Downing Street Years - Margaret Thatcher [518]
This performance set Geoffrey on the road to resignation. Exactly why is still unclear, perhaps to him, certainly to me. I do not know whether he actually wanted a single currency. Neither now or later, as far as I am aware, did he ever say where he stood — only where I should not stand. Perhaps the enthusiastic — indeed uproarious — support I received from the back-benchers convinced him that he had to strike at once, or I would win round the Parliamentary Party to the platform I earlier set out in Bruges.
No matter what I had said, however, Geoffrey would sooner or later have objected and gone. By this time the gap between us, unlike the rows I had with Nigel Lawson, was as much a matter of personal antipathy as of policy difference. I have explained how Geoffrey reacted when I asked him to leave the Foreign Office.* He never put his heart into the Leadership of the House. In the Cabinet he was now a force for obstruction, in the Party a focus of resentment, in the country a source of division. On top of all that, we found each other’s company almost intolerable. I was surprised at the immediate grounds of his resignation. But in some ways it is more surprising that he remained so long in a position which he clearly disliked and resented.
I heard nothing of Geoffrey on Wednesday (31 October). On Thursday morning at Cabinet I took him to task, probably too sharply, about the preparation of the legislative programme. I was slightly curious at the time that he had so little to say for himself. Afterwards, I had lunch in the flat, worked on my speech for the debate on the Loyal Address, had a short meeting with Douglas Hurd about the situation in the Gulf, and then went off to Marsham Street where, in the cellars beneath the DoE/Department of Transport complex, the Gulf Embargo Surveillance unit was operating. I had not been there long when a message came through that Geoffrey wanted urgently to see me back at No. 10. He intended to resign.
I was back there at 5.50 p.m. for what turned out to be almost a rerun of Nigel Lawson’s resignation. I asked Geoffrey to postpone his decision till the following morning: I already had so much to think about — surely a little more time was possible. But he insisted. He said that he had already cancelled the speech he was due to give that evening at the Royal Overseas League, and the news was bound to get out. So the letters were prepared and his resignation was announced.
In a sense it was a relief he had gone. But I had no doubt of the political damage it would do. All the talk of a leadership bid by Michael Heseltine would start again. Apart from myself, Geoffrey was the last survivor of the 1979 Cabinet. The press were bound to draw disparaging attention to my longevity. It was impossible to know what Geoffrey himself planned to do. But presumably he would not remain silent. It was vital that the Cabinet reshuffle, made necessary by his departure, should reassert my authority and unite the Party. That would not be easy, and indeed the two objectives might by now be in conflict.
I could not discuss all this with my advisers immediately, however, because I had to host a reception at No. 10 for the Lord’s Taverners, the charitable organization with which Denis was involved. But, as soon as I could, I broke away and went to my study where Ken Baker, John Wakeham and Alastair Goodlad, the Deputy Chief Whip, who was standing in for Tim Renton, got down to discussing what must be done.
I already knew my ideal solution: Norman Tebbit back in the Cabinet as Education Secretary. Norman shared my views on Europe — as on so much else; he was tough, articulate and trustworthy. He would have made a superb Education Secretary who