European Diary, 1977-1981 Part 11

The full European Council rea.s.sembled in the Christiansborg at 10.10 and went on until 12.40. Not a great deal of useful business was transacted. Jrgensen was an uncertain chairman. An interesting vignette was that towards the end of the morning, when Giscard was holding forth about French dissatisfaction with the degree of progress which we had been able to make with the j.a.panese, and was addressing some courteous but slightly critical remarks about the Commission (rather for the record, I thought) specifically to me, Schmidt came round the table and said, 'Could you quickly come and have a word with me?' I paused, being hesitant as to what to do, but then decided that a talk with Schmidt about monetary advance was more important than listening to Giscard on j.a.pan, and therefore got up and talked with Schmidt in a window with both our backs to the Council and indeed to the continuing Giscard. Giscard allowed this to go by without comment or sign of umbrage. If one is so foolish as to believe in the equality of the European Council, one has only to think how differently he would have reacted if it had been, say, Lynch or Thorn who had come round the table and taken me away.

What Schmidt had to say to me, however, was of considerable importance. He wanted to tell me about that morning's breakfast, which had not advanced things a great deal, except that Giscard had made it absolutely clear that if Callaghan did not come in, he (Giscard) would go along with Schmidt, and that France would be prepared to re-enter the Snake and stay there as from July. He, Schmidt, wanted me to know this, and to realize that Giscard was absolutely serious about it and he hoped that the British would realize the same. I was able to use the opportunity to tell him what I was proposing to say at the press conference afterwards, to which he said that he had no objection provided that it did not upset Callaghan, whom he wished to propitiate until he had had a private go at bringing him along. So I took the opportunity subsequently of telling Callaghan too what I intended to say, which he in turn took perfectly friendlily. Schmidt told me that his next step would be to talk to Callaghan, indicating that he would prepare a paper before this (though in fact he did not do so), and would keep in touch with me after that, as of course he would with Giscard.

After the session we had a hurried lunch with the three or four small-country Prime Ministers who had stayed (it was again typical that the big ones had gone), and I then gave an hour-long press conference (for about six hundred journalists) with Jrgensen, who did much better here than he had done as chairman. I apparently gave the impression of being extremely pleased with the outcome without saying too much. Left just after 4 o'clock by avion taxi for Brussels. An agreeable flight embellished by an hour's cultural conversation with Ortoli in French, which he, being in as ebullient a mood as I (but more surprisingly), seemed determined to have.

SUNDAY, 9 APRIL. Brussels.

A perfect day, one of the very few this spring. Jennifer and I picked up Helena Tine and drove down the Namur autoroute to picnic in the same field near Maillen, with a good open view across the lower Ardennes, in which we had picnicked on the last warm Sunday of the autumn in mid-October after my return from j.a.pan.

MONDAY, 10 APRIL. Brussels.

Dinner in the Economist flat on a top floor in the rue Ducale, with their correspondents Stephen Milligan and Christopher Huhne, plus the Simonets. Milligan was obviously anxious to find out about Copenhagen. I decided to be too clever. I gave him a lot of circ.u.mstantial detail about who sat where, who talked a lot, who didn't, etc., but nothing of substance. However, as he subsequently published all the circ.u.mstantial detail, as well as a good deal of substance which he had picked up from elsewhere, it looked, not unnaturally, to Schmidt and others, as though I had told him the main story. Home at about 11.30, Solly Zuckerman having arrived to stay for three days.

TUESDAY, 11 APRIL. Brussels and Luxembourg.

9.20 train to Luxembourg with Hayden, I suffering a post-Copenhagen exhaustion. To the Court of Justice where we thought we were lunching with Kutscher, the President. We discovered the building almost completely empty, certainly exuding an appropriate atmosphere of judicial calm. Everybody, secretaries, justices certainly, clerks, most of the huissiers, everybody in fact except one doorman and the Italian Advocate-General had gone to lunch. No sign of any lunch there or anywhere else. Hayden telephoned increasingly frantically and eventually discovered that the lunch was at Kutscher's flat about three miles away. No car by that time. We stood outside on a bright but extremely cold day waiting for the car for a long time, and eventually got to Kutscher's flat fifty minutes late. My temper uncertain by then. However, Kutscher and his wife were as always extremely nice and perfectly understanding, though rather a brief lunch with them and others from the Court because I had to answer questions in the Parliament at 3.00. Later, after a series of interviews, I gave a pointless dinner at the Golf Club for some parliamentarians allegedly interested in External Affairs.

WEDNESDAY, 12 APRIL. Luxembourg and Brussels.

Commission from 8.30 to 9.30. Then into the Parliament, first to listen to K. B. Andersen's report on the European Council and then to give my own report. Lunched with Colombo in the Parliament building and received the President of the Spanish Cortes in the afternoon. Listened to and replied briefly to the debate from 4.00 until 6.00. A particularly b.u.mpy avion taxi ride to Brussels, where I arrived too late to listen to Michael Palliser's lecture at the Inst.i.tut Royal but went to the reception for it briefly and then took Solly Zuckerman out to dinner.

THURSDAY, 13 APRIL. Brussels and Berlin.

Flew to Berlin, with a change of plane at Frankfurt, over lunch time. To the Kempinski Hotel, where the City government had installed me in a magnificent suite at the top. Then to the Schoneberg Rathaus for a call on the Governing Mayor, Dietrich s...o...b.., from 3.30 to 4.45. Mainly political talk with him about the Russians. I liked him very much.

Next to the Senate Guest House for a meeting with Mrs Juanita Kreps, the American Secretary of Commerce, whom I had not met before. She had asked for the meeting, and proceeded to behave in the most extraordinary way. Her object was to discover exactly what had happened at Copenhagen. Her method was to come into the meeting accompanied by seven or eight officials, of whom four were engaged in taking a verbatim note, and immediately, without establis.h.i.+ng any sort of relations, to ask me what had there taken place. When I pushed the question away, she seemed rather miffed. But it was a most bizarre idea that I would suddenly spill the Copenhagen beans to somebody I had never met before who (i) showed no understanding of the subject, and (ii) sat around with a whole series of hard-faced note-takers.

On from there to the Chamber of Commerce, where I gave quite a good lecture for about forty-five minutes, attended a reception, and returned to the Senate Guest House for a fairly hard-working dinner with thirty guests for two hours or so.

Then back to the Kempinski for a talk with Lambsdorff, the German Economics Minister, from 10.30 to midnight. I had not known him well before and found him easy and agreeable, much more so than one might at first think. Physically, and even mentally, he is like a curious mixture of Iain Macleod and Donald Tyerman, the ex-editor of the Economist whom I nearly succeeded.

FRIDAY, 14 APRIL. Berlin and East Hendred.

A splendid morning panoramic view from the top of the Kempinski, with the Berlin weather as splendid as usual. Further talks at the Schoneberg Rathaus, made memorable by the deputy Mayor, who spoke the most excellent English, suddenly announcing that one of the major social problems in Berlin was the presence of two or three hundred thousand immigrant 'turkeys', who apart from anything else made a great deal of noise in the streets. I said 'What, after Christmas, as well as before,' and then, such is the English juvenile sense of humour, and our capacity for expecting linguistic perfection from others while not even attempting it ourselves, we all found it very difficult not to giggle for the rest of the meeting. Then a press conference and afterwards the signing of the Golden Book in the Schloss Charlottenburg with a nice gracious speech from s...o...b.. and a reply from me which was one third in German. An official lunch there, and then the 3 o'clock plane from Tegel. East Hendred via Frankfurt by 7.45.

MONDAY, 17 APRIL. East Hendred and London.

Motored to lunch with about forty American correspondents at the Waldorf Hotel. Made them an unprepared speech for about fifteen minutes and answered questions. I stressed that we were not pursuing an anti-American course by wanting somewhat to reduce the role of the dollar in world monetary affairs and to do something of our own in Europe, rather than merely complaining about what the Americans did or did not do. At 6.45 I went to Eaton Square for a forty-minute worthwhile monetary talk with Harold Lever,56 whom I had not seen for some time. He wanted a little rea.s.surance on the American point, but was sensible, sympathetic and generally helpful.

Then to address a grand European League for Economic Cooperation dinner of about two hundred people, a very powerfully representative gathering, marred typically by the twelve or fourteen MPs present having to go off in the middle of the speeches to cancel each other out in a vote in the House of Commons: the speech was both well received and well reported.

THURSDAY, 20 APRIL. Brussels.

A meeting with Doko, the very old President of the j.a.panese employers' organization, and the delegation he had brought. I am not sure how much progress we made, but I suppose it was worthwhile. Then a luncheon for the chairmen or the managing directors of about twenty-five European television chains. They all seemed keen on monetary union, but not as much so as my 3.30 deputation from the European Cooperative Savings Inst.i.tute who came specifically to express their strong support.

FRIDAY, 21 APRIL. Brussels and East Hendred.

12.35 plane to London (late), and to East Hendred. Worked quite hard on my speech for that evening at the Vale of the White Horse Council's annual dinner in Abingdon. They had a.s.sembled a great European turn-up from Lucca, Montreuil, and the other twinned towns. I had a.s.sembled what I hoped was a number of apposite quotations, two from Chesterton and one from Matthew Arnold, but I suspect I would have done better if I had devoted the time to putting on a tail coat with decorations, which all the top table except me were wearing, rather than the dinner jacket which I thought was enough.

SAt.u.r.dAY, 22 APRIL. East Hendred and Birmingham.

Motored to Birmingham in the early evening for a Stechford farewell party to Ruby and Oliver Rhydderch (two former councillors). It was quite unlike last summer, no great sense of regret at going back to Birmingham, no sense of how awful it was that I was no longer MP there. They were extremely pleased to see me, though equally all extremely pro-Terry Davis (my successor), who was there, and who obviously turned up at everything; not that they criticized me for not doing that.

MONDAY, 24 APRIL. East Hendred and Brussels.

Stayed at East Hendred for the morning, not rus.h.i.+ng back to Brussels, as I am increasingly of the view that I don't get much real work done in the Berlaymont. 3.30 plane, and to an International Medical Services dinner in the Amigo Hotel, to which David Ginsburg57 persuaded me to go. I made them rather a dull speech after the first course. Belgian service excelled itself and was so incredibly slow that when I left at 11 o'clock the last course was still unserved.

TUESDAY, 25 APRIL. Brussels.

A noon meeting with the Portuguese Foreign Minister (Victor Sa Machado), who came into the Government following its widening to a coalition, and is not a socialist. He speaks very good English, unlike most Portuguese, mainly I suppose because he was Secretary-General of the Gulbenkian Foundation-or perhaps the other way round. The good news was that the long-drawn-out negotiations with the IMF were at last settled and that the Portuguese expect to sign in the near future.

Bob Maclennan,58 Professor Maurice Peston,59 David Marquand and Michel Vanden Abeele to lunch rue de Praetere. Peston I found an impressive man: I liked him very much indeed. He used to work for Reg Prentice and was rather fed up with what Reg had done, though still speaking of him with sad affection. We had a useful discussion about various points around the monetary union issue.

At 3 o'clock I went to the External Affairs Committee of the Parliament, opened for half an hour, listened to their comments, and wound up for twenty minutes at the end. I like this format of opening fairly informally, listening to what they say and then weaving what points one chooses into a reply.

I saw Christopher Tugendhat for an hour on a number of his points, but also because I wished to tell him I had now decided, fully in accordance with his wishes, to relieve him of the Personnel portfolio with the intention of giving it to Vredeling. He made no difficulty about this.

WEDNESDAY, 26 APRIL. Brussels.

Six rather tiresome hours in the Commission, particularly at the end of the morning on a Vouel paper on State Aids (to industry), which had been badly prepared by the Chefs de Cabinet. I was much worse briefed than I usually am on what is likely to come up. However, no disasters, although mildly irritating.

An Economic and Social Committee dinner at Basil de Ferranti's60 flat, mainly for Leslie Murphy, Ryder's successor as Chairman of the National Enterprise Board. There were various other people like le Portz of the European Investment Bank, Provost, President of UNICE, and Debunne, the chief Belgian trade unionist. A general discussion after dinner, which I had to lead and which was not too bad. Murphy a bit sceptical on monetary questions. But Provost and one or two others obviously excited at what they thought had been the real progress at Copenhagen and how it had followed on from my Florence speech, which was encouraging.

THURSDAY, 27 APRIL. Brussels and Madrid.

1.40 plane to Madrid. First a meeting of one and a half hours with Calvo Sotelo, the minister in charge of the negotiation, and various members of his equipe. To the Ritz Hotel to change and see Jennifer who had arrived from London, and then to an hour's meeting at the Palacio Moncloa with Suarez, the Prime Minister. Found him as impressive as at our previous meeting. He afterwards gave a dinner of about forty people, remarkable for the fact that he had the leader of the Socialist Party, Felipe Gonzales, the Secretary-General of the Communist Party, Carrillo, and the deputy leader of the Catalan Nationalist Party, as well as most of the major ministers, round the table. As I said in my brief speech after dinner, there were not many countries in the Community, or indeed in the world, where such a cross-section could have been a.s.sembled, although I suppose Britain is one of them, and Italy another, but it would certainly not have happened in France, and probably not in Germany. Home very late, dinner not starting until nearly 11 o'clock.

FRIDAY, 28 APRIL. Madrid.

Left at 9.15 for the drive out to Zarazuela, the King's semi-country palace. It is in fact more a large modern villa than a palace, though set in a big park about fifteen miles from the centre of Madrid. An hour's talk alone with him, in which he struck me, much as in Brussels six months before, as being agreeable, quick, with a non-regal manner, shrewd rather than intellectual. He expressed some concern about the coolness of Spanish public opinion in the street towards Europe, which was more than any of his ministers said to me.

Back to the centre of Madrid, indeed into the old town for the first time, for a meeting at the Foreign Ministry with Oreja, young, bright, quick, if not heavyweight, on a wide range of foreign policy questions. Then back to the Ritz, where Calvo Sotelo came to see me to follow up how we were to deal with one particularly difficult point relating to the renegotiation of the 1970 agreement which had arisen the evening before.

Then, at 1.15, to the Danish Amba.s.sador's residence to brief the amba.s.sadors of the Nine, including Antony Acland, Bobbie de Margerie61 and others not known to me. I liked them rather better than the Community amba.s.sadors in Portugal. Then, at 2.15, to a lunch of industrialists (or empresarios as they are rather surprisingly called in Spanish), which took place in the Financial Club, a newish inst.i.tution at the top of a fourteen-storey building with a very good view over Madrid and out into the barren countryside beyond the edge of the city, which remains fairly concentrated, even though the population has now gone up to four million.

A dullish but not testing press conference at 4.45, and then to the Cortes for a meeting with the President and his various Deputies. A rather stilted discussion with them with inadequate interpretation and therefore a good deal of bad French.

Back to the Ritz and then, at 9 o'clock, a Calvo Sotelo dinner for about thirty people in the Palacio Fernan Nunez, an old Madrid hotel particulier, built about 1750 and then done up rather sumptuously in the height of the style of the 1840s and taken over some time in the last thirty or forty years by Spanish railways, of which Calvo Sotelo had in the 1960s been President.

SAt.u.r.dAY, 29 APRIL. Madrid and Toledo.

To the Prado for an hour. The Velasquez and Goya rooms immensely impressive, but I found El Grecos en ma.s.se rather disappointing. He curiously fails to gain from being displayed in great quant.i.ty. Then a short walk through the Plaza Mayor. Left for Toledo just after noon. After a tedious drive on a bad road, through dismal suburbs with heavy traffic, low cloud and a nasty light we installed ourselves in the extremely comfortable Parador Nacional de Conde de Orgaz. That evening there was still a disagreeable hard light, though the view across the Tagus Valley to Toledo from the parador, with the cathedral, the Alcazar, and the other buildings rising on a hill above a bend of the river, is quite remarkable.

We had the Aclands to dinner, and much enjoyed seeing them again, although I thought them only moderately happy in Madrid, partly because a fourteen-storey bank is being built with great noise and dust alongside their emba.s.sy.

SUNDAY, 30 APRIL. Toledo.

Sight-seeing expeditions across the valley in the morning (the cathedral and the Alcazar), and again in the early evening (the Hospital de Tovero outside the walls of the town, and Santo Tome with the magnificent El Greco, the burial of the Conde de Orgaz). From 7.30 to 9.00 I sat working and reading, partly on the balcony and partly in my room with the window open, in one of the most magnificent lights I have ever seen, a complete contrast with the evening before, still cold, still windy, but the clouds had broken up, giving a brilliant late-April sharpness, with snow-covered mountains to the north of Segovia (nearly a hundred miles away) clearly visible in the last hour of sunlight.

MONDAY, I MAY. Madrid and Brussels.

Made to leave Toledo for Madrid airport much too early, which I hate doing. We were there over an hour before the plane was even due to take off. We hung about in the VIP lounge, with various members of the send-off party trickling in, and it was therefore not possible even to get down to any useful work or reading. Calvo Sotelo wisely left his arrival (to say goodbye) until the last possible moment, saying he had been held up by the traffic-a very sensible man in my view. Brussels at 1.15.. To lunch a little late with the Danes: Foreign Minister, Permanent Secretary, Permanent Representative.

TUESDAY, 2 MAY. Brussels.

Foreign Affairs Council at 9.30 and all day including lunch until 5.30, when I left. There was a slightly obscure debate about protectionism, mainly between Lambsdorff and Owen, in which Owen uttered some of the most protectionist sentiments -unprepared, I think-that I have ever heard.

Then, towards the latter part of the morning, I introduced the 'fresco' on enlargement, which was surprisingly politely received by all the ministers. I rather feared that they would think we had been a mountain in labour and had produced a mouse, but although there were some points of disagreement about the transitional periods and some desire for more detail on economic matters, they all accepted the doc.u.ment as a good beginning and welcomed the fact that we kept it to twenty pages. Genscher was particularly forthcoming.

Dined with the Nanteuils in their new large suburban villa at Tervuren, with which they seemed very pleased compared with their previous less convenient but more distinguished town house in Ixelles. After dinner I was given an interesting little lecture by Hure, the French Amba.s.sador to the Kingdom of Belgium, about the difference between the state and the nation in French political thought. Giscard, he thought, was too concerned with the nation, whereas the French desperately needed the state to hold them together as they were inherently febrile and undisciplined. Hence the need for Napoleon, de Gaulle, etc. Debre,62 from the death of whose father the conversation started, exaggerated appallingly but nonetheless such exaggeration was necessary for the balance of French politics. It ended up by Hure saying that Pompidou-partly because he had more humble origins-understood the state as opposed to the nation much more than did Giscard, i.e. was much more of a Napoleon, whereas poor Giscard was left to be a Louis Philippe!

WEDNESDAY, 3 MAY. Brussels.

Five and a half hours of Commission. The long item in the morning was on the agricultural price position, with a report from Gundelach as to the result he saw being arrived at the following week. Everything seemed reasonably satisfactory except for wine, on which he had gone substantially further than authorized in the Commission a few weeks before. A slightly acrimonious exchange with him, but the Italians and the French being of course solid with him, and not much fight in anybody else, there was no chance of doing more than pulling him back very marginally. In the afternoon a moderately good discussion on the draft of the first part of the 'opinion' on Portugal's application for members.h.i.+p.

A monetary affairs lunch with four cabinet members, rue de Praetere. A drive and walk in the Foret de Soignes for an hour before dinner; a beautiful evening, the weather having changed at lunchtime, and for the first time this year we saw the sun slanting through the light green beech leaves which are the best feature of Brussels in May.

THURSDAY, 4 MAY. Brussels and London.

Having decided not to go to Aachen for the Karlspreis Ceremony, and it being a Commission holiday, I went to London in mid-morning with Jennifer, and there worked on my speech for the Reform Club banquet that evening, which was to mark their having made me one of their few honorary members. It was a gathering of about a hundred and fifty, including I think six of the Nine amba.s.sadors, Michael Palliser, etc. I had prepared a speech for the occasion with a lot of Reform Club references, with only a little serious stuff at the end. However they indicated during the day and on arrival that they hoped I would give them a full-scale serious European talk. I therefore had to do a combination of the two and, as a result, took forty-five minutes.

FRIDAY, 5 MAY. London and Oxford.

Another filthy day, pouring with rain from morning till night. In the afternoon I motored to Oxford to deliver the Cyril Foster Memorial Lecture. Tea in Michael Howard's63 room in All Souls and then across to the South School of the Examination Schools, where to my amazement there were about five hundred people, including one or two surprising figures like Ann Fleming and the Michael Astors, and also the Hayters64 and a lot of undergraduates. The lecture seemed to be curiously and jointly presided over by Raymond Carr, Warden of St Antony's, and Robert Blake, Provost of Queen's, he in his capacity as one of the pro-Vice-Chancellors. It was a solid lecture, lasting fifty-seven minutes, about relations with the Third World. There was some quite interesting material in it and it was well listened to by the audience, but it was certainly not sparkling. An early dinner at St Antony's for about forty.

MONDAY, 8 MAY. London and Manchester.

Peter Preston, editor of the Guardian, to lunch at Brooks's. I found him remarkably agreeable: not difficult to talk to as I half-expected, very European, well-informed, and sensible on practically everything.

5.20 train to Manchester. Installed in the same suite in the Midland Hotel in which John Harris, Irwin Ross65 and I had sat gloomily sipping whisky and sweating prodigiously on the hottest English evening I can remember after a bad meeting (Manchester meetings mostly are) in the Albert Hall in June 1970, and where I had begun to wonder whether that election really was in the bag after all.

On this occasion there was a dinner for about thirty people, given by the Sun66 with brief speeches. I sat between Larry Lamb67 and a Tate and Lyle director called, surprisingly, Tate. Lamb and all the Sun people were in very buoyant mood, as they had just got news that they had decisively pa.s.sed the Mirror and become the largest circulation newspaper-a considerable feat in such a short time -meaning, as I indicated in my speech, that the decision of the old Mirror Group to put the Sun on to the market was one of the most ill-judged acts in the history of British journalism. To have kept it there like Hemingway's fish, fastened to their boat, gnawed at but protective, would have been much wiser.

TUESDAY, 9 MAY. Manchester and Strasbourg.

A brilliant morning with spectacular Manchester suns.h.i.+ne, but I saw little of it as we were incarcerated in the Midland Hotel for the Sun-organized seminar on the Common Agricultural Policy. A rather good and worthwhile gathering. I spoke for thirty-five or forty minutes at the beginning, then we had 'the a.s.sessors', Neil Marten MP,68 plus a rather good farmer from Ches.h.i.+re, plus Professor John Marsh from Aberdeen plus a Co-operative Wholesale Society manager. I replied to them for twenty minutes and then left by avion taxi for Strasbourg. I arrived in the Parliament just after 4 o'clock, where I received the news of the death of Aldo Moro69 at the hands of his Italian kidnappers. Recorded a brief television statement on this shattering event for the Italian state and government, and therefore, indirectly, for the Community.

WEDNESDAY, 10 MAY. Strasbourg.

An easy Commission meeting from 9.00 to 10.00. Then into the Chamber, luckily, as little Fellermaier without any notice got up on a complicated point of order which turned out to be a justified complaint about the very poor attendance and performance of the Commission at question period the previous day. Only Burke and Vredeling had been there. We had discussed this at the Commission meeting that morning, deciding that we must strengthen the team for Thursday and in future. I therefore had an answer, but felt I had to change my plans, stay in Strasbourg and do Thursday questions myself. I also settled down to a Wednesday in the hemicycle, making a series of brief speeches up to 7.30 p.m.

In one interval I took David Wood of The Times to lunch, mainly gossiping about British politics of the past. And in another interval I had a useful drink with Dohnanyi and discovered that he was keen to present some paper to the German Government about a very substantial increase in European Investment Bank funds to be used as a sort of mini-Marshall Plan for the applicant countries. Good as far as it goes, which may be quite a long way.

My change of plan had defeated the Sofitel (though this was not entirely a bad thing in view of our opinion of it) who could not have us for another night. We therefore went to Illhaeusern.

THURSDAY, 11 MAY. Strasbourg and Brussels.

Left Illhaeusern at 7.45, though not quite early enough, to drive hectically to Strasbourg Cathedral for a memorial Ma.s.s for Moro. Just squeezed into the front row between Colombo and Natali. It was a longer service than I had expected, nearly a full hour, good music, splendid setting, high Ma.s.s and communion service for everybody; a fairly good attendance. And then a quick breakfast in the Place de la Cathedrale before spending the morning in the Parliament. In my afternoon question hour I answered five out of six questions, all going reasonably smoothly, and, as in December, quite enjoying the occasion.

FRIDAY, 12 MAY. Brussels.

Hilda and George Canning (my Stechford chairman) arrived to stay. John Harris and Jennifer were also due to arrive, but they were diverted by a strike and indeed had a ghastly journey as the driver missed them at Lille.

SAt.u.r.dAY, 13 MAY. Brussels, Rome and Brussels.

Jennifer took the Cannings to Walcheren, Middelburg and Vlis-sengen in order to see some of the scenes of George's exploits in the Navy during the war. I left for Rome by avion taxi just after 1.00 for the grand Moro memorial Ma.s.s. Two in a week was perhaps rather much, but the Italian Government had made it fairly clear that they would greatly appreciate my presence. John Harris and Hayden came with me for the ride. Met by Forlani, the Foreign Minister, and Natali, as well as by the rather typical news that the ceremony had been put back by half an hour on security grounds. (It was not clear why keeping the congregation waiting for a longer time in St John Lateran was going to help security.) We arrived at the basilica, which is of course magnificent, at 3.45. The Ma.s.s started late even for the postponed time of 4.30. The Pope (Paul VI) made an exceptional appearance outside the Vatican70 and was borne in on his ceremonial chair carried by ten men who, although presumably practised, were a little unsteady. This did not impair the dignity of his blessing as he swayed around six feet above the ground; no doubt he is used to that. His presence and demeanour were impressive. The service was beautiful, with haunting music, though, to me, cold, but perhaps that was because I did not know Moro. It took a long time and it was 5.45 before we left the church. Not many heads of government-Thorn and Tindemans I think were the only ones-but there was a fairly substantial representation nonetheless. Elwyn-Jones (Lord Chancellor) for the British, Peyrefitte (Minister of Justice) for the French. There was also a remarkable turn-out of Italian politicians. All the Christian Democrats, apart from poor Cossiga71 who had resigned as Minister of the Interior and was not there, but also Berlinguer as well as most of the Socialists.

Rather a jam of the planes of various governments at Ciampino so that we did not get into the air until just after 7 o'clock Italian time (8 o'clock Brussels time). Nonetheless we got to rue de Praetere in time for dinner with the Cannings and Phillips' at 10.15.

TUESDAY, 16 MAY. Brussels.

Henri Simonet to lunch. As usual it was a pleasure to talk to him. He seemed at that stage on perfectly good form and not unduly apprehensive of what was happening in Zaire, although taking the mistaken view that while the Belgians might have to do something, the French were unlikely to move.72 WEDNESDAY, 17 MAY. Brussels.

Seven hours of Commission, with a COREPER lunch, which is by no means a relaxation, in the middle. I gave the Commission a great lecture in the morning about inadequate attendance at the European Parliament.

Arrived late with Jennifer to dine with the Australian Amba.s.sador for the Whitlams, who were visiting. A curiously mixed party, with the Papal Nuncio apparently subst.i.tuting for the Amba.s.sador's non-existent wife. The Whitlams in buoyant form as usual. I enjoyed talking to Mrs Whitlam, who really is a rather splendid figure. He is going to give up politics and become a professor at the National University at Canberra. Also present were Roy Denmans and Marquands. David Marquand is now finally going, having got his chair at Salford. He has written two or three extremely good speeches for me, but I do not think that he has found quite enough worthwhile to do.

THURSDAY, 18 MAY. Brussels.

I gave a lunch for the Daily Telegraph - William Deedes (the editor) plus the foreign editor, plus a leader writer. I enjoyed the occasion. Deedes is not a scintillating man (although he has other virtues), nor were the other two, but they seemed favourable and friendly and therefore it was worthwhile. Then a two-hour session with the Political Affairs Committee of the Parliament about enlargement.

At 6 o'clock I saw John Palmer of the Guardian, who asked curiously desultory questions, but we got on in a reasonably friendly way, which is at least an improvement on a year ago. I had in fact been extremely nice about him (although I have no idea whether he knew that) to Peter Preston ten days before, saying, which is indeed the truth, that he was much the best informed of the British correspondents in Brussels.

Wayland Kennet73 and Jacques Tine and three or four others to dine. Jacques Tine on very good and funny form, apparently delighted to get away from his NATO society, which I think bores him considerably. Wayland is keen to stand for the European Parliament, but he is not at all clear where he is going to find a seat he can win. Nor am I.

SAt.u.r.dAY, 20 MAY. Brussels and Nybrg.

Avion taxi to Odense and then helicopted to Hesselet, near Nybrg, for the Danish 'Schloss Gymnich' meeting, which was held in a very smart, curiously j.a.panese-style hotel on the edge of the sea. When I got into the helicopter at Odense, David Owen and van der Klaauw, the nice Dutch Foreign Minister, were already sitting in it. Van der Klaauw was as agreeable as ever, but David was apparently in a very bad temper and scowled most ferociously at everybody in sight. Ostensibly that was because Simonet was not coming. However, David's temper, performance and general agreeableness improved substantially as the weekend went on. Simonet's absence persisted.

There was a considerable general to-do over lunch about this. Guiringaud had not arrived, but was definitely coming during the evening, and it was thought very desirable to have them both together to hear what each had to say about Zaire and to try and patch up the difficulty which had arisen between them. I spoke to Simonet on the telephone during lunch and got a promise out of him that he would come at 7 o'clock, but he then went back on that, claiming that there was a special Belgian Cabinet meeting (there was one floating around, but it never took place). What is more likely is that Henri, finding himself in a rather impossible situation, decided to go to ground.

In the afternoon we had a discussion on enlargement, which was an agreeable seminar but not much more. Then I had a walk and long talk with Genscher. We had two further sessions, one from 5.15 to 7.00, and another from dinner until midnight. In the latter we listened to a long and extremely impressive expose by Guiringaud of the French position in Zaire. It was much the best thing that I have heard Guiringaud do. He spoke for about forty minutes, quietly, slowly, very clearly, with great knowledge and therefore great conviction; great knowledge of exactly what had happened from hour to hour, and of the position on the ground, although I think he had never been to Kolwezi.

SUNDAY, 21 MAY. Nybrg, Hamburg and Copenhagen.

I flew to Hamburg in the early afternoon for the DGB (German trade unions) Conference. An audience of about two thousand, speeches by Vetter and then by Scheel, the Federal President. Scheel's was very long, almost exactly an hour, and certainly not a conventional speech from a head of state. I would guess he had written it all himself. He tried to deal with the balance between growth and ecological and environmental considerations, and did so interestingly if in some ways naively. I spoke for twelve minutes, the first two paragraphs in German. When at the end of them I announced, 'I am now going to turn to English, which will perhaps be as big a relief to you as it is to me.' there was tumultuous applause, but it was a little ambiguous whether this was a tribute to my German, or an expression of deep relief.

The Conference had a remarkable turn-up of German politicians (and of some others, including Jack Jones). Apart from Scheel, there was also Carstens, the Christian Democrat President of the Bundestag, Kohl, leader of the CDU, as well as most of the SPD ministers, Apel, Matthofer, etc. Then back to Denmark by avion taxi, arriving at the Hotel d'Angleterre in Copenhagen just after 7 o'clock.

MONDAY, 22 MAY. Copenhagen and Greenland.

Airport at 10.30 to be informed that the plane was at least an hour and a half late. I therefore insisted on doing some sight-seeing and went first to Koger, a former Dutch settlement on the sea looking across to Sweden, next to the Francis Church, with the winding exterior staircase going up to the copper spire, to the bottom of which Laura and I climbed, and then back briefly to the Angleterre for a drink, until we were summoned to the airport and arrived exactly seven minutes before take-off at 1 o'clock: a satisfactory defeat of airport time-wasting.

Then a flight of just over four hours to Sndre Strmfjord, across Iceland, then over the very high mountains of western Greenland, then across the endless waste of the Ice Cap and into Sndre Strmfjord, in quite good weather, at 1.10 Greenland time. A quick turn-round and off in a helicopter for nearly two hundred miles to Sukkertoppen (Sugarloaf). Remarkable scenery, all off the Ice Cap, but flying over a sunny, s...o...b..und landscape (ground temperature probably about 38F) down fjords of quite remarkable length, steepness and complication, mainly frozen up but a little less so as we got to the sea.

At Sukkertoppen we were greeted by a demonstration, though it didn't seem a very serious one, being mainly composed of schoolchildren out for the afternoon, organized indeed by the bearded deputy headmaster, but with lots of slogans like 'No Rome rule', 'Go home Father Christmas Jenkins', 'Greenland out of the EEC'. The deputy headmaster made a speech, I made a speech in response, it was all quite good-tempered, although by walking slowly in front of us they blocked our way down from the landing pad to the public hall, where we had a meeting with the town council, who were all rather friendly and constructive. I think the Green-landers could be persuaded to stay in the Community, but whether that is good for them or for us is another matter.

We then helicopted on to Atangmik, a settlement of about 180 people on the sea, a bleak place, where we wandered around in slushy snow and saw a rather pathetic fis.h.i.+ng hut where they produced cod's roe and also dried cod carcases which hang up and are then exported to-of all places-Nigeria. Then we had a sort of village meeting, rather reminiscent of some election meetings, in which about sixty people shuffled in rather reluctantly and stood at the back. The mayor, if that is the right word, made quite a good, sensible speech, which he had typed out, and I responded. What they made of my speech I cannot think, particularly as it had to be translated via Danish into Greenlandic.