The Tories' xenophobia

By Hasan Suroor

NOT SINCE Enoch Powell's infamous ``rivers of blood'' speech on immigration nearly four decades ago has a responsible British politician's statement provoked so much outrage as the Tory leader, Mr. William Hague's remark at a party conference recently that Britain would become a ``foreign land'' if the Labour Government was allowed to go ahead with its pro-Europe policy and ``soft'' approach to asylum seekers. It was not a fleeting, off- the-cuff remark, which would have been bad enough, but a well- rehearsed performance clearly intended, as his own party veteran, Mr. Michael Heseltine, pointed out, to pander to a ``growing xenophobia'' in the country. Mr. Heseltine, who is a former Deputy Prime Minister and remains a considerable presence in the party despite his strong pro-Europe views, was so infuriated that he publicly voiced doubts about voting for his own party in the coming general election.

Any doubts that Mr. Hague may have not meant exactly what he said were removed after he insisted that he stood by his remarks and indeed would not hesitate to repeat them. He accused his critics of making a virtue of political correctness and of being afraid to speak the truth. His speech, he claimed, represented the ``commonsense instincts'' of the British people and his critics could cry themselves hoarse if they so wished. ``Tony Blair and his Ministers can sneer all they like. But they're are not sneering at me. They're sneering at the British people whose opinions they hold in contempt.'' Brave words but the fact is that his comment has caused embarrassment in his own party and even the Euro- sceptics and those who favour a tougher asylum policy regret Mr. Hague's choice of words at a time when the party is trying to soften its public image in the build-up to the elections. This is how he put it: he invited his audience to a ``journey to a foreign land - to Britain after a second term of Tony Blair'' in which the British currency would be ``gone forever'' and asylum seekers would be lurking at every street corner. Declaring that the general election would be the last chance to ``save Britain'' from foreigners - the bureaucrats in Brussels on the one hand and asylum seekers at Dover and Heathrow on the other - he said a Tory Government would not allow Britain to become a ``soft touch'' for people fleeing their own countries for greener pastures.

The speech was drafted by Mr. Hague's new speech writer Mr. Daniel Hanman, known for his rabid anti-Europeanism, and there is no doubt that the anti-Europe and anti-asylum sentiment in Britain is very high which the Tories are keen to exploit - and legitimately so. But what has surprised commentators is the coded racism of Mr. Hague's rhetoric and the length to which he is inclined to go to capitalise on fears essentially arising out of ignorance. Those who know him say it is particularly unfortunate because personally Mr. Hague is not a racist - or even as congenitally right-wing as some grassroots Tories or some of his colleagues in the Shadow Cabinet. Certainly he is no Enoch Powell and yet he has spoken a language which is dangerously close to ``Powellspeak''.

The Liberal Democrat leader, Mr. Charles Kennedy, echoed this saying:``I don't believe that William Hague is a racist. But by his use of emotive language over the issue of asylum and immigration and now by his claim that Britain is becoming a `foreign land' William is playing on some people's fears and pandering to some people's prejudices... by choosing his language so carelessly he shows himself to be soft on racism and soft on the causes of racism.'' It is argued that the Tories have every right to raise issues which they think would help them in the election and asylum and Europe are two such issues but they must ensure a certain literate and civilised level of debate. A debate on whether Britain should or should not join the single currency need not be reduced to bashing the Germans and the French by portraying them as ugly foreigners out to overrun Britain. As Mr. Heseltine said:``Does anyone really think that France is a foreign country? Or that Germany is a foreign country? These are great giant nation states fighting for their self-interest and they believe their self-interest is better sought and protected and advanced in concert with their neighbours than apart from them.''

Raising the bogey of ``foreign-ness'' on the asylum issue is even more dangerous because there are hundreds of asylum seekers in Britain and such inflammatory statements can make them more vulnerable to prejudice than they already are. Even The Sun, not known for restraint at the best of times, found Mr. Hague's speech extremely distasteful though the Tories have sought to dismiss it as a part of its pro-Labour campaign. The tabloid accused Mr. Hague of ``flirting'' with ``extremism'' and said his speech ``left a nasty taste in the mouth.'' The Times, which has strong reservations on Europe and the Blair Government's somewhat vague policy on asylum, was equally critical of Mr. Hague's tactics. A commentator, Ms. Mary Ann Sieghart, argued that Mr. Hague, by claiming to appropriate the ``commonsense instincts'' of the British people, had ``underestimated the tolerance of the British people and his rhetoric will have struck a chord only with those who would never have voted Labour anyway''. There could not be a more emphatic popular rejection of his theme than the fact that according to a recent opinion poll 58 per cent of the people think that the Tories cannot win the next election under Mr. Hague. The Labour's lead, on the other hand, has shot up to a formidable 20 points despite the footh and mouth crisis and the shadow of sleaze.

Why is he then persisting with it? One argument is that Mr. Hague is whipping up xenophobia against his better instincts, and perhaps on bad advice from his aides. This has an echo of the familiar argument used in India to whitewash a certain BJP leader despite his own pride in being an unadulterated RSS product - that he is a ``good man'' but caught up in bad company. Good men do not have to fall in bad company and even if they do they are expected to have enough moral courage to renounce it - or at least avoid flirting with their company's more dangerous ideas.

The real reason why Mr. Hague and other ``good men in bad company'' behave as they do is because of the absolute intellectual bankruptcy on the Right which, after the collapse of socialism, has lost even its pretensions to engage in ideas. The result is an agenda solely designed for short-term gains by playing on people's basest of instincts - their racial and religious prejudices, and the imaginary fear of the ``foreigner'', the outsider. A false sense of combative nationalism which sees all other nationalities as necessarily hostile is deliberately promoted and those who do not agree are cast as ``anti-national'' who - in Mr. Hague's language - would hand over Britain to ``foreigners'', pound and all. The Indian electorate is all too familiar with such tactics - right- wing campaigns run in the name of ``sentiment'', ``faith'' and ``feelings''; and it is also all too familiar with their disastrous consequences.

In Britain, liberal opinion is still deeply rooted and the state enlightened enough not to let the Tories get away with what their more rabid peers in India were able to do. More importantly, the country is enjoying an economic boom and people are too busy reaping its benefits to care for such distractions. But seeds of prejudice, once sown, yield a bitter harvest on a bad day; and Mr. Hague is doing his best to sow those seeds. He may be acting against his better instincts but as a right-wing politician, exhausted of ideas, he is acting true to type.

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