Downing Street Years - Margaret Thatcher [15]
Otherwise, it seemed prudent in the light of our effective performance in Opposition and the election campaign to maintain a high degree of continuity between Shadow Cabinet and Cabinet posts. Willie Whitelaw became Home Secretary, and in that capacity and later as Leader of the Lords he provided me personally and the Government as a whole with shrewd advice based on massive experience. People were often surprised that the two of us worked so well together, given our rivalry for the leadership and our different outlook on economics. But Willie is a big man in character as well as physically. He wanted the success of the Government which from the first he accepted would be guided by my general philosophy. Once he had pledged his loyalty, he never withdrew it. He supported me steadfastly when I was right and, more important, when I wasn’t. He was an irreplaceable deputy prime minister — an office which has no constitutional existence but is a clear sign of political precedence — and the ballast that helped keep the Government on course.
But I felt that some changes in portfolios were required. I brought in the formidable Christopher Soames to be Leader of the House of Lords. Christopher was his own man, indeed excessively so, and thus better suited to solo performances — whether as Ambassador in Paris or the last Governor of Rhodesia — than to working in harmony with others. Peter Carrington, who had led the Lords skilfully in Opposition, became Foreign Secretary. His unrivalled experience of foreign affairs more than qualified him for the job. Peter had great panache and the ability to identify immediately the main points in any argument; and he could express himself in pungent terms. We had disagreements, but there were never any hard feelings. We were an effective combination — not least because Peter could always tell some particularly intractable foreign minister that whatever he himself might feel about a particular proposition, there was no way in which his prime minister would accept it. This generally proved convincing. I was determined, however, that at least one Foreign Office minister should have a good grounding in — and sound views on — economic policy. I had Peter bring in Nick Ridley.
Two other appointments excited more comment. To his surprise, I asked Peter Walker to be Minister of Agriculture. Peter had never made a secret of his hostility to my economic strategy. But he was both tough and persuasive, priceless assets in dealing with the plain absurdities of the European Community’s Common Agricultural Policy. His membership of the Cabinet demonstrated that I was prepared to include every strand of Conservative opinion in the new Government, and his post that I was not prepared to put the central economic strategy at risk.
That was perhaps less clear in my decision to keep Jim Prior on at Employment. I shall describe elsewhere the divergences of opinion between Jim and the rest of us during Opposition. Running on from that time there was a lively argument about trade union reform. We all agreed that trade unions had acquired far too many powers and privileges. We also agreed that these must be dealt with one step at a time. But when it came down to specific measures, there was deep disagreement about how fast and how far to move. Yet there was no doubt in my mind that we needed Jim Prior. There was still the feeling in the country, and indeed in the Conservative Party, that Britain could not be governed without the tacit consent of the trades unions. It was to be some years before that changed. If we had signalled the wholesale reform of the unions over and against their opposition at the outset, it would have undermined confidence in the Government and perhaps even provoked a challenge we were not yet ready to face. Jim was the badge of our reasonableness. He had forged good relations with a number of trade union leaders whose practical value he perhaps overestimated.