around, and got a far better reception than I expected. Indeed, we were doing better across Lambeth than we had hoped. Barbara Wallis, one of our candidates in an unpromising ward in Vauxhall, reported a good doorstep reaction. So did Sir George Young in neighbouring Clapham. But I disregarded George’s reports: George was 6'4" and canvassed with his Irish wolfhound, Cerberus, in tow. Cerberus looked even bigger than George: it was no surprise to me that everyone offered him support.
We were optimistic about gaining seats in the council elections. Harold Wilson’s Labour government was very unpopular. It had devalued the pound the previous year and seemed unable to shrug off the difficulties it faced. Even so, winning Ferndale was not considered likely.
Then fate took a hand. On 20 April, three weeks before the local elections, Enoch Powell made his notorious ‘Rivers of Blood’ speech in Birmingham, warning of the dangers of immigration. It stirred emotions and fears, and turned a favourable Tory drift into an avalanche that changed the political landscape. Ted Heath sacked Enoch from the Shadow Cabinet. Quintin Hogg and Iain Macleod denounced him. But millions felt he had voiced their fears. The dockers marched in his support. There was political pandemonium – and everyone took sides.
I thought Powell was wrong and his speech inflammatory – Ted Heath was right to dismiss him, and I said so. But in Lambeth, Conservative politics was divided over his speech. Some council candidates, including my friend Clive Jones, strongly supported Enoch, and some issued ‘We Back Enoch’ leaflets as part of their election campaign. Barbara Wallis and another friend, Laurie Kennedy, opposed him. So did Bernard Perkins and Peter Cary, the two most senior local Conservative figures. Many white people in Brixton thought Powell was articulating their fears. The black residents felt threatened, though I did not know many of them to talk to about it. Those I did know shied away from speaking about Powell, because often they couldn’t be certain if they were talking to someone who agreed with him or not.
I did not share the view that Powell was personally a racist, and I recognised that he was expressing genuine fears. But I was sure he was mistaken. Years later, in the Commons, when I came to know this strange and brilliant man, I saw at close quarters the spell he could weave. I did not often agree with him – he carried his arguments too much to extremes for my taste – but he was a remarkable parliamentarian. In 1968 he conjured powerful political magic. The Labour government slumped in the polls as Enoch caught the public mood. The local election results that year were catastrophic for Labour, and provided unimagined political riches for the Conservatives.
We won Lambeth in a landslide: fifty-seven of the sixty seats fell into our hands. The town hall count was alive with disbelief and excitement as seat after seat fell to the Tories. The new councillors were a mixed bunch. Reg Allnutt and Jean Langley, who joined me as the Ferndale victors, hadn’t really expected to be elected, and were excited to make it, even if only by a handful of votes. Barbara Wallis, George Young, Clive Jones and many other friends romped home in other wards. They were political professionals. Barbara, short, red-haired, fiery for moderation (though in later years the moderation would slip), was later to become my constituency secretary in the Commons and at Downing Street. George Young served in my Cabinet. Clive Jones, amiable, large, a second son to my parents, was to be my best man and a friend for many years.
On the way home from the count I tried to wake up our Association President, Mrs Evans, an elderly Welsh lady, to tell her the news. She was fast asleep, having gone to bed expecting to lose, as usual, and did not answer her bell. Undaunted, I was hoisted up a lamp-post with my damaged leg held gingerly to one side as I lobbed pebbles at her window. Suddenly, my companions fell very silent and I became conscious of another figure standing on the pavement. It was a policeman. ‘And what are you up to?’ he asked, reasonably enough. We explained our election win. He walked off shaking his head at the lunatic behaviour of the sort of young people who went in for politics, and Mrs Evans slept on.
There were one or two squalls as I settled in on the council. Bernard Perkins and Peter Cary made it clear that the new Conservative council would have no part in anti-black propaganda. I strongly agreed with this and fought my own battle against constituency activists who had opposing views. A few weeks after my election the Town Clerk, John Fishwick, gently took me to one side to query my eligibility to have stood as a councillor in Lambeth. I was living between three flats at the time, but the address on my nomination form was for a fourth address, at which I had never lived. Mr Fishwick had discovered this and was puzzled.
In fact, I did have a residency qualification for Lambeth. I was still living partly with Jean and should properly have registered as a Lambeth elector from her address – but, for reasons of discretion, I did not wish to do so. In order to ensure a residency qualification I had taken two rooms in nearby Templar Street, but had not been able to move in by the October deadline for inclusion on the electoral register. As a council candidate this left me in a dilemma, so I registered with the address of an old friend of my mother, Mrs Olifent, also in Templar Street, opposite the rooms I had rented. John Fishwick was highly amused, and I heard no more about this innocent deception until Panorama unearthed it – only partly accurately and to the great distress of Mrs Olifent, who was tearful and upset at the repeated questioning – twenty-five years later.
The greatest problem in Lambeth, then as now, was poor housing. Much of Streatham and Norwood was attractive, and small parts of Kennington were already being gentrified. But Clapham was declining, and large parts of Brixton were slums, overcrowded and insanitary. They were breeding grounds for discontent and misery. The ‘swinging sixties’ did not swing in Lambeth. Land prices were soaring, and owner-occupation was dying. The population was growing, and so were council costs. Many immigrants, mostly from the West Indies, who had come to England in search of a better life, found themselves unemployed, without hope, living in deprived and miserable conditions as fear of real conflict rose around them. In the midst of this powder-keg, Enoch Powell’s speech reverberated – reassuring the whites that their private fears were not overlooked, and terrifying the black population.
Lambeth was overwhelmed. The solution to the housing problem was to build more houses. Yet even as that was done, it created other problems. Remaining streets of owner-occupation disappeared. The population mix narrowed ever more to those in need. The pressure on education and other services rose. High expenditure forced up local rates and forced out small local businesses, thus worsening unemployment. A cycle of deprivation faced Lambeth.
And yet, somehow, Brixton battled on. Tenant groups, church groups, all manner of special-interest groups tried to improve local conditions; if this sometimes led them into conflict with a local authority that would not meet all their demands, that was unsurprising. Yet despite its problems, Brixton was always vigorous and vital. Brixton market was its epicentre: cosmopolitan, bustling, bursting with stalls and traders shouting their bargains, music overlaying the chatter, the scent of spices mingling with hot dogs and South London and Caribbean accents on every side.
The dominant figure on Lambeth Council was Bernard Perkins, the leader of the Conservatives, who knew local government inside out. By profession, he was a senior local government officer in next-door Wandsworth. He devoted all his free time to Lambeth. He was supported by Peter Cary, the deputy leader – a Nigel Lawson-like figure who was a specialist in housing. I was lucky. Bernard appointed me to the Finance and Housing Committees. I could have asked for no more, and threw myself into the necessary learning curve.
Politics began to take over more of my life. I left work each day and headed either for the Conservative Association, where I remained Treasurer, or the town hall for committees and other meetings. If I had none of my own to attend I listened in on others to learn all that was going on. My early-morning banking studies had to share the time with preparation for council meetings. I continued to pass the examinations, but my progress was slower than before.
At the end of 1968 the Brixton Association agreed with neighbouring Clapham and Vauxhall to link together as the North Lambeth Conservative Group, and to appoint Jean Lucas, the formidably efficient
