Interviewer
Prime Minister, congratulations on the drug summit, and you have successfully organised one. Are you fully satisfied with the United States level of representation here and the interest shown by the US government?
Prime Minister
Oh yes, Mr Sullivan is here, yes we are very satisfied, very satisfied. We have great admiration too for Mr Bennett, we knew him when he was Education Minister, and we are sad he cannot come but we quite understand that he has other things at the moment.
Interviewer
So there is no feeling that the United States has not given enough focus to your conference? [end p1]
Prime Minister
No, no, no feeling at all, we have a very strong delegation from the United States and it will make a very active contribution.
Interviewer
Last year, more than a year ago Mr Bush declared a war on drugs. In your estimation, is it working, has it helped?
Prime Minister
I saw that broadcast from the White House, it came very late in our time but I was still up working and I saw it. You have to fight drugs the whole time, you will never completely get it licked, you have to go on fighting. And you just think how terrible the situation might be if we were not fighting. And now we are doing far more international cooperation than ever before. We were doing some before the 1988 United Nations Convention, but much closer cooperation now and this is a further stage in that cooperation. So we do not have to be over-optimistic or euphoric, but we are going steadily ahead and I think we have a chance of steadily improving the situation and defeating the drug barons and the traffickers and those who peddle and make a lot of money out of these things.
Interviewer
But words from politicians here in London, will they mean anything in the inner cities of America, for instance? [end p2]
Prime Minister
Together, I think that the effort that we are making I hope will mean something. Just think what it would be like if we did nothing, if the drug peddlers were free to peddle, to get children to destroy their lives by taking drugs. What kind of society would that be, what kind of society if we had not made international arrangements to follow their monies into bank accounts into any country in the world and confiscate them?
Interviewer
So things are bad but they could be worse?
Prime Minister
Things could be a lot worse and I believe the arrangements we are making will make them better.
Interviewer
You are going to see Mr Bush. It is perhaps a measure of the importance of the drug problem, will you be discussing drugs with him?
Prime Minister
I would not have thought we would discuss drugs in any except a very short way because we have so much else to discuss in international affairs and you cannot get on to absolutely everything. [end p3]
Of course I think whenever we meet the question of drugs always comes up but not not in extenso, I hope we will have discussed most of that now. He has been so forthright on fighting drugs and so were the Reagans before.
Interviewer
Whether on drugs or any other subject, an American at this point might wonder do you have the mandate to pursue initiatives on drugs, on other fields. In other words, they are aware of what we see as political difficulties for you, trouble on the streets, polls?
Prime Minister
Good heavens, I have had political difficulties several times before, of course you tend to get it if you are doing things very firmly which are very very long-term views. We have at the moment our main problem is inflation, we were growing too fast, and had we been growing more slowly we should not have had the inflation we have now. And that is really at the root of our problems, the root of our economic problems, we had inflation down to below 3 per cent before and it is up now to 7.7 and it is up much too high and so we have to keep the interest rate high until it comes down. People do not like that, they protest, of course they do, that is not surprising. [end p4]
Interviewer
I am trying to pursue how an American might see you at this point then, perhaps somewhat weakened?
Prime Minister
No, they have never seen me like that before even when we have had problems in between elections before and they should not now.
Interviewer
But you are fully prepared, you feel you are speaking for Britain whether on drugs, on Soviet policy?
Prime Minister
Yes, yes, you are elected for a period of five years. What happens to you if you get a President, although you have not had one who has been unpopular for a long time, what happens to you if you get a President who goes through a mid-term difficulty? You do say that he no longer has a mandate to negotiate abroad on your behalf, of course you do not, nor do we.
Interviewer
What are you and President Bush going to decide about the Soviet Union and Lithuania, what are you telling Moscow? [end p5]
Prime Minister
I shall not tell you what we shall decide, I shall tell you the approach which I think both of us have taken and I think it is the right one. We have come a very long way in the post-war period through NATO and staunchly defending everything we believe in and not being deflected in any way. Lithuania, neither the United States nor Britain has ever recognised as being legally annexed to the Soviet Union and we have had no representation in Lithuania. Lithuania and also Estonia have made their views clear that they really would like to determine their own future and President Gorbachev has some difficulty at the moment and has passed a new law.
These things must be resolved by discussion, force is not the kind of weapon available under these circumstances and it would be a tragedy if it were used and it would put back everything that we have achieved for such a long time. So there is only one way forward, let us be quite clear about it, it is dialogue and discussion, it does not sound very much but actually I would say the position is rather better than it was twelve or fourteen days ago because I think everyone is realising that that is the way forward.