David Waddington Memoirs Read Online Free PDF Page B

triumphant. No wonder many of that generation grew up with an abiding hatred of socialism, with all its bossy advocates, and took a great delight in cutting down to size people like Hugh Dalton who, on a visit to Oxford, was reminded by an impious undergraduate that at Eton he had been known as ‘Crab’ Dalton because he always had to cling to the nearest wall to avoid being kicked in the backside.
    About this time Lord Woolton made a broadcast in which he said he wanted the day to return when a chap could buy his girl a box of sweets. When a Labour politician criticised the speech in a Union debate, saying that his father had had eight children and their family had never been able to afford a box of sweets, he wastold by another irreverent student that no doubt his father could have afforded sweets if he had not kept his brains in his balls and he could not blame Woolton for that.
    I do not know which of the visiting Conservative politicians-made the greatest impression on me. I know who made me laugh the most – Lady Astor. In one speech she set out to illustrate the point that all of us are born different with different intelligences; and that equality was, therefore, unachievable. ‘I have two sons,’ she said. ‘Put one down in darkest Africa and he will come out leading the natives. Put the other down in Piccadilly Circus and he can’t find his way home – and I only live round the corner.’
    Bob Boothby was one of our favourites. His support for a united Europe which would never again tear itself apart in war gave us an idealistic theme when we were bored of just thumping Labour for its arrogant incompetence. We looked forward to France, Germany, the Benelux countries and Italy forming a close federation with their industries so intertwined they could not make war against each other – however much they wanted to do so. Britain would help them with their endeavours and would be the bridge between Europe, the Commonwealth and America. We never thought for one moment that Britain should become a member of a united Europe at the cost of abandoning her Commonwealth and worldwide commitments. Anyone who had suggested anything of the sort would have been thought to have taken leave of his senses.
    I had an impressive list of speakers for my term as president. The great disappointment was Viscount Simon who afterwards complained bitterly that he had been questioned by members of the audience about his past. In fact, the audience had been very restrained and I could not understand how someone in his position could resent being questioned about the years of appeasement and his actions at that time.

CHAPTER FOUR
Life in the Army
    I n the summer of 1950 I went on holiday to Corsica and Italy and arrived home to find that my Bar final course at Gibson & Weldons had already started. I set off for London and found lodgings in Notting Hill. Then I fell on my feet. John Morrison’s father, Shakes Morrison, who became Speaker of the House of Commons before being elevated to the peerage as Viscount Dunrossil, offered me the use of his flat in the Inner Temple. My fellow lodgers in Notting Hill could hardly believe their eyes when I showed them my new ‘digs’.
    Rationing was, however, still very severe and one person living alone had to use a great deal of ingenuity to avoid going hungry. The weekly meat ration from a butcher in Fetter Lane provided one good meal. I used to enjoy fried onions – just fried onions – for one or two other meals.
    I took the Bar finals examination in December 1950 and it could not have been very testing because I passed with little difficulty. But when, wanting to get my national service over as quickly as possible, I tried to get called up for the army, I found no one in any great hurry to have me. Eventually, after a frustrating wait, I was ordered to attend an interview at Preston in the course of which I was asked which part of the army I wanted to join. I found it very difficult to