John Major: The Autobiography

‘I’ve been playing with Jeffrey Archer,’ he said, ‘and, you know, his game’s going off. And he’s so young.’ Jeffrey was in his late forties.

Other senior members of the Huntingdonshire Conservative Association welcomed us warmly. Maurice and Doris Twydell and Tony Finch-Knightley introduced us to ‘old’ Huntingdon, while Mike and Beryl Robertson – the best judges of how the vote was going locally – did the same for us in the overspill estates.

Archie Gray, a retired naval commander, was chairman, and his writ ran. But, like so many Conservative associations, Huntingdonshire was largely an amazonian enterprise. Many of the guiding forces were women. The President, Mrs Jo Johnson, was a Scot, one of many active in the association. Jo was one of the wisest ladies I ever knew, and a huge support. She was no fair-weather friend. Nor was Emily Blatch, later Baroness Blatch and a senior member of my government, or Olive Macaulay, whom I later gave away in her marriage to Eric Baddeley. As for Anne Foard, she placed a bet at a hundred to one that I would be Chancellor of the Exchequer within ten calendar years of my election to Parliament – and she won.

The farmers were prominent in the constituency. Roger Juggins took me in hand and explained farming. The Juggins family had been in Stukeley for centuries, and had a political commitment to match the Cecils or the Churchills. Ted Smith added to my farming education, as did Joe Pickard, who once remarked, ‘They tell us you know nothing about farming, but Sir David tells us you’re all right.’ Sir David said I was all right! I needed no other endorsement for the farming community.

Old Mr Skinner introduced me to pigs. He loved his pigs, and no luxury was too good for them. With the wind behind them the pigs could make their presence known over a wide area, but no one complained. They all liked Mr Skinner and his pig farm was state-of-the-art.

The non-farmers were just as helpful. Mike Bloomfield, Ivor Ross Roberts and Mike Harford, all successful businessmen, introduced me to the business community and, like many others in Huntingdon, became firm friends.

Andrew Thomson, my agent, was another Scot. Sometimes controversial, he was determined to bring in the new voters in the overspill areas outside Huntingdon and Peterborough, and worked me mercilessly to do so. Meet people. Meet people. Meet people. That was his motto. And it worked. I knew the constituency and it came to know me, and it was a happy relationship. Some MPs see their constituency only as a vehicle to get into Parliament, and something of a cross to be borne. I was lucky. I never did. From the very first, Huntingdon became a home, the source of many friends and a political fortress.

I left nothing to chance. Over the months I came to know Rotary Clubs, business groups, charities, schools, tenant groups, sports clubs and everything else that was active in the constituency. I knew the election could come at any time. Jim Callaghan, the Prime Minister, had formed a Lib – Lab pact to stay in government, but it looked very fragile. Each morning as I commuted from Huntingdon to King’s Cross I wondered how long they’d last. And returning home each evening I hoped it wouldn’t be long.

But stagger on they did. And on. And on. An election looked inevitable in October 1978 when Jim Callaghan announced that he was making a prime ministerial broadcast, but all he said of note was that there would be no election until the spring. After two years’ hard slog as the prospective candidate for Huntingdonshire, and seven years since my first candidacy at St Pancras North, a further delay was dispiriting. A long, hard winter lay ahead, but it was longer and harder for the Labour government as the Winter of Discontent set in.

Eventually, a dramatic defeat by one vote on a Confidence Motion brought down the Callaghan government on 28 March, and the following day the election was called. It was the best birthday present I ever received.

The Huntingdonshire machine swung into action. It was a Rolls-Royce operation compared to anything I had experienced before. By day I canvassed, visited pubs and clubs, market squares, railway stations and retirement homes, gave interviews and filled every moment with activity. Each evening I held three public meetings at 7 p.m., 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. in different villages. Almost all were packed out, with standing room only, and the reception was almost always very friendly. There was little opposition, but I was leaving nothing to chance. The Liberal candidate was Major Dennis Rowe, a well-known local figure, and the Labour candidate a young man named Julian Fulbrook. Years later, in the Blair campaign of 1997, I saw Fulbrook trotted out to praise Labour as if he was a neutral who had fallen in love with the New Labour Party. The age of the spin doctor had arrived.

A few hecklers followed me around. One, a Labour supporter, was a persistent nuisance, and one evening I responded pretty sharply to his comments. He rose from his seat, snorted disapproval and stalked out in high dudgeon. Unfortunately for him he was so intent on registering his disgust that he walked into the broom cupboard rather than out into the night air. The audience watched fascinated, then burst into laughter and applause as he emerged. Red-faced and embarrassed, he slunk out and did not reappear. I missed him – he had provided many a light-hearted moment during the campaign.

Election day, 3 May 1979, dawned crisp and bright. It looked as though we were set to win nationally, although, curious to relate today, many wondered if Britain really would elect a woman as prime minister. But I was confident locally, and Andrew Thomson was super-confident. I drove around the huge constituency with Archie Gray, starting in the south and visiting polling stations and committee rooms. Norma and Andrew Thomson performed a similar odyssey, starting from the north. We planned to meet in the middle.

As Archie and I reached the village of Brampton, I was astounded to see long queues of RAF personnel from the local air station patiently waiting to vote. Archie purred. ‘Look at that. They’re not going to put a Labour government back in office. You’re going to win, my boy.’ So saying, he produced a bottle of champagne.

‘A little early,’ he went on, ‘but we have something to celebrate.’

We pulled into a layby and cheerily drank half the bottle. Thus fortified we pressed on.

At each committee room the mood was buoyant. A high turnout, a Conservative lead and, in some areas, very little sign of opposition. It was a joyous day of pleasurable anticipation and growing excitement. As the polls closed I went to the club at ‘The Views’, the association headquarters, where Emily Blatch had some more news.

‘I’ve done a straw poll,’ she said, ‘outside a few polling stations. Based on that, you’ve romped home. I think you’ve won by twenty thousand!’

Everyone chortled. Good news probably, was the consensus, but not that good.

Because Huntingdonshire was such a large rural seat it did not count the vote until the next day, so Norma and I sat in front of the television as the national drama unfolded. It was soon apparent that there was a swing to the Conservatives. Many who were to become good friends were elected. Robert Atkins won Preston North, John Watson was in at Skipton, Chris Patten at Bath, Matthew Parris at West Derbyshire, Nick Lyell at Hemel Hempstead, Graham Bright at Luton – and then Brian Mawhinney won back Peterborough from Labour. From that moment I had no doubts. If marginal Peterborough was comfortably won, how could neighbouring Huntingdonshire be lost? At 5 a.m., with the certainty of a Conservative government and the happy anticipation of supporting it in the House of Commons, I went to bed.

The count at St Ives was well under way when I arrived the following morning, and the result was soon clear. There was one glorious moment: as I looked at the line of tables holding counted votes for each party, the ‘Votes for Major’ tables stretched way ahead. A huge pile of freshly counted votes appeared, and I waited for them to be added to my opponents’ totals – but they weren’t. They were all Conservative votes, and more tables were levered into place to hold them. Emily Blatch had been right, and the result far exceeded our expectations. The candidates were bussed back to Huntingdon, where the result was traditionally announced by the High Sheriff from the balcony of the courthouse overlooking the packed market square. I had polled over forty thousand votes, and had a majority of 21,563. At last I was a Member of Parliament.

Later that afternoon, after much celebrating in the Conservative Club, Norma and I went home in delight, to find our front doorstep festooned with cards, flowers, chocolates and champagne. I had found my political home.

CHAPTER THREE Into the Commons (#ulink_98c05912-4255-5c74-88fa-606166e23acc)

WHEN I WALKED INTO the Commons as an MP for the first time on 9 May 1979 it was still the magical place I remembered from my first visit as a thirteen-year-old. I had promised myself then that I would go again when I could enter as a matter of right. Now, one hundred years after my father’s birth, I could, and I knew how my parents would have felt had they been with me as I arrived.

I have never lost my awe for the institution of Parliament or the majesty of the building. It has history in every nook and cranny, and the shades of the past can easily be conjured up even though its purpose is to prepare the future. The place half glances over its shoulder at what has been. I believe the aura of the Commons, of itself, can influence policy, tugging at the imagination of Members. Would a glass-and-steel legislature have summoned the same emotions, for instance, over ‘sovereignty’?

As I walked through the Members’ Entrance for the first day of the new Parliament the policeman on duty greeted me with a cheery ‘Good morning, Mr Major. Congratulations.’ Since I was but one of many anonymous new Members, I was astonished that he had done his homework so speedily. I soon learned that this was a matter of pride among the police, staff and attendants at the Commons.

The new Conservative intake in 1979 was large in number and, we were assured flatteringly, one of the most talented for many elections. Many of its members would find their way to high office. Chris Patten, John Patten, William Waldegrave, David Mellor, Ian Lang, Robert Cranborne, Stephen Dorrell, Douglas Hogg and Brian Mawhinney would all reach the Cabinet. Nick Lyell, Tristan Garel-Jones, Robert Atkins, Richard Needham and many others served in senior posts. Graham Bright and John Ward both served as my Parliamentary Private Secretary during my time at Number 10. Others like Matthew Parris and John Watson had great talent but would leave the House for careers in journalism and business.

The new Members soon formed their own alliances. Within weeks, like-minded Conservative colleagues set up dining clubs. The Blue Chips included those new MPs with most experience of the inner ring of government, often gained through working at Central Office or as a front-bench aide – Waldegrave, Patten and Patten, Cranborne and Garel-Jones foremost among them. It was the praetorian guard of the 1979 intake, with a healthy hint of one-nation scepticism about the instincts of Britain’s new Prime Minister. Most of us, of course, hardly knew Margaret Thatcher. I had met her for the first time at the Berwick and East Lothian by-election in 1978, when I visited the constituency to help the Conservative candidate Margaret Marshall, an old friend from Lambeth days. We thought we would win the seat, but Mrs Thatcher arrived for a day, sniffed the political air, and privately doubted we would make it. She was spot on. It seemed that our new prime minister had an acute political nose.

I was to join the Blue Chips after the 1983 election, but at first I gravitated to the Guy Fawkes Club. Perhaps more workaday than the Blue Chips, it had its share of future stars, among them Stephen Dorrell, David Mellor, Graham Bright and Brian Mawhinney. We had asked each other what we hoped to achieve in Parliament, and I had answered without hesitation: ‘Chancellor.’ ‘PPS to the prime minister,’ said another member, Graham Bright, just as wet behind the ears as I was. In October 1990 Graham, the loyal and down-to-earth MP for Luton South, became my PPS at the Treasury, and he moved with me to Number 10 when I became prime minister a few weeks later.

A number of my new colleagues had built reputations for themselves before entering the Commons, and were widely expected to gain early promotion. Others chose the tortoise’s strategy, and set out painstakingly to learn the way Parliament worked. The Chamber of the Commons is the display cabinet for talent for the world at large, but committees and backbench groups are where worth is often recognised by the cognoscenti within Parliament, and especially by the all-seeing Whips’ Office, who hold Members’ fates in their hand as surely as any prime minister.

Some colleagues found their feet in Parliament before others had found the washroom. I had been in the House for only a few days when I walked across the Central Lobby to turn into the corridor that leads to the Members’ Lobby and the Chamber. As I did so a figure emerged from the shadows. It was Tristan Garel-Jones.

He clasped my arm: ‘I’m worried about the government,’ he said.

Tristan was the first rebel of our intake. He voted and spoke against the government over its handling of independence for the Banaban Islands, situated in the South Pacific and soon to be part of the minuscule state of Kiribati. This minor rebellion was led by Sir Bernard Braine, a senior Member who was anti-abortion, anti-drink and pro-island. He impressed us new boys by his fiery sense of injustice, and a passion that was easily aroused and easily stilled. His indignation could be Vesuvial, and to witness an eruption for the first time was awesome, even if the frequency of subsequent eruptions diminished their excitement. Bernard’s constituency of Essex South-East (subsequently renamed Castle Point) included Canvey Island, but he had a bee in his bonnet about all islands – he loved them like a father. In 1979 his affections had settled on the distant and unfortunate Banabans, and he drew new Members to his cause. He was persuasive – ‘Don Quixote de la Essex’, someone called him – and Tristan signed up as his Sancho Panza, though I doubt he could have found the Banabans on a map.

Tristan was not the only Blue Chip to share Bernard’s passion for islands. Jocelyn Cadbury, the newly-elected MP for Birmingham Northfield and a specialist in the cultural history of Polynesia, also threw himself into the battle. A shy, sensitive, painfully principled man, a few years later he took refuge in a better world by his own hand. I cannot remember what happened to the Banabans, but I will not forget Jocelyn’s fate. I heard of his death with dismay early one evening at a garden party in Huntingdon. Later, when the Blue Chips had their portrait painted by Rose Cecil, Robert Cranborne’s sister, we asked her to include Jocelyn. He is there in a portrait on the wall, poised ethereally on the fringes of the picture, remembered fondly by his parliamentary friends.

A new Parliament meant elections for the 1922 Committee, the representative body of all Conservative backbenchers. I knew few of the candidates. Nor did many of the other new Members. But we quickly began to learn parliamentary ways. We received notes from every candidate inviting support. Cabals were formed for and against – the political instinct to be part of a tribe was very strong. The Smoking Room was full of partisans. The bars abounded with rumour and gossip. Sir Edward du Cann’s Rolls-Royce was reported in action, drawing up in Westminster side-streets beside new Members and offering them a lift to the Commons. One more carload. A few more votes. It was good-humoured and clubbable, and we all loved being part of it. I voted for Sir Edward (without the incentive of a lift in his Rolls), and found him to be one of the best chairmen of a meeting I ever saw. He did attract stories, though.

‘What time is it, Ted?’ he was once asked. ‘Dear boy –’ peering at his watch ‘– what time would you like it to be?’

Another colleague told me how, crying into his brandy in the Smoking Room because his local newspaper had attacked him, he had sighed to Sir Edward, ‘I suppose after years in this place you get used to being attacked.’

Sir Edward patted his arm: ‘Nice people never do.’

These were jolly elections, with a drink in the Smoking Room often making the bargain between candidate and elector. Mr Pickwick, with his experience at Eatanswill, would have felt very much at home.

I settled down, decided to listen and learn before committing myself to a maiden speech, and was elected Joint Secretary to the Conservative Backbench Environment Group, with John Heddle, the new Member for Lichfield, as my partner. I shared a large office with other Members including John Carlisle, who was to become a persistent and outspoken opponent in later years, and who took pleasure in offending every politically-correct code that existed. John Butcher, an opponent also on some issues, but more thoughtfully and less vociferously, was another companion of those early days.

Huntingdonshire was a huge constituency that generated a large postbag which increased every year as I became established there. My secretarial problems were soon solved. One day a small figure with fiery red hair bounded up to me outside the Commons post office.

‘I always said I’d come and work for you if you got elected. So here I am!’ she declared. It was Barbara Wallis, my former colleague from Lambeth days.

‘I thought you worked for Chris Patten at the Conservative Research Department,’ I said.

‘I did,’ said Barbara, ‘but that’s then, and now’s now. I’ve come to work for you. I know you’ve got no one. These are my terms.’

So began a happy working relationship that was to last until Barbara retired, thirteen years later, having spent two years with me at Number 10. And even then she only left after identifying her successor, Gina Hearn, who remains with me still, offering the same high-quality service.

Barbara was indomitable. No MP was a hero to her, and she was something of a legend among the members of the Secretaries’ Council, the Westminster secretaries’ ‘trade union’. She was astute politically, having served on Lambeth Council with me and twice contested the parliamentary constituency of Feltham, and had forceful political views that veered from very liberal to intensely crusty Conservative. She was loyal and fearsomely efficient; the constituency purred at the ultra-smooth service she provided, and I basked in the credit that was largely due to her own efficiency. Yet later, when everyone else urged me to run for the leadership of the party after Margaret Thatcher resigned, Barbara dissented. ‘It’s too early,’ was her view. I entered the contest anyway, and Barbara joined the team, worked day and night, and was ever-present in those dramatic few days.

Not every new MP takes cheerfully to the place. Some never do. With my unusual background (for a Conservative MP) and lack of practised gentlemen’s-club ways, you might suppose that at first I felt ill at ease. Not so. As a new backbencher I was as happy as Bunter in a bakery. In the early days I was not among those who dined eagerly with members of the Cabinet and other senior figures in the party. I attended a drinks and question session one evening with the Chancellor of the Exchequer Geoffrey Howe, and saw the danger of such occasions. Some new colleagues had views, and brought them forward. ‘Why are the government …?’ ‘Should not the government …?’ ‘It is surely clear that we should …’ They sounded to me like talking press releases culled from the Campaign Guide to the Election. Geoffrey gently explained the political realities of life, and left some of the more assertive questioners looking rather callow. Others, saying nothing, gave the impression of being tongue-tied or (depending upon their demeanour) wise. I decided that short, pithy questions were the best option and stuck to those. Having now spent many years on the other side of the desk at such meetings, I’m sure that early judgement was right. As Kenneth Baker once put it, in a slightly different context, the line between sycophancy and rebellion is difficult to tread. I watched others carefully, and noted what worked and what did not; I saw the mistakes some made by self-promotion and an eagerness to lend a glib line to every passing newspaper hack.

I made my maiden speech in mid-June in a debate on Geoffrey Howe’s first budget. The Chamber had barely sixty Members in it when I rose to speak, but that did not diminish my nervousness. I was well-prepared, but even so, looking up, I was pleased to see the familiar face of Canon Ronald Jennings, a constituent from St Ives, sitting in the Public Gallery for the debate. He smiled down with a clerical benevolence that I took as a very good sign.

It was an unremarkable first speech: the traditional tour of the constituency, a mention of Oliver Cromwell, Huntingdon’s most famous son, a complaint about the government grant to Cambridgeshire, broad support for the budget. Soon it was over and, if I had not distinguished myself especially, I had not disgraced myself either. It is a tradition in the Commons that maiden speeches are greeted with acclaim provided the first-time orator manages to string together a few sentences. I received, therefore, ludicrously complimentary hand-written congratulatory notes from colleagues (as did most others, I later found to my dismay), and went home content that a hurdle had been overcome and that I could now widen my horizons as a new Member. The induction was over – now the real work could begin.

The Commons is not easily impressed with new Members, but it remembers foolishness for a long time. And so I was cautious and well-prepared whenever I spoke. New Members need issues to make their mark, and I was soon to have one. In 1980 it was announced that the United States was to station sixty-four Cruise missiles at RAF Molesworth, in my constituency, and this began to attract anti-nuclear protesters in large numbers. My constituents, familiar with RAF bases at Brampton and Wyton and American servicemen at Alconbury, were unperturbed by the imminent arrival of the missiles, but they became very anxious as the peace protesters grew in number and their level of activity increased. As one robust Molesworth resident, Stephen Hill, put it: ‘The peace movement will cause more disturbance to our peaceful environment than the missiles will.’ In August 1983 2,500 CND protesters occupied part of the base to protest against the plans, and in October they planted wheat, destined for famine relief in Eritrea, on four acres of the base.