Powell insisted that it was not the result of changing economic conditions improved prospects or the availability of more places
Powell insisted that it was not the result of changing economic conditions, improved prospects or the availability of more places. "This," he said "is the expression of a national call for progress in education." Like so many Powell purple passages, the high-sounding assertion had absolutely no meaning. It is hardly surprising that when Alec Douglas-Home resigned the Tory Leadership, Powell received only 15 votes in the election which followed. Before the result was announced the Daily Telegraph reported a "strong ground swell" for Powell as the man "best equipped to imbue the country with Conservative principles". Although he has moved to the Daily Mail, Simon Heffer is still a Telegraph man at heart.From the early Sixties onwards, it was all downhill for Powell.
Having refused to fight for the Conservatives in 1974, he returned to the Commons as the Official Unionist Member for South Down - and naturally took a more extreme view about the Republic than any of his colleagues. He actually "participated in a great act of Unionist solidarity in west Belfast" - the commemoration of the signing of the 1912 Ulster Convention. That was the occasion when the Orangemen declared that "Ulster will fight and Ulster will be right". Enoch Powell the great patriot, royalist and nationalist celebrated the declaration of rebellion against the crown. He was also appalled by the thought that the Queen's head might be removed from British bank notes and coins.Yet all this is forgotten by those who revere his memory and is even hidden from those who despise him for the "rivers of blood" abomination. On the day that speech was made I was in my Birmingham constituency and at a primary school surrounded by what Powell would have called "grinning piccaninnies". I still wonder how their parents felt when they read the evening newspapers Enoch Powell deserves to be, and is best, forgotten..
It seems that we are more concerned today with how people come by their children than how they raise them. Perhaps as a result of our reluctance to tackle the latter, we seem to be re-examining our ideas about conception and adoption, and looking for trouble. Channel 5's We Are Family series tonight takes a fairly tame look at sperm donation in "Secret Dads". It sets out to make the case that children born thanks to donor insemination should have the right to know who the donor is It is not clear why. One boy wants to know who his biological father is so he will know who to support in the World Cup. It does not seem the best reason to violate the agreement of anonymity under which the donor collected his pounds 15.
