1982: COURAGE AND DETERMINATION!

I send to all readers of Conservative News my very best wishes for 1982. January is the time-honoured month for New Year resolutions, and the greatest of all resolutions this January is resolution itself—determination, born of the conviction that the course we are following is the right one, that it is beginning to show results, and that we are winning our way through the most severe recession for 50 years.

The worst mistake of all, for the country, for the Government, for the Conservative Party, would be to relax our efforts now, at the very moment when we have the prospect of bringing about lasting recovery for Britain.

This year, 1982, has all the signs of being one of great opportunity for Britain, if only we have the courage and determination to succeed.

Yes, these first 2½ years of Conservative Government have been hard: hard for the country as a whole, hard for all our friends and colleagues in the Conservative Party, hard for us in Government, and hardest of all for the unemployed.

Paid Back

To be fair to ourselves, we said it would be hard when we fought and won the election in May 1979. But think back just a little further than that, back to December 1976.

That, also, was 2½ years into the life of a Government, a Labour Government, and that was when, far from seeing any signs of economic expansion and recovery, Mr. Healey had to go cap in hand to the IMF for an enormous loan to bail us out. We have now paid back nearly all of that loan, and far from anyone else having to bail us out, we are climbing back after our 2½ years, climbing back to economic recovery.

No, it's not right yet, and there is still a long way to go. But in our resolve to reach the goal of economic stability, sustained growth, lower inflation, and much lower unemployment, let us not forget our achievements on the way.

We need to be proud of those achievements and blow our own trumpet a little more than we have been doing.

The rate of inflation shows every sign of coming down further during the coming year: productivity, so vital to our recovery, is up and still rising: restrictive practices have declined, overmanning is down, competitiveness has improved 10%; in 1981, pay demands and pay awards are down from the crazy heights of the wages explosion which followed Mr. Callaghan 's pay policy.

Don't Be Beguiled

Let us look outside the economic field at the other positive measures taken by this Government; at the election promises fulfilled.

Did you know that under this Government there are 7,000 more police than in May 1979 and the number continues to grow?

Did you know that there are 21,000 more nurses and midwives, and 1,000 more doctors and dentists in the Health Service than in May 1979, and that these are figures for England and Wales alone? Did you know that agricultural production rose substantially; that pupil/teacher ratios in our schools are now better than ever?

Did you know that there were an extra 5,000 nursery school places created last year?

Did you know that it was this Government that abolished income tax on war widows' pensions and introduced extra tax relief for the blind?

Others Should Know

Did you know that there are now 52,000 fewer Civil Servants than in May 1979 and that, by April 1984, there will be a further reduction of 50,000, giving us the smallest Civil Service since the War?

And did you know that we had denationalised British Aerospace, the National Freight Corporation, Cable & Wireless, and that it was our Transport Act which allowed free enterprise buses to compete with those owned by the State or Local Authorities?

Yes, you probably did know, but will you now make it your business to see that others know too?

Tell them of the whole package of special employment measures; of trade union reform protecting the rights of the individual, limiting secondary action and picketing, and setting the stage for sensible industrial relations; Of three Education Acts to allow the grammar schools to remain, to ensure parental choice, and to make proper provision for handicapped children; Of the sale of council houses and flats to their tenants; Of the most far reaching and effective measures to assist the formation and expansion of small businesses.

Twin Evils

We have achieved a great deal in a short time, but there is much more to be done.

Let me return to those twin evils of inflation and unemployment; let us be very clear. They are not alternatives. It is not a question of choosing to defeat inflation or unemployment, as our opponents would have us believe: it is a question of defeating inflation, and thereby defeating unemployment.

For the direct result of ever-increasing inflation is ever-increasing unemployment.

Beware of that new, beguiling expression creeping into our opponents' vocabulary, so beguiling that even some of our own supporters are using it, “reflation” . Remember that all it means is “re-inflation” .

It means the Government spending billions and billions of pounds it does not have in order to buy a short-term advantage and a short-term popularity at the expense, within the space of a year or two, of even greater inflation, leading to even greater unemployment.

Any short-term job bought by so-called reflation will be paid for heavily and many times over in other lost jobs not long after.

The True Way

We all recognise the deep distress that unemployment causes. We have taken new measures to alleviate that distress, especially among the young.

But the only true way to reduce unemployment, the only way towards more jobs, real jobs, permanent jobs, is for this country to produce the goods and services of a quality and at a price that the customer will pay.

And the only way to do that is to stop paying ourselves wages we have not earned, cut costs, raise productivity, reduce overmanning, eliminate restrictive practices—in short to be competitive. Of course high wages can be paid, but only when they have first been earned.

There is no short cut, no easy way out, no bailing out by others.

Thirty years ago Winston Churchill told us there are some things that we British have to do not only for ourselves, but by ourselves.

In this, as in so much else, Churchill was right. No one has any obligation to make our economy productive and competitive if we do not do it ourselves.

1982 is the year when we will prove to ourselves and to others that we have the courage and the resolution to build on the sure foundations which we have laid.