by Chris Mullin
I asked Tony Benn what he thought of The Man’s conference speech. ‘A combination of Julius Caesar, Churchill and Mussolini,’ he replied. He said he had recently asked Ted Heath what advice he would offer the Prime Minister in present circumstances. True to form, the old curmudgeon replied, ‘Pipe down. You are upsetting the Europeans and upstaging Bush. They won’t like it.’
Friday, 5 October
Sunderland
Far from piping down, The Man has his foot hard on the throttle. Last night he was in Moscow. Today Rawalpindi. And later, Delhi. A headline in the Wall Street Journal describes him as ‘America’s newest ambassador’.
Should we be pleased?
Graham in my office reports a visit from a constituent, clutching a plastic bag. The exchange that followed was pure Monty Python.
Constituent: ‘Do you want to see what’s in here?’
Graham (hesitating): ‘What is it?’
‘A pigeon.’
‘Is it dead?’
‘Yes.’
‘No … just leave it there.’
‘This global warming thing. I’ve come up with something big. This pigeon has been eating weeds. It’s passing green stuff. I’ll show you …’
‘That’s okay. I’ll take your word for it.’
‘If we could breed weed-eating pigeons, we could do without weed-killer.’
‘That pigeon will be riddled with disease. Do you keep it in your flat?’
‘It’s fine, man.’
‘It’s dead.’
‘It’s fine. Look, I’ll show you.’
‘No, no, don’t.’
He was eventually persuaded to leave after Graham suggested he contact a pigeon fanciers’ club. The man is a neighbour. We can see him every day from our kitchen window, in his top floor bedsit in the terrace behind us. He sits there hour after hour, day after day, feeding pigeons and staring into space.
Sunday, 7 October
The attack on Afghanistan has started. It is a measure of our total lack of influence that we were not even able to persuade the Americans to delay for 12 hours until the British journalist, Yvonne Ridley, who is due to be released tomorrow, was out. Tonight’s television news depicted The Man, looking pale and exhausted, in the Pillared Drawing Room at Number 10 reading a short statement. He was flanked by JP, Jack Straw and Geoff Hoon, silent and irrelevant.
Although it is billed as some sort of great alliance, as usual it is just us and the Americans with other governments making vaguely supportive noises from the sidelines. I suppose it has to be done, but there is something distasteful about the armed forces of two of the richest countries in the world sitting in the Arabian Sea firing Tomahawk missiles at £700,000 a shot at one of the poorest.
Wednesday, 10 October
A row has broken out over a leaked memo, dated 11 September, by an adviser to Steve Byers, suggesting it would be ‘a good day to bury bad news’. What is particularly chilling is that the note was written within an hour of the planes hitting the World Trade Center, while the nightmare was still unfolding. In other words, at the very moment when thousands of people were in the process of being incinerated, while the rest of us were sitting transfixed in front of our television screens, this New Labour android had her mind firmly focused on the small picture. Unsurprisingly, she is a product of 1980s student politics which gave birth to the New Labour equivalent of the Taliban. I would have sacked her on the spot, but Steve, decent fellow that he is, is sticking up for her. I hope this doesn’t do him too much damage.
Friday, 12 October
Sunderland
To the headquarters of the Employment Service, front line in the war against benefit culture, for a report on the New Deal. If we don’t make progress here, we are destined for ever to go on manufacturing sullen,
indifferent, useless youths; pouring into a bottomless pit money that should be spent on schools and hospitals. If we can’t change this, we won’t change anything. The news is good: a 40 per cent reduction in young unemployed in four years. ‘You guys have got nothing to worry about,’ says one of the managers. ‘It’s working.’ Also, the gap between the world of work and the world of benefit is gradually widening. The Working Families’ Tax Credit is, we are told, ‘an outstanding success’, enticing hundreds of lone parents back into the world of work. None of this is of much interest to the chattering classes or the cynics in the Lobby, but it matters up here.
There is still a mountain to climb, however. In addition to the 9,000 people in Sunderland (half of whom are lone parents) still signing on for Jobseekers’ Allowance, a staggering 38,000 are claiming for sickness, incapacity or disability. None of these are even in the market for work, although many of them must be capable of doing something. Benefit culture is our greatest inheritance from the Thatcher Decade. It hangs around our neck like a huge albatross.
Saturday, 13 October
Reports from Kabul suggest that civilian casualties are mounting. A 2,000 pound bomb has hit a residential area and the Pentagon has grudgingly owned up to what it calls ‘a targeting error’. Tonight’s news showed a brief clip of desperate people scrabbling through the ruins of their homes, but because the cameraman was an Arab it isn’t being taken seriously. The usual weasel words are being trotted out. What would be called a monstrous crime if it happened in New York or Omagh is merely an unfortunate targeting error in Afghanistan.
Monday, 15 October
The destruction of a village near Jalalabad has been confirmed. One man is said to have lost his wife and five children. We must be grateful that we do not have to look him in the eye and explain that, while the people who blew up the World Trade Center were evil terrorists, those who rained death upon his family were heroes engaged in a just war.
Tuesday, 16 October
Another debate on the war. Once again Jack was put up to hold the line. I was sandwiched uneasily between Tam Dalyell and Bob Marshall-Andrews. Tam was shouting ‘gobbledegook’ and ‘tell that to the Macedonians’ every time Jack defended the bombing by reference to Kosovo. By and large the dissidents were the Usual Suspects, although unease runs deeper. Our strategy is high-risk. If the Taliban implode, as the Milosovic regime did, we will get away with it. If they don’t, and there is a huge famine, disaster beckons. Later some of us had a meeting upstairs with Jack. I told him that he should not imagine – contrary to what he asserted in the chamber – that only those who opposed the intervention in Kosovo were unhappy about the attack on Afghanistan. Also, it was nonsense to assert, as he had been doing, that all our bombs were carefully targeted. The Americans had always had a casual attitude towards civilian casualties. Jack didn’t argue. In passing he even described the American airdrop of pasta and tomato sauce as ‘gauche’. He said it was important to stick with the Americans to discourage isolationism. ‘Because Tony has done the diplomacy, he has an enormous amount of influence in Washington. See the way the Americans have shifted on using the UN in the last few weeks.’
M came in this evening, hotfoot from Washington. ‘Bush is a puppet,’ he says. ‘He doesn’t know anything.’ To begin with he was in hock to Karl Rove, a right-wing ideologue who occupies some obscure post in the White House. ‘After September 11 they had to bring in the adults.’
Wednesday, 17 October
To a crowded meeting of the parliamentary party, to hear The Man.
‘September 11,’ he said, ‘will define politics for the foreseeable future. Especially in terms of America’s attitude to the outside world.’ There is no alternative, he kept saying. No alternative. No alternative. (Where have we heard that before?)
As usual, Tam was first to stick his head above the parapet. ‘Are you sure,’ he asked, ‘that by bombing you are not doing exactly what Osama bin Laden wants?’ Tam was heard quietly at first, but when – for the third time – he added, ‘And another thing …’ people began to groan audibly. Dear old Tam. Armed with the utter self-confidence that he has carried with him since Eton, he just ploughs on like a
bulldozer. And, of course, he may well be right – it wouldn’t be the first time. At the end, The Man was applauded warmly. For the time being he has nothing to worry about.
Afghanistan also dominated the parliamentary committee. Jean went in first. ‘Don’t be fooled,’ she told The Man, ‘there is deep unease below the surface. Everyone is hoping you are right.’ Apparently, David Hanson, his Parliamentary Private Secretary, has been telling him this too.
Andrew Mackinlay raised Jo Moore, author of the ‘good day to bury bad news’ memo. The consensus seemed to be that she should have been sacked, but The Man was having none of it. ‘Too harsh. The end of her career – where would she find another job? She’s got two kids, she’s the main breadwinner.’ I warmed to him. It reveals an attractive side of his character. This is Tony the Merciful. Tony the Compassionate. He has only to raise his little finger to dispose of her and yet he chooses not to. He added, ‘In any case, once a minister has taken a decision, I have a visceral reluctance to let the media decide.’ Amen to that. The trouble is it is doing terrible damage to poor Steve Byers.
Monday, 22 October
To an upper committee room to hear Geoff Hoon talking glibly about the ‘astonishing accuracy’ of the bombing. Many Afghans, he asserted, were surprised by the accuracy. As for Kumar, the hamlet west of Jalalabad where up to a hundred civilians are said to have been killed, ‘that was not a village in any normal sense of the word’. I found this too much to swallow. When my turn came I said, ‘I have some difficulty with this concept of benign bombing and with the idea that the Afghans were all that grateful to us for the pin-point accuracy with which they are being bombed. If so, why were there so many desperate people at the border trying to escape?’ I rounded off by asking if we were dropping cluster bombs.
‘There was one incident,’ Geoff said hesitantly, ‘but they were used against equipment rather than people …’ About 40 members were present, but there was no real dissent apart from Tam. One or two people mildly expressed concern that there was no end in sight. Ann Clwyd asked what we were doing to persuade Pakistan to keep the borders open to refugees. My comments about the bombing attracted not even a murmur of support. What a tame, useless bunch we are. So far, apart from putting down the odd marker, I have kept quiet in public (a) out of loyalty, (b) in the hope that I am wrong and The Man is right, and (c) knowing that HMG has little or no influence anyway, but I’m not sure I can keep this up much longer.
Thursday, 25 October
The television news tonight showed a traumatised Afghan woman, in a Pakistan hospital, who is said to have lost five daughters, two sons and her husband in one of Geoff Hoon’s ‘astonishingly well-targeted’ bombing raids.
Tuesday, 30 October
To the select committee for the opening session of our inquiry into drugs policy. The witnesses were various officials from the government’s anti-drugs apparatus, including the ‘Tsar’, Keith Hellawell, who seemed depressed. We ambled along predictably for the first 90 minutes or so. It was only when I inquired why their written evidence had not addressed decriminalisation – half our terms of reference – that things livened up. The officials seemed to be in a state of denial.
In the real world a huge debate is going on. Even senior police officers are arguing that the so-called war on drugs is lost and that the only way to defeat the criminals is to collapse the black market by ending prohibition. Round and round we went, but they seemed reluctant even to address the subject. It was clear they had given it no thought whatever, presumably on the assumption that this was territory on which politicians fear to tread. The poor woman from the Home Office was distraught. When I suggested she go away and provide us, by Thursday, with a paper rebutting the arguments for decriminalisation her forehead actually touched the table.
Today I crossed the Rubicon. At Foreign Office Questions I went in hard over the bombing of Afghanistan. Alex Salmond followed on and backed me up. Then Field Marshal Winnick came in, talking of appeasement. I am on tricky ground now. On the one hand, I don’t want to be bracketed with the handful who are opposed to all military action. That way lies impotence. On the other, I cannot sit quietly while the Americans spray bombs in every direction.
Wednesday, 31 October
To Thames House, headquarters of MI5, to discuss the proposed Anti-Terrorism Act with the Director, Stephen Lander. In appearance, though not in demeanour, he vaguely resembles Norman Lamont.
Every time I see him I am struck by how down to earth he is – open, relaxed, frank, at ease with the democratic process, which could not be said of all his predecessors. At one point our committee clerk, Andrew Kennon, passed me a note: ‘Did you ever dream you might hear a Director General of the Security Service bandying around articles of the European Charter of Human Rights with such fluency?’ He gave every appearance of taking us seriously and not just going through the motions.
We sat around the table in the boardroom, with our backs to the fine view of the river and Lambeth Palace. Chocolate biscuits were offered with the coffee, though there were few takers. A couple of people – Winnick and Cameron – arrived late, which must give a bad impression. I asked if he had read Stella Rimington’s book and he said he had seen about five different drafts. ‘Was her description of the early days accurate?’
‘Yes, there was a lot of drinking and laziness.’
The threat, he said, was threefold: (a) al-Qaida, made up of individuals who met during the Russian-Afghan war and who went on to fuel (b) individual nationalist struggles in Egypt, Algeria, Kashmir,
Chechnya; and (c) individuals radicalised by these events who choose to do something on their own. He added, ‘There is a strong presumption that further events are planned.’ He is seeking power to detain indefinitely (i) terrorist suspects who are denied entry and immediately trump a refusal by claiming asylum, and (ii) suspected terrorists, resident here, whose lives would be at risk were they to be deported to their country of origin.
Afterwards, we had a briefing from Ben Gunn, of the Association of Chief Police Officers (also Chief Constable of Cambridgeshire), who detailed the extra powers the police are seeking to interfere with bank accounts of suspected terrorists. ‘We recognise this doesn’t sit easily with the Human Rights, Freedom of Information and the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Acts,’ he said. Surprisingly, the police have no legal power to collect intelligence. ‘Previously, we could do what we liked, but now we need specific authority.’ He said that as the law stands the police can’t photocopy a passport or examine baggage at ports. So far the law is untested. ‘Until challenged, we do it.’ He added that it was time to look at a new offence of conspiracy to commit terrorism.
Briefing over, we waited for someone to show us out, but no one came. We put our heads outside the door. No one was around so, strictly against the rules, we made our own way to the lifts and down to the ground floor. We passed no one on the way. The most striking thing about Thames House is how eerily empty it seems.
In the Tea Room, George Howarth tells an hilarious story. Out shopping last weekend he was flagged down by a constituent: ‘Hey, George. I want to talk to you about this Osman Bin Liner’ (sic). The man’s wife was three paces behind, weighed down with carrier bags full of groceries. He, by contrast, was unencumbered.
The man proceeded, at some length, to offer George his analysis of events since 11 September. ‘Terrible,’ he said, ‘the way these Arabs treat their women.’
Meanwhile the man’s wife, standing a little distance away, surrounded by her shopping bags, was urging him to get a move on. Whereupon this magnificent product of Western civilisation responded, ‘Shut up you soft bitch. Can’t you see I’m talking to my MP?’
Thursday, 1 November
At lunchtime I went over to Millbank for an interview with Tyne Tees and when I got back to the House there were two urgent messages from Jack Straw at the Foreign Office. Unfortunately, an hour having passed, he wasn’t there when I rang back. In due course a letter fro
m Jack appeared on the letterboard correcting the answer he had given me about accidental bombings during our exchange on Tuesday. He had said, ‘I understand that, across more than 3,000 targets, there have been misses in respect of five.’ The new version read, ‘The coalition has fired around 7,000 weapons at 118 targets of which six show no damage on target.’ A somewhat different picture: 7,000 bombs, any number of which could have gone astray, aimed at a relative handful of targets, most of which must have been destroyed in the first few days. What have they been bombing since?
Friday, 2 November
Sunderland
My ambiguous stance on the war prompted a bit of flak at the management committee this evening. In vain did I protest that bombing civilians wasn’t going to help us find Osama bin Laden. Several people took my side, but we were a minority. There was a bit of talk about supporting our boys (not one of whom has yet set foot on Afghan soil). Someone proposed that any British Muslims found fighting for the Taliban should be tried for treason. ‘They should be shot,’ said another. At times it was like a Sun readers’ convention.
Wednesday, 7 November
The Man was at this morning’s meeting of the parliamentary party, cheerful but tired. I caught him yawning once or twice, but he was on good form. He had a fairly easy ride. Criticism was directed mainly at the Americans. ‘Many people in Britain are revolted by what’s going on,’ said Jeremy Corbyn, referring to cluster bombs and depleted uranium. On a point by David Winnick about Israel, he said, ‘The Americans want to take the initiative, but a minimum level of calm is
needed first. The timing must be right.’ On the big picture, he spelled out the realpolitik: ‘No one has 6,000’ (he keeps using that figure, even though the true figure seems to be about half that number) ‘of their citizens wiped out and says they’ll do nothing.’ It was important that they didn’t act alone. That, of course, is the bottom line. We are all but irrelevant. The only choice for us was whether to go along in the hope of exerting some influence or to sit quietly on the sidelines and let them get on with it.
