Even now there was some sympathy for Heath. Peter Hordern, a well-respected City figure and MP for Horsham who was present, recalled there was still significant support for him on the Executive. However, the tactics of the Heath camp worked to undermine it. Hordern says that Humphrey Atkins rang du Cann during or after the meeting and told him, ‘You have absolutely no right to have this meeting. You don’t represent the party at Parliament. There’s going to be an election next week for the executive and we shall make quite sure that you’re not re-elected, any of you.’5
Ted’s men had put their knowledge of the gathering to good use. As Neave and the rest were leaving, they ‘heard there were Press and cameras outside and the place of meeting had been again leaked’.6 Du Cann ‘led us to the back door and a key was found’. The scurry to the fire exit reminded several of Airey’s great claim to fame and ‘there were many jokes about Colditz.’ They opened the door to a blaze of flashbulbs. That afternoon’s Evening Standard revealed the existence of the ‘mafia’ furtively plotting their leader’s downfall. Neave was furious. ‘Everything is being put out by the whips to represent the Executive as acting unconstitutionally and to make it look absurd,’ he fumed.7 He later saw Jack Weatherill, who he trusted, and ‘explained the situation to him but we have lost the first round’.
A week after the election, despite doubts about his personal fitness to shoulder the burden of leadership, Keith Joseph had emerged as the front runner. He offered something new: a clear alternative to Heath’s centrist approach. All summer, he had been making speeches developing a ‘monetarist’ theory that argued that control of the money supply, rather than the incomes policies tried by Labour as well as Conservative governments, was the way to beat inflation. Joseph’s restless mind ranged in many directions and he was careless of the effect of his utterances. On 19 October, he made a speech in Edgbaston on the subject of population control, a live political issue of the day. ‘The balance of our population, our human stock is threatened,’ he warned. The wrong sort of people were having the wrong sort of babies, for ‘a high and rising proportion of children are being born to mothers least fitted to bring children into the world.’ These women ‘from classes four and five are now producing a third of all births’. All Joseph was arguing for was better propagation of birth control. The cold sociological jargon of ‘classes four and five’ made him sound like an early-century apostle of eugenics. It was soon clear that his credibility as a candidate had been severely, and possibly fatally, damaged.
The immediate effect of the media squall that followed was to relieve the pressure on Heath. Joseph had been ‘very tactless,’ wrote Neave. ‘This has raised a storm and will affect his chances of replacing Heath. The latter seems to have recovered his position and I suppose we have to accept the worst.’8 His fears were confirmed a week later when, following the Queen’s opening of Parliament, he saw Heath interviewed by ITN. Heath’s message, he recorded, was ‘I shall not resign. I am the leader. I have obligations to 11 million people who voted for me and the party.’9 Two days later, on 31 October, the full 1922 Committee convened. Out of twenty-one who spoke, ‘only two’ were in favour of Heath.10 However, even those who were critical were ‘eminently fair’. The most telling contribution came from Kenneth Lewis, a rare bird in the Tory aviary having been born the son of a Labour-supporting Tyneside shipfitter, who in the course of what Neave regarded as a moderate speech declared that the leadership was ‘a leasehold not a freehold’. He concluded, ‘Anyone but he would resign after this meeting.’
In early November, the elections for the 1922 Committee Executive were held. There were fifty candidates for the eighteen places, some of them Heath supporters standing to counter what the leader regarded as the existing members’ implacable hostility to him.11 The result dented any hope Heath might have nourished that the threat to him was fading. Despite Humphrey Atkins’s warning, all the incumbents were returned – ‘triumphantly’ in du Cann’s judgement.
Even Heath could see that some conciliatory gesture was needed. On 14 November, he met the committee. Neave recorded that he was kept waiting for ten minutes, then received ‘coldly but politely’.
The leader told them that he was now prepared to submit himself for re-election. However, in the meantime he would not be standing down. Given that this was an unprecedented situation – the first time a Conservative leader’s continued tenure had been openly challenged – he intended to ask Alec Douglas-Home to chair a committee to draft new leadership election rules. This naturally created unease. The fear was that the new arrangements would be fixed to the leader’s liking. At a ‘kind of anti-Heath rally’ at the home of Julian Ridsdale, the Powellite MP for Harwich, on 14 November, where ‘many other right-wingers’were present, Airey urged an early election on the existing rules, but failed to convince du Cann.12
Neave was now more exposed than at any time since he arrived at Parliament. During his career to date he had steered clear of party intrigues. His dissatisfaction with Heath was shared by many backbenchers, alienated by their leader’s rudeness and complete lack of interest in them or their concerns. But now Neave’s head was silhouetted dangerously above the parapet. For all his moaning about ‘what hell it is to be an MP’,13 politics was his life. The leadership crisis was becoming a matter of personal survival. ‘If Heath wins this battle (which he might) my position will be hopeless,’ he wrote on 16 November.
For the next several weeks, Neave pursued a parallel course of seeking to mend fences with Heath, while at the same time positioning himself to be on the winning side when the leadership contest eventually played out. The relationship between Ted and Airey had always been rather more complicated than the old story of the post-heart-attack encounter suggested. Lately it had taken on a disquietingly personal edge that Neave was anxious to blunt. On 21 November, he lunched with the leader’s PPS, Kenneth Baker, who told him that ‘Heath says “people keep coming to say that Airey dislikes me.”’ Neave replied that he ‘never said I “disliked” him but [had] criticised his style of leadership.’ He told Baker he wanted ‘to see Heath about this’, and the PPS said he would look into it. Later he discussed the matter with du Cann, who suggested that the badmouthing had come from the whips.
There soon came further evidence of Heath’s animus towards him. Diana heard via someone who had encountered Heath at the home of Toby Aldington that the leader regarded her husband as ‘wicked’.14 This news prompted Neave to call on Humphrey Atkins the following day, 6 December, to try and arrange an air-clearing meeting. ‘He agreed I ought to see E. Heath and “have it out with him”,’ he recorded. Ten days later, on Monday 16 December, they met. It was, he told Diana that evening, ‘an extraordinary interview’. It started – apparently in the Leader of the Opposition’s office in the House – at 7 p.m., and Heath offered him a drink, which he refused. Heath, he noted primly, ‘took 2 whiskies during the 35 mins I was with him.’
Neave began with a forthright declaration that ‘I thought that I should tell him my views and that over Christmas he should consider standing down,’ as ‘it would be impossible for him to reconcile the differences in the party.’ This was a vague formula which avoided the assertion that the central issue was Heath’s personality and the perception that he was an electoral liability. Neave suggested that he should do this (i.e. stand down) ‘before campaigns for individual candidates began’. Heath replied that Neave was ‘ingenuous’ to think that campaigns had not started ‘the day after the election’.
There followed some conversational va-et-vient. Airey suggested that Heath might want to take up some ‘position in Foreign Affairs’, given that ‘he was so important in Europe’. As Britain’s membership of the EEC had finally been agreed, it was obviously vital to have a senior figure overseeing the entry process. Ted smartly knocked back the idea that he might serve under a new leader, replying that ‘if people didn’t want him, he was still young enough to get another job.’ (He was then fifty-eight.)
&nb
sp; They locked horns when Neave asserted that the party machine should remain aloof from the leadership process and ‘Central Office should not promote any individual candidate.’ Heath replied that ‘Central Office supports the Leader,’ while admitting there could be some there who ‘might support a particular candidate’ – which Neave took to be a reference to Willie Whitelaw.
So it went on, but although minds never met, the atmosphere seems to have been civil enough. Ted ‘became more friendly when I said I had no axe to grind and could not hold office because of health, and he referred to my visit to him as Chief Whip in 1959.’ That Heath was happy to bring this up is surely further proof that the encounter was not the seismic event of legend. He made a last attempt to get Neave to understand his point of view, asking him, ‘Would I not “as a friend” agree that the 1922 ctee were aiming to overrule him and the Shadow Cabinet? I said they were more moderate than he thought. As I left he said, “We must fight on.”’
The meeting – the most prolonged encounter they had had in years – ended at 7.35 p.m. On his way out, Airey passed on his thoughts about Ted to Humphrey Atkins: ‘I told the Chief Whip I was sorry for him.’ It went further than that. ‘I feel he is in no fit state to lead a political party,’ he wrote, ‘but I could hardly expect him to agree with what I said.’
Heath was, of course, right in saying that the campaign to oust him had started as soon as he lost the election. By now there were clear runners in the field, but as yet Neave had yet to make up his mind which one to back. It was a crucial decision, on which his future depended, and heart and head were in constant conflict.
He had first come to think of Margaret Thatcher as a possible replacement for Heath a full fifteen months before, in September 1973. Recording a conversation with Diana in which the usual complaints about his ‘lack of any idea of how to handle MPs or their wives’ were aired, they discussed ‘whether we can stand him much longer’. Then the only possible rivals were ‘Whitelaw, Barber and possibly Margaret Thatcher’.15 Since the visit to the constituency in July that year his admiration for her had only increased. There had been a further local encounter at the end of September when she toured Harwell, where ‘Margaret made a hit with the scientists and it all went very well.’16 The Thatchers stayed the night and the following day visited Uffington churchyard to inspect the graves of ‘several members of the Thatcher family … They appear to have been local farmers dating back to the 18th century.’17 There was a jolly lunch at the Old Rectory with Philip and Val Goodhart and others (‘smoked salmon, curried chicken and ices, champagne to begin with, red and white wines’). The visit was ‘a tremendous success’ and Margaret raised the prospect of the Thatchers buying a cottage in the Vale of White Horse, handy for Swindon, where Burmah Oil, of which Denis was a director, had its headquarters.
During the fevered months between the two Conservative defeats of 1974, Neave made several remarks in his diary about her cleverness and at a lunch in April assured her ‘she had great political future’.18 At that time she had no intention of letting her ambition shine too brightly and, as the summer passed, let it be known that if it came to a contest, she would be backing Keith Joseph, now seen as an ideological ally.
In the meantime, Neave had been pulled into the orbit of Edward du Cann. He had been impressed by his deft performance as chairman of the 1922 Committee, and soon after the second defeat it seemed likely that he had enough potential support to be a serious contender to replace Heath – an impression du Cann encouraged without explicitly confirming. He exercised a curious attraction on Airey, who was normally unimpressed by City types. He was emollient and sympathetic, a smooth-haired and impeccably tailored tribune of the back-bench plebs. He was also emotionally intelligent and a skilful flatterer. One July evening, despite suffering from a recurrent throat infection, Airey struggled into the House for a vote. There he ran into du Cann, who urged him to get well soon, ‘as I had an important part to play. “There were no big men left.”’19
Neave felt du Cann took him seriously, and he – always troubled by the feeling that he was overlooked and undervalued – responded warmly to the attention. When the October plotting commenced they were as thick as thieves. Airey had detected the first faint creaking of a Thatcher bandwagon preparing to roll. Even before the election, he had reported whip Jack Weatherill’s conviction that ‘she can be leader of the party.’20 But he was not yet aboard, and would not be until du Cann’s possible candidacy was played out.
As the autumn progressed, he was pulled in different directions by the forces of loyalty, ambition and self-preservation. It was an agonising time. Du Cann was a difficult man to pin down – Heath had attached the word ‘slippery’ to him.21 Keyser Ullmann was rumoured to be in deep trouble and Labour were said to have compiled a dossier on its dealings that would blow a possible du Cann leadership bid out of the water. On 13 November, Neave was present at a meeting at the House chaired by Nigel Fisher to discuss du Cann’s candidature. ‘It appears he is not yet willing to stand, partly owing to his wife’s dislike of politics,’ he wrote. It was apparent that there might be other reasons for his hesitation. They ‘discussed how rumours about his reputation in the City can be countered, as inquiries show nothing against him, though Keyser Ullmann has a doubtful reputation.’ They decided that it was ‘premature to start a campaign’.
On 20 November came the first reports that Margaret Thatcher had decided to declare her candidature, and the following day Neave was told by Geoffrey Finsberg, a Tory MP whose Hampstead constituency was next door to Thatcher in Finchley, that ‘Margaret would definitely stand.’ How Finsberg knew is unclear, but it emerges from Charles Moore’s biography that by her own account it was indeed on that day that she made up her mind.22 The decision followed an early-evening meeting with Keith Joseph at his office in the Commons, where he told her that the furore that followed his Edgbaston speech, and the effect that it had had on his wife Helen, had dissuaded him from taking on the challenge.
Despite their good relations, Airey was not involved at all in Margaret’s decision. On 26 November, he went to see her in her room in the House and she confirmed the news. ‘She seemed rather apprehensive about the effect on her Shadow Cabinet colleagues,’ he recorded. In her autobiography Thatcher referred to a meeting which took place at about this time. ‘Airey had come to see me shortly after my decision to stand was known,’ she wrote.23 At that time, though they ‘got on well’ and she was ‘conscious of mutual respect … we were not yet the close friends we were to become.’ Neave told her that he ‘hoped to persuade Edward du Cann to stand’, but ‘until Edward decided one way or the other it was not, of course, possible for Airey to support me actively.’ However, she ‘knew that I could rely on his advice and he promised to stay in touch, which we did,’ coming to her room in the House ‘to exchange notes on several occasions between then and the end of the year’.
Neave left the meeting reckoning that ‘she has a good chance.’ This was still not enough to persuade him to abandon his support for du Cann, around whom stories of Keyser Ullmann’s financial difficulties continued to swirl. They had prompted Neave to consider asking a constituent, Paul Paubon, who he described as a member of the Secret Intelligence Service, to make some checks – though if he did so and what resulted is not recorded.24
As the days passed, the odds changed continuously. On Friday 29 November, he lunched at the House and, ear to the ground as always, ‘talked to some members about Margaret Thatcher, about whom there is not much enthusiasm.’ A week later, another encounter with her persuaded him that ‘I shall back her if Edward Du Cann¶ does not stand.’25
On Thursday 12 December, he saw Thatcher again. She too seemed to believe that du Cann was the best candidate. They ‘had a private conversation … She made it clear that if Edward Du Cann were to stand she would drop out.’ Much depended on the form of the election system Alec Douglas-Home was due to reveal the following week. The new proposals were announced on Tuesday
17 December. Home’s committee came up with two changes to the rules. One was a provision that made it possible for the leader to be challenged by MPs every year. The other was to change the existing system by which, to win the first ballot, a candidate had to have an absolute majority, plus a 15 per cent margin over their nearest rival. This was now to be modified so that the 15 per cent would be calculated on the total number of MPs eligible to take part, whether or not they did so. The proposals were to be voted on in the New Year. ‘Everybody quite cheerful but confused,’ Neave recorded. However, the general view was that Home had not favoured his boss and ‘pro-Heath people complain that he is given too hard a task to win on the first ballot.’
In the run-up to Christmas 1974, the Westminster weathervane was swinging to all points of the compass and it was impossible to detect a strong prevailing wind that favoured any particular candidate. Mrs Thatcher had recovered easily from an early low blow by the Heath camp which publicised an old interview she had given to a small magazine called Pre-Retirement Choice in which she revealed that she stockpiled tins of ‘expensive proteins: ham, tongue, mackerel …’ as a strategy to beat inflation. This was immediately presented across the media as evidence of ‘hoarding’. Stockpiling was something only the well-off could afford and the word still carried pejorative overtones from the last war.
The Man Who Was Saturday Page 24