRIDAY, 14 NOVEMBER. Brussels and near Amsterdam.
Bob McNamara to lunch rue de Praetère. Crispin and Caroline were the only others there. Very enjoyable conversation with him; I find him rather a spectacular man, and it was well worth having changed my plans and stayed in Brussels in order to see him. I don’t know what we talked about exactly—but all a great pleasure. Drove to Holland in the afternoon for an Amsterdam visit the next morning. Stayed at the Waterland Hotel, which was in fact only about twenty-five kilometres from Amsterdam Airport, but they took us about two hours. We got constantly lost in drenching rain, had a drink at some extremely sunken café, which looked as though it was in Tennessee. We were then stopped by the police for going too slowly on to a motorway. They began extremely aggressively – very odd for the Dutch police—as though they thought we were smuggling drugs, but then quietened down a good deal. However, eventually we arrived at the hotel, a tiny and extremely elegantly furnished château in a little park at Velsen; roaring fires in all the rooms.
SUNDAY, 16 NOVEMBER. Brussels and Stockholm.
Jennifer and I by avion taxi to Stockholm, where we arrived at 7.30. We were met by the Prime Minister, Thorbjörn Fälldin, who seemed a nice man, though talking far from perfect English. Being a Conservative Prime Minister (the first for decades) certainly did not mean he was a good linguist. Installed at the royal guest house called Haga Palace, about five miles from the centre of the city.
MONDAY, 17 NOVEMBER. Stockholm.
One of my last days of official visits with a typical programme. At 10 o’clock we had a morning-long meeting of ministers, presided over by the Prime Minister. Then a working lunch in the Operakällaren, presided over again by the Prime Minister. Then quite a good meeting with Ullsten, the Foreign Minister. Then Feldt, who is the Social Democratic economic expert, Palme being away in the Middle East. Then Bohman, the Minister of the Economy. Then I briefed the Community ambassadors and then, after an interval, had the Prime Minister’s dinner in the Foreign Office. Unfortunately it was unattractive weather in Stockholm. It had been very cold as with us but in the last few days has become mild and wet with a lot of dirty piles of half-melted snow all over the city.
TUESDAY, 18 NOVEMBER. Stockholm and Strasbourg.
The Speaker of the Parliament at 9.00. Then some sight-seeing, first a famous ship which sank in the harbour in about 1600 on its way to Poland, and then the Armoury Museum. At 11.00 I did a press conference and at 12.00 we lunched with the King and Queen in the Royal Palace. He is small and boyish-looking, slightly nervous but very agreeable. The Queen is mainly Brazilian and not at all German as I foolishly thought. I found her slightly difficult at first, but once one got going conversationally easy and interesting. After lunch we talked to them for about half an hour, standing in a group of four, they and Jennifer and me. The Swedish Court is a curious mixture of informality shot through with occasional strands of high formality. Lunch was in the slightly gloomy old castle (well suited to my Ballo in Maschera impression of what the Swedish Court should be like) looking out over the harbour across to the Grand Hotel. The family are about to move out of it very soon, not into a villa, but into another castle, apparently more suitable for children and some way out.
Arrived in Strasbourg for the last time at 4.30. To the Parliament for two hours, then to dinner (everything beginning to be for the last time now) at La Vieille Enseigne.
WEDNESDAY, 19 NOVEMBER. Strasbourg.
Lunch for four of the five pro-Market Labour MEPs at La Want-zenau. From 5
.30 to 6.30 I gave a long interview to Tad Szulc for a New Yorker article which he was doing on the work of the European institutions. At 6.30 I went to see Mme Veil in order to complain (disinterestedly) about the Commission’s Strasbourg accommodation, and got her to come and see my room, which, having moved from the splendour of hers, was a salutary experience, and she was duly shocked by it.
THURSDAY, 20 NOVEMBER. Strasbourg and Luxembourg.
Paid a sort of symbolic farewell visit to the hémicycle of the Palais de l’Europe—and then Jennifer and I motored to Nancy. Walked around the Place Stanislas and down the Allée before lunch. Drove to Luxembourg, where we installed ourselves in the Embassy. I then paid an hour’s farewell visit to Werner, who gave me a nice picture. Then saw Thorn from 5.00 to 6.15 and talked about his future problems. Then back for speech titillation at the Embassy, where Crispin had arrived. The Jeremy Thomas’s74 have recently replaced the Patrick Wrights. I liked both the Thomas’s. Then gave the Churchill Memorial Lecture.
MONDAY, 24 NOVEMBER. Brussels.
Downstairs at 11.30 to receive the Queen and Prince Philip. Took them up to my room, with two or three other people, for twenty minutes. Easy conversation. Then Commission meeting for an hour. Good presentations by Cheysson, Gundelach, Davignon and Tugendhat. I couldn’t get the Queen to ask any questions but the Duke of Edinburgh butted in a good deal, and kept the thing going rather well. He started a great argument with Tugendhat about how ridiculous it was to want to spend more money and increase own resources. At that stage I came in and explained firmly to him why this was not extravagant but necessary if the Community was to do much outside agriculture, which was very much in Britain’s long-term interest. However, as the Queen was rather silent, although not looking at all bored, he was on balance a help.
Then from 1.00 to 1.30 we had the reception for the Directors-General of all nationalities, and British staff selected by ballot, in the ‘cathedral’. Then out in a great hurry to Val Duchesse to receive the Queen there at 1.40. Luncheon went on until 3.30, with only a formal toast—no speeches. But the Queen was then definitely on good form, agreeable, and apparently amused by some of the incongruities of Community life. For once Val Duchesse produced quite good food. Saw them all off with a certain sense of relief but thinking it had gone well and been worthwhile. It was fairly well covered by British television, and I hope will have some mildly beneficial effect on British public opinion vis-à-vis the Community. It was very good of her to have come.
Council and Political Cooperation from 4.30 until 10.00
TUESDAY, 25 NOVEMBER. Brussels.
Council for nearly four hours from 10.15, at which we mainly discussed, without getting very far, the social aspects of the steel volet. The Germans and the French were both being fairly difficult. Before lunch there was a thoroughly nasty argument on New Zealand butter—getting absolutely nowhere—the French being unpleasantly difficult.
WEDNESDAY, 26 NOVEMBER. Brussels and Paris.
11.43 TEE to Paris after an early Commission meeting. Lunch on the train and arrived in rain at the Ritz at 2.45. Installed not as we had asked in a small suite on the garden side, but in an immense suite rather badly furnished in the style arab overlooking the Place Vendôme. Discovered to my horror that it was incredibly expensive—over 4000 francs for the night—and told Crispin that we could not possibly pay this and must either change rooms or move hotels. He went down to negotiate and had a rather good encounter with the management saying, ‘Il faut que vous sachiez que Monsieur Jenkins n’est pas un sheik arab ni même un roi nègre.’ The net effect of this, though we were not informed of this until afterwards, was that he got them to look up how much I had last paid and discovered that it was about 1500 francs. As a result they offered to reduce the bill to about 1800 francs, which was a considerable triumph.
Then we went to a meeting with Giscard, which lasted exactly an hour, from 4.20 to 5.20. He was alone, though I had Crispin. It was polite and courteous, even had bits of interest, and without being either fascinating or warm was not notably unfriendly either. We parted in good order, with honours tolerably even. Then at 6.00 we went to see Barre in Matignon and had just over an hour with him. The meeting was quite different: he was warm but at his most pedagogic and went on and on, giving me an only mildly interesting lecture on the state of the French economy in which, according to him, everything was about as good as it possibly could be.
THURSDAY, 27 NOVEMBER. Paris and Dublin.
Dublin at 2.30 for a fairly intensive series of Dublin farewell visits, beginning with President Hillery, who would not let me go, partly because he likes talking and partly I think because he wanted to make me late for the Taoiseach. In any case we went on long after the scheduled time, and I got to Haughey half an hour late. I had a reasonably constructive talk with him and more or less cut, at his suggestion, my meeting with Lenihan (the Foreign Minister) who is a very nice man, and when I rushed in to apologize to him, said that he was giving me dinner and it did not in the least matter.
Then to a press conference at the new Commission office, followed by a reception. A very good attendance at the reception—a lot of ambassadors, members of the Government, etc. - and quite a good speech by me. Then to Iveagh House, where I dined with Lenihan and various other ministers. A thoroughly agreeable occasion—I like Lenihan very much indeed—and there was a lot of warmth in his speech and a very good atmosphere. I have attached great importance to my Irish relations—as I should have done as a British President—and I think they have been good. Stayed at the Hibernian Hotel.
SATURDAY, 29 NOVEMBER. East Hendred.
David Owens with their children came to a long lunch from 1.20 to 5 o’clock. He told me firmly, for the first time, that he was prepared to join a new party, and that he thought that Shirley would come too, though he was curiously less sure about Bill. He was also, although agreeable in other ways, very firmly geared up to tell me that he thought that Shirley should be leader; they very much wanted me to play a full part in it, but that it was his view that Shirley should be leader because of her great popularity, etc. And it was made clear that it was in his view to be not a centre party but a ‘Socialist International’ party, and I was joining them rather than vice versa.
We will see how that works out, but at any rate it is a great advance which no one would have thought possible some time ago. There will now be a real break in the parliamentary party, and I may well get, at the end of the day, much more the sort of party I want than the sort of ex-Labour Party that for the moment he wants. But we will see. At 6.30 I had a telephone call with David Steel and informed him I thought things were going well without telling him the full details. To bed early feeling reasonably content with the movement of affairs. It is an incomparably better position than looked likely last July.
MONDAY, 1 DECEMBER. Brussels and Luxembourg.
Motored to Luxembourg for the European Council and arrived at the Holiday Inn, in which non-Ruritanian surroundings we were installed by the Luxembourg Government. Lunch with the Grand Duke in his palace. Sat between Schmidt and Nothomb (the new Belgian Foreign Minister). Schmidt not on very good form -looking tired, seeming tired, saying he was tired (he always does that), but whereas previously he seemed to enjoy being tired and enjoyed complaining that he was tired, he has now got to the state where he gets no enjoyment out of the complaint. There were beautiful views out on to a sunlit Luxembourg through the narrow fortified windows of the palace dining room. The European Council met from 3.20 until just after 7.00: economic and social situation, EMS, industrial innovation (a rather good discussion following a Commission paper). Thorn report on the Middle East. Then dinner for heads of government at the Palais Vauban, where we had been the previous spring, with no riveting conversation.
TUESDAY, 2 DECEMBER. Luxembourg and Brussels.
Final session of the European Council for three hours. I made a wind-up ‘report on the four years’ speech, thoughts for the future, etc. for twenty minutes,
which was surprisingly well received, and started quite a vigorous and sensible discussion. Giscard began the discussion, was very gracious for him, and said the best compliment was to take some of the things I had said seriously and discuss them. It was an agreeable hour and a good wind-up to a series of wearing (and sometimes wearying) European Councils.
WEDNESDAY, 3 DECEMBER. Brussels.
Commission for two hours only as we all had to go and lunch with the King and Queen at Laeken. The great excitement of the morning was before the Commission began. When I walked in Crispin took me over urgently and rather secretly to Christopher Tugendhat. Christopher then told me how he had been shot at by an assassin an hour before and narrowly missed. It was all rather dramatic. At that stage he did not seem unduly upset but became manifestly more shaken as the morning went on; this was particularly noticeable at lunch.
Lunch at Laeken was very agreeably done by the King and Queen, who do seem to have a genuine friendship for us and spoke very warmly, so that the whole occasion was enjoyable, except for poor Christopher. For almost the first time I felt guilty for the benefits of ‘protection’. There was absolutely no reason why terrorists (presumably Irish) should have assaulted him rather than me, and plenty of reasons for the reverse. But I am protected and he is not. Back for a resumed and I hope the last long meeting of the Commission from 3.40 to 7.15.