A friend of mine ran into Bernard Ingham at Victoria Station last night. This is how the conversation went...
Friend: Evening Sir Bernard- Pleased to see us back?
Ingham (face like thunder, eyebrows quivering): Not under these circumstances - it's a disgrace.
Friend: We could be in for 10 years though?
Ingham: Huh. Perhaps. Depends how they do.
10 comments:
But where would we be without generals fighting the previous war. Ingham, Tebbit, Heffer (although he never actually *did* anything) are a useful reminder that all spectacles grow more rose-tinted over time.
I will worry when one of them agrees with Cameron.
What's so funny about that?
Like Tebbit he wants Cameron to sit in opposition again. His days are long gone and he sticks out like a vegetarian in a steak house. His policies-the UKIPs policies were rejected by the electorate. Move on Sir Bernard, the world has moved.
The new generation takes charge. Forget Ingham and Thatcher and Major and Tebbit and the rest. Dead. The only good old boy around who counts is good old K. Clarke - and he was always a closet Liberal really (like C. Patten). Find new friends time - OAP home for Ingham and his like.
Why is there so much "air" being generated by the coalition. Maggie had a coalition hidden away under the umbrella of the Conservative Party (she even had a name for her coalition partners - the "Wets"). Major had a coalition in his cabinet (seem to recall he also had a name for them "B" something...). And Blair and Brown was a coalition of convenience if ever there was one. In all these cases, there were significant differences of opinion as to policy. At least now, this coalition is more transparent and open. And it will also enable Cameron and Clegg to "manage" the more extreme fringes of their two parties.
And yet in your post below you talk of Thatcher.
Hope these "OAP" voices continue to play a part in our politics. This isn't the Labour Party - there is room for dissenting voices, especially in private conversation.
Maybe instead you should all grow up.
A former Industrial Correspondent for The Guardian and member of the Labour Party is unhappy with the new dispensation? Go figure.
Never mind Bunkum and Balderdash from Ingham - have you seen Matthew Parris' column in today's Times Mr. Dale? I think you should, you know!
@Alison
Spot on.
Conservatism is not a fixed ideology; it adapts to changing circumstances as any intelligent person does.
As Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa wrote in The Leopard "If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change".
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