William Hague has a chapter in his new biography of William Wilberforce, the
antislavery campaigner, called Eloquence without Victory. It contains a
vivid description of the frustrations of winning the arguments in the House
of Commons but losing the war. That title might more aptly apply to its
author.
One of the most distinguished parliamentarians in living memory, forever
besting the prime minister on the floor of the house, Hague nonetheless saw
the Conservative party he led pulverised by Tony Blair at the 2001 general
election.
Wilberforce was given the epithet “the nightingale of the House of Commons”.
Hague too was singing sweetly last Monday night at the launch of his book,
holding a high-powered audience spellbound with his wit and oratorical
craft. “He’s really very good,” Lord Owen, the former SDP leader, gasped to
me.
He really is – the Oxford Union command of an audience leavened by
self-deprecation and a way of making serious arguments without sounding
forbidding. And now he is back as shadow foreign secretary in the top Tory
team. This time, he thinks, the contest can be won. But the laurels will
instead go to another, younger man – David Cameron. Bitter, him?
He says not. In his clean-lined modern office at Portcullis House,
Westminster, he gives off a curious aura of diffidence and confidence. After
all, he was making a lucrative living out of speech making, his last book,
William Pitt the Younger, was a bestseller and he was enjoying playing the
piano. And for what? The drudgery of opposition, having seen the worst of it
already for four years. “It is quite a sacrifice, a large financial
sacrifice,” he says, “but a financial sacrifice is something you can put
right at a later stage.” It is the lack of personal freedom he considers the
greater sacrifice. “The piano lid is closed. I have managed to finish
Wilberforce, though there is no way now I could do another book.”
First the diffidence: “I freely admit I was in two minds about coming back. I
don’t feel like a career politician any more.” And he adds with an elegant
turn of phrase: “I would like to become a writer when I have done with
politics or politics has done with me.” Certainly he has the talent, as our
reviewer Max Hastings judges in today’s Books pages.
But then comes the hint of steel: “I am not a dependant, I am in a stronger
position to give franker advice to colleagues. I didn’t want to be leader of
the party again.” That frankness and strength is appreciated by his leader.
Indeed Cameron takes trouble to show he holds in high regard the frank
opinions of his star signing. He turns up for the book’s reception and went
out of his way to pay court to Ffion Hague, William’s equally strong-minded
Welsh wife. On his comeback, he adds: “I have always said she has a veto on
these things. But she is very supportive.
“It was old-fashioned duty that won. It was my duty to support David Cameron
and to support a team to run the country” – though there had been some
backbench muttering that he ought to come to the aid of the leadership or
find a new job altogether. “It is fun and exciting. The Conservatives have
been doing better than at any time since I have been involved at a senior
level. And David Cameron has been doing very well and is a good colleague.”
Indeed Cameron is still ahead in the opinion polls, but of late his personal
standing has been dented. The proportion of voters who think he is strong
fell from 44% to 37%. On the question of whether he has the qualities to
make a good prime minister his ratings plummeted from 42% to 33%.
The row over his education policy created a storm because it wasn’t just the
usual dinosaurs who opposed him. A Thatcherite generation of hard-faced
meritocrats who had done well out of their selective grammar education
disliked being called “delusional” by their Etonian leader for defending
such schools. It wasn’t just that David Willetts, the Tory education
spokesman, had ruled out expanding grammars but that he had rubbed it in by
asserting there was no evidence they promoted social mobility.
Indeed Hague, an alumnus of a Yorkshire comprehensive, supported restoring
grammars. Meanwhile, also present at his launch party, stood the vulpine
shadow home affairs spokesman David Davis, defeated by Cameron for the
leadership of the Conservatives. He is a fellow Yorkshire MP and a proud
product of a grammar school where 60% of the boys came from poor homes.
Hague dismisses it all loyally as “a bump in the road”. “Splits,” he chuckles
self-deprecatingly, “in my time we had yawning craters and earthquakes over
European policy and in the aftermath of defeat.” Here his tone reminds me of
the rich Yorkshiremen in the Monty Python sketch who, when confronted with
another’s hardship about an even more impoverished background, come out with
boasts like: “We worked 24 hours a day at the mill for fourpence every six
years”, etc.
“We must possess the centre ground and be seen to worry about nonpolitical
man’s concerns and worries about the health service,” says Hague. “Of course
we worry about taxes. But the top of our agenda is quality of life issues.
We are trying to win people who weren’t of voting age when the country last
voted Conservative. This requires a more up to date approach”
Tony Blair, in opposition, forced the Labour party to give up its clause 4
constitutional commitment to the nationalisation of swathes of British
industry. Cameron and Willetts were trying to say that the days of providing
support for a sector of the middle class in education or the public services
were over. But if this was a clause 4 moment for Cameron didn’t he fluff it,
I ask. Hadn’t Willetts partly caved in to his rebels, including Dominic
Grieve, the shadow attorney-general, who asked if his native Buckinghamshire
could open a new one.
Hague rejects the premise of the question and the analogy. “This was not a
clause 4 moment for the Conservative party. We didn’t have to admit our own
basic beliefs are wrong. We don’t have an equivalent . . . there hasn’t been
a fudge,” he asserts obstinately. But why is an idea that was good for him
six years ago no good today?
He then grandly defends Cameron as working “in the tradition of Peel,
Disraeli, Macmillan and Thatcher” – and doubtless old Uncle Tom Cobley and
all. Let us remind our Tory historian the first two Tory statesmen tore
their party apart for a generation over the corn laws and at a critical
stage in her fortunes Macmillan criticised Thatcher for “selling off the
family silver” and showing insufficient compassion for the poor.
Then he boasts: “We are advancing on a broad front. It is astounding to see
David Cameron cheered to the rafters by junior doctors. In the 1990s, when
the Conservatives lost their advantage in taxation, it was a huge blow so it
is an immense strategic blow for the Labour party to lose their lead on
health.”
These points are fairly made. But can you be both in favour of the more
radical Blairite reforms and, as the modernising Conservative party insists,
trust the health service professionals who oppose them? Hague skips neatly
past this one with a denunciation of government maladministration and red
tape and being “in favour of local decision making”.
“The answer is to do more of what we are doing, to do more of what David
Cameron is advocating. We have broken out of the flatlining support of the
1993-2005 era. We’re not complacent. We know we have a mountain to climb.
Speaking personally I am very confident the Conservatives will get the most
votes at the next election, though I do not know how that will translate
into seats. It would be astonishing if there weren’t a Brown bounce of some
sort, rabbits pulled out of a hat, a frenetic 100 days.”
In spite of Hague’s defence of Conservative advances in the local elections,
analysis of the results reveals that Cameron should have used the past six
months more productively. The electorate thinks he is a nice chap, but they
still dislike his party. They haven’t a strong enough idea of what he
stands for, he lacks definition.
If Brown suffers from southern discomfort (affluent London and the southeast
are out of love with Labour) then the Conservatives are victims of northern
distemper. As Hague implies, the Tories cannot be at all certain of an
outright general election victory. The battle in the next six months will be
crucial.
We talk about Wilberforce and modern times. What of slavery today here in the
United Kingdom. “It is difficult to get the system into action. In human
trafficking, John Prescott and I spoke about modern human trafficking,
sexual slavery and bonded labour.
“A lot of things we can do, but we haven’t done enough; measures like a proper
border police. We stand up in parliament and call for these and nothing
happens. We feel Wilberforcian frustration at the slow turning of the cogs
when human issues are at stake.”
Then I recall seeing another interesting Tory face at his party. Wasn’t that
Graham Brady, his shadow junior, beaming at him over there? You know, the
one who resigned over grammar schools much to Cameron’s chagrin? A
surprising appearance. “These things happen,” he smiles. “I have great
respect for anyone who resigns over a policy disagreement. He will continue
as a great friend.”
Hague has steel all right. He reserves the right to pick his friends and makes
no compromise. That much he shares in common with his hero Wilberforce, who
picked his friendships and his causes wherever he cared.
If I were Cameron I would continue to try hard to keep him on board. The
talent is there. He’ll stick around too I guess – so long as the Tories win.
William Wilberforce: The life of the Great AntiSlave Campaigner, by William
Hague, Harper Press, £25
