(9 of 11)
Within hours, the right-wingers announced the formation of a new "Council for Social Democracy" as a prelude to forming a new political party. A trio of former Cabinet ministers, Shirley Williams, David Owen and William Rodgers —immediately dubbed "The Gang of Three"—were quickly joined by a fourth: former Deputy Party Leader Roy Jenkins, back from four years as president of the European Commission. They have appealed to other Laborites to join them. The acrimony between victorious leftists and the rightists was demonstrated at the next meeting of the national executive committee. Foot wheeled on Williams. "You had better make your mind up—if you want to join another party, it is quite intolerable that you should sit here." Tony Benn, the suave standard-bearer of the radical left, was even more virulent. He shouted at Williams: "If you are plotting to form a new party, you cannot sit here in the highest councils of Labor with all access to party documents available to you!"
The party split, if it comes finally and formally to that, would not cleave the party down the middle but break off an influential splinter, made up mostly of "Oxbridge" (Oxford and Cambridge) educated, middle-class M.P.s. Tweaking their somewhat elitist image, the Guardian ran a cartoon about the hypothetical problem the dissidents would have when they met to choose a leader: "... They could always have a wine-tasting competition." Last week five moderate trade unions joined to declare they would fight to overturn the rules change at the next party conference. Deputy Party Leader Denis Healey, borrowing a phrase from Hugh Gaitskell's fight against the left in 1961, vowed to "fight, fight and fight again."
Meanwhile, Liberal Party Leader David Steel, the most popular such figure in the country at the moment, with a 63% approval rating, told the disaffected Laborites to "stop dithering" and form a new party. The Liberals, who have never held power, usually poll between 14% and 18% in general elections. Steel is eager to cooperate in an alliance with a potential Social Democratic party that could bring his own group into a bona fide governing coalition. Several new polls indicated that such a centrist alliance could win 38% to 40% of the vote, and even some disenchanted Tories talked of signing on. But few political analysts believed any such alliance could score heavily against the long-standing organizations of the conservatives and Labor when the next election comes some time before the spring of 1984. Says University of London Professor Esmond Wright: "The alliance hasn't a cat's chance, and that's a pity, because that's where the country is."
Many British intellectuals see this as a pivotal moment in the country's political history. Certainly, the influence of the new left, both inside and outside the Labor Party, is being strongly felt. The universities are full of noisy protesters. "A pacifist is a chap shouting at you when you're trying to speak," sighs an official spokesman on nuclear weapons policy.
An antinuclear lobby is growing larger and more vocal as bearded young militants in duffel coats and girls with CND (Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament) pins over their hearts express hostility to