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[Mr. Healey]
Zussoyes
4 NOVEMBER 1982
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Mr. Monis
Foreign Affairs
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only on the condition that he could be satisfied that it would not damage our ability to give the bulk of our aid to much better off countries. In the Third world.
I know that the Foreign Office agrees with us about the Government's handling of overseas students, because the Government have taken an intredibly short-sighted step. We have already lost more exports to Malaysia alone as a result of that decision than we have gained from the reduction in grants to overseas students. I assure the
111 025 Foreign Secretary that he will have our full support if he
puts pressure on the Treasury in that respect.
Mr. Ian Mikardo (Bethnal Green and Bow): On the subject of the Government's attitude to overseas aid to poor countries, I am sure that my right hon. Friend will recall that the British Government were one of the two Governments who virtually sabotaged the proceedings at Cancun.
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Mr. Healey: Of course, I recall that and we debated that a few months ago.
I do not think that the Foreign Secretary will disagree with me, at least about the problems of the world as a whole. There are two overwhelmingly important tasks for international statesmanship. The first is to maintain the military balance between East and West at the lowest possible level of cost and risk. The second, which is often ignored by Foreign Offices, is to maintain the balance in the world economy at the highest possible levels of growth and employment. All Western Governments seem to have ignored that second task, to our common cost. It is desperately necessary that Governments address them- selves to that task, preferably at a summit conference.
The Secretary of State spoke eloquently about his objectives. He made a vigorous and well-constructed speech, but the picture that he drew of Britain's current reputation in the world is different from the perception of the country's foreign policy across the Channel, across the Atlantic and in the Third world. We must ask ourselves how it is that Britain, which has been famous for centuries for its skill and wisdom in handling international affairs and which played the leading role in the years after 1945 in establishing a framework of world order to give us a quarter of century of unparalleled peace and prosperity, now cuts such a poor and negative figure in international affairs.
I am afraid that the responsibility lies in large part with the Prime Minister herself. She entered office with little knowledge or experience of external affairs. She is not to be blamed for that. For some time she was content to leave most of the more difficult and important issues to Lord Carrington who, as I said at the time, did a good job on the tasks allotted to him. He did a good job in controlling the Prime Minister's extravagances and repairing the damage that she caused.
The Prime Minister's relations with the Secretary of State seem to be a little less comfortable. She seems increasingly to be tempted to arrogate to herself responsibilities which should be his and, simultaneously, to reject the wisdom and experience of his professional advisers in the Foreign Office. Her general motto seems to be, as it always is, "Please do not confuse me with the facts.'
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For the first year or two the Bank of England was the institution most at risk from that attitude, but recently the
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Foreign Office has moved into the firing line. For the last few months the Prime Minister has been barging about like some bargain basement Boadicea leaving dismay and disruption wherever she goes from Peking to Berlin. Thank God that she has not yet gone to Gibraltar.
The Prime Minister's visit to the Far East was an unmitigated disaster. I think that the Secretary of State will agree. The right hon. Lady completely failed to make any impact on the attitude of the Japanese Government. The way in which she handled the Chinese Government brought Hong Kong close to disaster--a disaster from which I hope that it may soon recover. Now the Prime Minister is behaving increasingly like Catherine the Great and surrounding herself with favourites: If she cannot install them at the head of the relevant Department she puts them inside No. 10 and ignores the Departments altogether.
This may not work out as well as she hopes, or as badly as we fear. It was one thing to staff No. 10 with bizarre interlopers from academia, such as Professor Walters, the Dr. Who of economics, or Sir John Hoskyns, the rich man's Frances Morrell, but now she is recruiting from a different source. It is just possible that a skilled diplomatist such as Sir Anthony Parsons may be able to put the realities of world affairs to her more effectively from inside the portals of No. 10 than from across the road.
It is fascinating to see how the right hon. Lady has begun to pluck people out of retirement. In diplomatic terms Sir Anthony is probably the George Smiley of the Foreign Office. Maybe he is a double agent and works just as well for the Foreign Office as he does for her. I know that that is the Foreign Secretary's hope. I wonder where the right hon. Lady will find the next of Smiley's people. Unfortunately Sir Nico Henderson has already pre-empted the role of Sir Toby Esterhazy.
It is dreadful that Britain's reputation in the world is now so much at the mercy of one woman's imperious caprice. The only hope is that those are right who interpret the Gracious Speech as meaning that the period during which we shall suffer from these dangers may be over before we assemple for next year's Speech.
4.35 pm
Dr. David Owen (Plymouth, Devonport): It would be churlish not to admit that the House has enjoyed the speech by the right hon. Member for Leeds, East (Mr. Healey). Its most endearing characteristic was that in all its points of substance it bore no relation to the policy or resolutions of the party that he supports.
The debate should concentrate on some serious issues. I believe that what the right hon. Member for Leeds, East said about the state of the world and the state of our alliances was closer to the truth than the Foreign Secretary's description. I understand the Foreign Secretary's problem. He has to put as brave a face on the world as he can. He has to try to present the British Government's role in the most positive light. The Foreign Secretary is an honest man and he knows that East-West relations--and, more importantly, relations within the NATO alliance-are fraught. That is not new. When one looks back at what has happened in the one and a half years since the Polish problem began its decline, the response of the NATO allies has been divided, incompetent and incoherent.
Today the Soviet influence in Poland is naked and growing. We must remind ourselves that in Europe 10
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