THE 31 August 1974 The international Catholic weekly 15p
TABLET Notebook commemorates our 7000th issue A Pope frustrated: Alec Randall England’s Gregory: Felicitas Corrigan The rational ecologist: Brian W icker
A time for calm Silly-season topics are not hard to come by when there is so much that is senseless in the way in which we conduct our lives. But some things are more senseless than others and can become dangerous if the media take them up with any degree of seriousness. In the past week or so they have been giving a great deal of publicity to an organisation launched by Colonel Stirling which is intended to serve as an emergency force to. take over essential services in the event of a breakdown of these through industrial action on a revolutionary scale. As a courageous soldier, capable of bold initiatives, Colonel Stirling served his country well in World War n, but we very much doubt whether he is serving its permanent interests with his present ideas and activities. Nothing could be better calculated to breed bitterness between different sections of the community, a distrust of our institutions and of our national character, than these phantom preparations. Coming as they do on the eve of a general election, they are bound to excite passions, darken counsel and provide anti-Conservative propaganda for a wide range of people ranging from the Liberals to the extreme left.
We are not so foolish as to say “ it cannot happen here” and there are those who can quite justifiably point to the threat to or disappearance of democracy in areas of Europe, in a large part of Africa, not to mention Latin America. True, there has been a return to democratic rule in Portugal and in Greece but both these countries are still in critical stages of evolution and the risk of a return to the status quo ante or of a more despotic rule from the left cannot be altogether discounted.
Though the differences are great between this country and Italy there are lessons to be learnt by comparison. There is a legally established neo-Fascist party which a few weeks ago was responsible for a bombing that caused several deaths and many injured. There is also a well constituted Communist Party. Britain is sometimes linked with Italy as the “sick men” of Europe. Purely in terms of economic stability, the comparison has some plausibility. Certainly of all the members of the European Community these two countries stand lowest in the scale of resources and foreign indebtedness and highest in unemployment. Signor Agnelli, head of the Fiat motor industry, recently declared that disaster would soon come unless steps were taken to avert national bankruptcy. The country, he said, must come to a choice between economic chaos and viability of a free society. The situation inspired the Italian Communist Party to propose that they should be offered a share in the Coalition government. This has prompted the Secretary of the Christian Democratic Party, Signor Fanfani, to give a list of reasons why the Communist offer should be ignored. In an important speech on 21 August he argued that Communist support for the government would endanger Italian interests in relation to the world balance of power and encourage Fascist adventurism.
Apart from our economic plight, there is little else to compare us with Italy today. Here there is no substantial Communist Party, though the occupation of key offices in our trades unions by Communists has recently increased to a serious extent. Apart from this potential threat to our national wellbeing there is the fact that the British economy is fundamentally stronger than Italy’s. Even the three-day week demonstrated that British productivity is higher than most people had imagined. We have richer natural and financial resources than Italy even without the prospect of North Sea oil. The fall in Stock Exchange share prices is not a true reflection on the underlying strength of British industry and worldwide productive investment.
When anxious voices of alarm are raised at home and people point to highly critical situations abroad which can easily affect us it is vital to stick more firmly than ever to our characteristic ways. Mutatis mutandis, we share the view expressed by the first editor of this paper. Writing in 1840, he said: “We believe that many necessary reforms have been effected, that more remains to be accomplished but the comparatively low estimate we form of the good that can flow from them inclines us to examine every proposed reform with
