Home for the summer
It is the first of August and I am sitting on a bench under our willow tree, shielded from the late afternoon sun - and feeling rather sorry for myself. I have developed a very unpleasant summer cold. But nothing can really spoil the glories of an English summer and for the last few days we have enjoyed the best high summer weather in years, able to eat every meal in the garden and to spend every hour there too. What can beat lunch under English apple trees, or supper in an English twilight?
An added bonus is that we have been able (for the first time in two years) to have the whole immediate family with us: sons, their wives, and two increasingly interesting and beguiling grand daughters. It was a long weekend break for which I was more than ready.
THURSDAY JULY 19: End of term feel to Question Time, made more of a House of Commons occasion by Michael Portillo's graceful exit and Gordon Brown's gracious tributes to him. And the last of the day's Business, my Adjournment Debate on the threatened asset stripping acquisition of the Wolverhampton and Dudley Breweries, was a half-hour of further cross-party comradeship as Ken Purchase, Rob Marris and Dennis Turner intervened supportively.
FRIDAY JULY 20: Into the House for Prayers but then away for a series of constituency engagements, the first the distribution of leavers' awards at the Havergal Primary School at Shareshill - a traditional Church of England school in the best sense of the term. The pupils are given a thorough grounding not only in the curriculum subjects but in how to behave and to identify right from wrong and good from bad. No wonder it has a splendid reputation for miles around. In the evening to a meeting of our Parochial Church Council to approve, among other things, the design for a new stained glass window.
SATURDAY JULY 21 and SUNDAY 22: A weekend of desk clearing. When I finally get back here next weekend I want to feel there is some time to enjoy the place - to work gently in my hut in the garden and to read books for which I would normally not have the time. There is a large pile in the study put by for the purpose. On the Sunday evening an amazingly good journey back to London. It is a welcome relief after a series of Sunday and Monday journeys which have taken between four and five hours. Much of the world is already en vacance.
MONDAY JULY 23: The House is not sitting but I had planned, foolishly as it turned out, on a 27th July rising of the House and had made a number of commitments which I cannot honourably break. But at least I can ignore the screen in the corner, or feeling guilty if I am not in the Chamber. I am tempted to go over and see if Eric Forth is making one of his speeches but it is a temptation I am able to resist, especially when I am told he has already left for his spiritual home across the Atlantic. A morning of dealing with correspondence, then a series of meetings and an interview for the BBC Parliament programme on the mechanics of the Conservative Leadership election. One of my sessions is with a young post graduate student from Berkeley , doing a thesis on British attitudes during the Balkans conflicts in the 1990s - a time when I often found myself completely isolated within my own party but on which I can look back with a degree of quiet vindication.
TUESDAY JULY 24: A meeting with Don Mckinnon, Secretary General of the Commonwealth, at Marlborough House to discuss a Jubilee project I am involved in and then to The Athenaeum for a meeting of the Art Committee. Having given up the Chairmanship of the Works of Art Committee here I have taken on a similar job there. Today we have two very exciting tasks, to view the recently restored - in every sense - portrait of George IV by Lawrence, given to the Club by the artist (he was one of our Founders) but presented by an anti-something Committee to Brighton Corporation in 1859 to hang in the Pavilion. It never did and now the Corporation has generously agreed to lend it back to us indefinitely. Our other main task of the morning is to decide on a commission for a major piece of ceremonial silver to mark the Golden Jubilee. Most of the afternoon is taken up with meetings but I do manage to get away to see the Summer Exhibition at the Royal Academy - not an unalloyed joy - and the rather more enticing exhibition of French pictures in the Sackler Galleries above. Wandering through those wonderfully proportioned rooms and looking at some of the things selected for the Summer Exhibition I cannot help but feel that it is a pity that so many elderly Academicians have to behave like ageing uncles at a wedding - those who insist upon being “with it” to the embarrassment of all concerned.
It is the first of August and I am sitting on a bench under our willow tree, shielded from the late afternoon sun - and feeling rather sorry for myself. I have developed a very unpleasant summer cold. But nothing can really spoil the glories of an English summer and for the last few days we have enjoyed the best high summer weather in years, able to eat every meal in the garden and to spend every hour there too. What can beat lunch under English apple trees, or supper in an English twilight?
An added bonus is that we have been able (for the first time in two years) to have the whole immediate family with us: sons, their wives, and two increasingly interesting and beguiling grand daughters. It was a long weekend break for which I was more than ready.
THURSDAY JULY 19: End of term feel to Question Time, made more of a House of Commons occasion by Michael Portillo's graceful exit and Gordon Brown's gracious tributes to him. And the last of the day's Business, my Adjournment Debate on the threatened asset stripping acquisition of the Wolverhampton and Dudley Breweries, was a half-hour of further cross-party comradeship as Ken Purchase, Rob Marris and Dennis Turner intervened supportively.
FRIDAY JULY 20: Into the House for Prayers but then away for a series of constituency engagements, the first the distribution of leavers' awards at the Havergal Primary School at Shareshill - a traditional Church of England school in the best sense of the term. The pupils are given a thorough grounding not only in the curriculum subjects but in how to behave and to identify right from wrong and good from bad. No wonder it has a splendid reputation for miles around. In the evening to a meeting of our Parochial Church Council to approve, among other things, the design for a new stained glass window.
SATURDAY JULY 21 and SUNDAY 22: A weekend of desk clearing. When I finally get back here next weekend I want to feel there is some time to enjoy the place - to work gently in my hut in the garden and to read books for which I would normally not have the time. There is a large pile in the study put by for the purpose. On the Sunday evening an amazingly good journey back to London. It is a welcome relief after a series of Sunday and Monday journeys which have taken between four and five hours. Much of the world is already en vacance.
MONDAY JULY 23: The House is not sitting but I had planned, foolishly as it turned out, on a 27th July rising of the House and had made a number of commitments which I cannot honourably break. But at least I can ignore the screen in the corner, or feeling guilty if I am not in the Chamber. I am tempted to go over and see if Eric Forth is making one of his speeches but it is a temptation I am able to resist, especially when I am told he has already left for his spiritual home across the Atlantic. A morning of dealing with correspondence, then a series of meetings and an interview for the BBC Parliament programme on the mechanics of the Conservative Leadership election. One of my sessions is with a young post graduate student from Berkeley , doing a thesis on British attitudes during the Balkans conflicts in the 1990s - a time when I often found myself completely isolated within my own party but on which I can look back with a degree of quiet vindication.
TUESDAY JULY 24: A meeting with Don Mckinnon, Secretary General of the Commonwealth, at Marlborough House to discuss a Jubilee project I am involved in and then to The Athenaeum for a meeting of the Art Committee. Having given up the Chairmanship of the Works of Art Committee here I have taken on a similar job there. Today we have two very exciting tasks, to view the recently restored - in every sense - portrait of George IV by Lawrence, given to the Club by the artist (he was one of our Founders) but presented by an anti-something Committee to Brighton Corporation in 1859 to hang in the Pavilion. It never did and now the Corporation has generously agreed to lend it back to us indefinitely. Our other main task of the morning is to decide on a commission for a major piece of ceremonial silver to mark the Golden Jubilee. Most of the afternoon is taken up with meetings but I do manage to get away to see the Summer Exhibition at the Royal Academy - not an unalloyed joy - and the rather more enticing exhibition of French pictures in the Sackler Galleries above. Wandering through those wonderfully proportioned rooms and looking at some of the things selected for the Summer Exhibition I cannot help but feel that it is a pity that so many elderly Academicians have to behave like ageing uncles at a wedding - those who insist upon being “with it” to the embarrassment of all concerned.
WEDNESDAY JULY 25: Another morning at the desk and then to meet the Chairman of the Council of Lincoln Cathedral which I have recently joined. We meet at the wonderful Carvery in Butcher's Hall. I eat more sparingly than I would for I have to interview a couple of prospective PAs who have applied to work in my office from October. Then to the ESU, surely the most effective of organisations devoted to promoting genuine friendship and understanding, for a meeting of the Governors, and on to The Athenaeum to meet John Major for dinner and a wide ranging gossip. He is on sparkling form and obviously enjoying his new freedom.
THURSDAY JULY 26: Breakfast meeting to discuss this year's award for responsible capitalism. Then a session on a spring visit to Hong Kong, followed by a further interview and then a meeting with Andrew Pearson and his staff at the CPA to plan the special Jubilee Conference we are holding next March.
In the afternoon I see Baroness Young to discuss a particularly difficult constituency case where I do not believe the Environment Agency has covered itself in glory. In the evening we record the final two programmes of this series of Parliamentary Questions. We have already been signed up for another series in the autumn. This evening Roy Hattersley has Chris Moncrieff as his partner in anecdote. I have Anne McElvoy - and we manage to square the series. It is good lighthearted fun.
FRIDAY JULY 27: Into the office for the last time - I hope and trust - for some weeks. I have a very good journey back to Staffordshire to await the first of the family, Richard, and his wife Lucinda, home from Hong Kong.
WEDNESDAY AUGUST 1: And so the weekend has gone as only the very best of family weekends can go - too quickly but full of reminiscence and laughter, and a few quiet moments when excitable grand daughters were taught to feed the fish in the various pools we have established in the garden over the years. I have even found time to read the first of my summer books - a marvellously evocative novel about Vermeer: The Girl With The Pearl Ear Ring. I commend it to anyone who has seen the Exhibition at the National Gallery, although, alas, this most enticing of all his paintings remains in The Hague.
