On the campaign trail

Abstract

One of aspects of a general election campaign that voters never see is way that a party leader's grows and grows in performance. point is that actual audience at each rally hears basically same speech, but with sections added to highlight issue of day. Gradually these sections take over whole so that audience at final rally hears it in all its perfection. But voters at large never do. most that they get is issue of day as reported in press or on television. One of things that keeps those hapless souls like me sentenced to what amounts to three weeks' hard labour? following, in my case, Prime Minister around?is watching the speech take shape, and noting that what went down well in Birmingham fails to move them in Slough. Election tours are a time out of reality for press who follow, since we are never in touch with events, only in pursuit of our politician. text of speech, or at least extract for day, is usually issued by party headquarters to resident political corps in London, although now and again we might get our copies a little earlier. So we journalists have to while away time that may very well be unproductive in terms of getting something into paper. Thatcher tour has been dubbed Gulliver's Travels, since by a happy coincidence that is name of pilot who captains chartered BAC-111 that takes Mrs Thatcher, her entourage, and travelling press, as we are known, around country. On land we travel in a fleet of buses. pace may be quite hectic, and there are days when little things like lunch simply slip past unnoticed?even by Prime Ministers. So far it looks as if Dr David Owen, deputy leader of Social Democrats, is being proved right and that health is hidden issue of campaign. It has certainly not surfaced in way that defence or unemployment has, nor would I expect it to. But I expected perhaps a little more argument, more debate, more charge and counter charge than there have been. The speech has not altered much over days from its basic form. This goes : government since war has done more for disabled. promised to maintain spending on National Health Service, and 45 000 extra nurses and 6000 extra doctors are witness that we have more than kept our promise. Those extra doctors and nurses made it possible to treat two million more patients than Labour ever managed. Hospital waiting lists are now lower than they were under Labour, despite last year's futile strike, and we're designing new hospitals. If that's dismantling NHS then Sir Christopher Wren was a demolition contractor. But Mrs Thatcher's concern is not in doubt, it is what happens next that is not clear. She clearly thinks that over period of her government Labour has managed to make running on health and that her record must be defended. In impromptu speeches during her whistle stop tours she always raises issue and defends that record in most vehement terms. We have honoured our promise to NHS. will continue to sustain NHS in way we have looked after it over last four years. I want to make that absolutely clear because I know people are worried about this, she said on one occasion. Then again, she said: We decided to give priority to NHS and you can see from our record that its future is safe in our hands. And later: The NHS is safe with us. No one can argue with facts. have to let them speak for themselves. There do not seem to be many worries in Mrs Thatcher's mind about outcome of election, but she is not a lady who likes to have her success, as she sees it, unfairly criticised, hence all rhetoric about Conservative record on NHS. She does not, however, promise anything specific, which is intriguing to say least.