Editing Alec Douglas-Home (section)

==Prime Minister (1963–1964)<span class="anchor" id="Premiership"></span><!-- linked from redirects [[Premiership of Alec Douglas-Home]], [[Premiership of Lord Home]], [[Premiership of Sir Alec Douglas-Home]], [[Premiership of the Earl of Home]], [[Prime ministership of Alec Douglas-Home]], [[Prime ministership of Lord Home]], [[Prime ministership of Sir Alec Douglas-Home]], [[Prime ministership of the Earl of Home]] -->==
{{Further|Conservative government, 1957–1964}}<!-- [[WP:NOTBROKEN]] -->
{{Infobox incumbency
| image        = Alec Douglas-Home in 1963.jpg
| caption      = Douglas-Home in 1963
| name         = Premiership of Alec Douglas-Home
| term_start   = 19 October 1963
| term_end     = 16 October 1964
| premier      = <!-- Alec Douglas-Home -->
| premier_link = Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
| cabinet      = [[Douglas-Home ministry]]
| party        = [[Conservative Party (UK)|Conservative]]
| election     = <!-- N/A -->
| monarch      = [[Elizabeth II]]
| seat         = [[10 Downing Street]]
| predecessor  = [[Premiership of Harold Macmillan|Harold Macmillan]]
| successor    = [[First premiership of Harold Wilson|Harold Wilson]]
}}
On 23 October 1963, four days after becoming prime minister, Home disclaimed his earldom and associated lesser peerages.{{Efn|The subordinate titles were the lordship of Dunglass, the lordship of Home, the lordship of Hume of Berwick, the barony of Douglas and the barony of Hume of Berwick.<ref name=p463/><ref>{{Cite news |last1=Boyd |first1=Francis |last2=Shrapnel |first2=Norman |date=10 October 1995 |title=Stumbling into Number 10 |work=The Guardian |page=15}}</ref>}} Having been made a [[Knight of the Order of the Thistle]] (KT) in 1962, he was known after stepping down from the Lords as Sir Alec Douglas-Home.<ref name=dnb/> The safe Unionist seat of [[Kinross and West Perthshire]] was vacant, and Douglas-Home was adopted as his party's candidate. Parliament was due to meet on 24 October after the summer recess, but its return was postponed until 12 November pending [[1963 Kinross and Western Perthshire by-election|the by-election]].<ref name="p464">Pike, p. 464</ref> For twenty days Douglas-Home was prime minister while a member of neither house of Parliament, a situation without modern precedent.{{Efn|Technically, no Prime Minister, or any other politician, is a Member of Parliament between the dissolution of one Parliament and the election of another,<ref>[http://www.Parliament.uk/documents/documents/upload/dissolutionarrangements.pdf "Dissolution Arrangements"], House of Commons, February 2010, accessed 14 April 2012</ref> but Douglas-Home was singular in being a member of neither house while a current Parliament was still in being. Although there was no precedent in modern British Parliamentary history, there were analogous cases in at least one other Commonwealth legislature: [[Mackenzie King]] twice remained as Prime Minister of Canada having lost his seat, in 1925 and 1945, returning to the Canadian House of Commons in by-elections.<ref>[http://www.parl.gc.ca/ParlInfo/Compilations/ElectionsAndRidings/TriviaPrimeMinisters.aspx?Language=E#9 "Federal Election Trivia"], Parliament of Canada, accessed 20 April 2012</ref>}} He won the by-election with a majority of 9,328; the Liberal candidate was in second place and Labour in third.<ref>{{Cite news |date=9 November 1963 |title='Tide Turning' with Kinross Win |work=The Times |page=8}}</ref>

The Parliamentary leader of the opposition Labour party, [[Harold Wilson]], attacked the new prime minister as "an elegant anachronism". He asserted that nobody from Douglas-Home's background knew of the problems of ordinary families. In particular, Wilson demanded to know how "a scion of an effete establishment" could lead the technological revolution that Wilson held to be necessary: "This is the counter-revolution&nbsp;... After half a century of democratic advance, of social revolution, the whole process has ground to a halt with a fourteenth earl!"{{Sfnp|ps=none|Pike|1968|p=463}} Douglas-Home dismissed this as [[populist]] anti-[[elitism]], and observed, "I suppose Mr Wilson, when you come to think of it, is the fourteenth Mr Wilson."<ref name=dnb/>{{Sfnp|ps=none|Pimlott|1992|p=3}} He called Wilson "this slick salesman of synthetic science" and the Labour party "the only relic of class consciousness in the country".<ref>{{Cite news |date=21 January 1964 |title=Fighting Reply from Prime Minister |work=The Times |page=10}}</ref> The opposition retreated, with a statement in the press that "The Labour Party is not interested in the fact that the new Prime Minister inherited a fourteenth Earldom&nbsp;– he cannot help his antecedents any more than the rest of us."<ref>{{Cite news |date=23 October 1963 |title=The New Prime Minister |work=The Times |page=11}}</ref>

Douglas-Home inherited from Macmillan a government widely perceived as in decline; Hurd wrote that it was "becalmed in a sea of satire and scandal."<ref name=dnb/> Douglas-Home was the target of satirists on [[BBC television]] and in ''[[Private Eye]]'' magazine. ''Private Eye'' persistently referred to him as "Baillie Vass", in allusion to a Scottish [[bailie]].{{Efn|This running joke began in 1964 when a provincial newspaper, the ''[[Aberdeen Evening Express]]'' accidentally used a picture of Douglas-Home over a caption referring to a baillie called Vass.{{Sfnp|ps=none|Ingrams|1971|p=104}} ''Private Eye'' then affected to believe that Douglas-Home was an impostor whom the newspaper had unmasked; the magazine maintained this fiction throughout the rest of Douglas-Home's premiership and thereafter.{{Sfnp|ps=none|Thorpe|1997|p=262}} ''Private Eye'' extended the notion to include Douglas-Home's nephew, the journalist [[Charles Douglas-Home (journalist)|Charles Douglas-Home]], whom it dubbed "Charles Vass".<ref>{{Cite news |date=18 January 2001 |title=Auberon Waugh |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1318325/Auberon-Waugh.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171225221811/http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1318325/Auberon-Waugh.html |archive-date=25 December 2017 |access-date=2 April 2018 |work=The Daily Telegraph}}</ref>}} Unlike Wilson, Douglas-Home was not at ease on television, and came across as less spontaneous than his opponent.<ref name=timesobit/>

[[File:JFKWHP-KN-C30678 (cropped).jpg|thumb|left|alt=Three figures standing and conversing. Jacqueline Kennedy wears a navy dress and has her back to the camera; she is flanked by Douglas-Home (left) and Edward Kennedy (right), both in morning dress.|Douglas-Home with [[Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis|Jackie]] (centre, back to camera) and [[Ted Kennedy]] (right) at the [[State funeral of John F. Kennedy|post funeral reception]] for John F. Kennedy, 25 November 1963]]
In international affairs, the most dramatic event during Douglas-Home's premiership was the [[assassination of John F. Kennedy]], which happened about a month after the start of his tenure. Douglas-Home broadcast a tribute on television.<ref>{{Cite news |date=23 November 1963 |title=Carried the hopes of the world |work=The Guardian |page=3}}</ref> He had liked and worked well with Kennedy, and did not develop such a satisfactory relationship with [[Lyndon Johnson]]. Their governments had a serious disagreement on the question of British trade with Cuba.<ref name=dnb/> Under Douglas-Home the colonies of [[Northern Rhodesia]] and Nyasaland gained independence, though this was as a result of negotiations led by Macleod under the Macmillan government.{{Sfnp|ps=none|Newsom|2001|p=114}}

In Britain there was economic prosperity; exports "zoomed", according to ''The Times'', and the economy was growing at an annual rate of four per cent.<ref>{{Cite news |date=31 December 1963 |title=Year of Disillusion and Change |work=The Times |page=13}}</ref> Douglas-Home made no pretence to economic expertise; he commented that his problems were of two sorts: "The political ones are insoluble and the economic ones are incomprehensible."<ref>{{Cite web |title=Sir Alec Douglas-Home |url=http://www.number10.gov.uk/past-prime-ministers/sir-alec-douglas-home-2/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120502130009/http://www.number10.gov.uk/past-prime-ministers/sir-alec-douglas-home-2/ |archive-date=2 May 2012 |access-date=30 April 2012 |website=Past Prime Ministers |publisher=British Prime Minister's Office}}</ref> On another occasion he said, "When I have to read economic documents I have to have a box of matches and start moving them into position to simplify and illustrate the points to myself."<ref>{{Citation |title=Home, Alec Douglas-Home, Lord |date=2008 |editor-last=Knowles |editor-first=Elizabeth |url=http://www.oxfordreference.com/views/ENTRY.html?subview=Main&entry=t93.e863 |access-date=30 April 2012 |chapter=Oxford Dictionary of Modern Quotations |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-1992-0895-1 |url-access=subscription |via=Oxford Reference Online}}</ref>  He left Maudling in charge at the Treasury, and promoted Heath to a new business and economic portfolio. The latter took the lead in the one substantial piece of domestic legislation of Douglas-Home's premiership, the abolition of [[resale price maintenance]].<ref name=dnb/>

The [[Resale Prices Act 1964|Resale Prices Bill]] was introduced to deny manufacturers and suppliers the power to stipulate the prices at which their goods must be sold by the retailer. At the time, up to forty per cent of goods sold in Britain were subject to such price fixing, to the detriment of competition and to the disadvantage of the consumer.<ref name=rpm/> Douglas-Home, less instinctively liberal on economic matters than Heath, would probably not have sponsored such a proposal unprompted,<ref name=dnb/> but he gave Heath his backing, in the face of opposition from some cabinet colleagues, including Butler, Hailsham and Lloyd,{{Sfnp|ps=none|Roth|1972|p=176}} and a substantial number of Conservative backbenchers. They believed the change would benefit supermarkets and other large retailers at the expense of proprietors of small shops.<ref name="rpm">{{Cite news |date=11 March 1964 |title=Resale Prices Bill as one move to sharpen competition |work=The Times |page=16}}</ref> The government was forced to make concessions to avoid defeat. Retail price maintenance would continue to be legal for some goods; these included books, on which it remained in force until market forces led to its abandonment in 1995.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Wheatcroft |first=Geoffrey |author-link=Geoffrey Wheatcroft |date=27 September 1995 |title=A cosy book cartel is remaindered |work=The Times |page=16}}</ref> Manufacturers and suppliers would also be permitted to refuse to supply any retailer who sold their goods at less than cost price, as a [[loss leader]].<ref name=rpm/> The bill had a difficult Parliamentary passage during which the Labour party generally abstained, leaving the Conservatives to vote for or against their own government. The bill received the [[royal assent]] in July 1964, but did not become operative until 1965, by which time Douglas-Home, Heath and their colleagues were out of office.<ref>{{Cite news |date=16 January 1965 |title=Resale Act Soon Operative |work=The Times |page=6}}</ref>

A plot to kidnap Douglas-Home in April 1964 was foiled by the Prime Minister himself. Two left-wing students from the [[University of Aberdeen]] followed him to the house of [[John Buchan, 2nd Baron Tweedsmuir|John]] and [[Priscilla Buchan]], where he was staying. He was alone at the time and answered the door, where the students told him that they planned to kidnap him. He responded, "I suppose you realise if you do, the Conservatives will win the election by 200 or 300." He gave his intending abductors some beer, and they abandoned their plot.{{Efn|Douglas-Home never publicly spoke of the kidnapping because he did not want to ruin the career of his bodyguard but told the story in 1977 to Hailsham, who recorded it in his diaries.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Pierce |first=Andrew |date=14 April 2008 |title=How Alec Douglas-Home foiled student kidnappers with beer |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1585069/How-Alec-Douglas-Home-foiled-student-kidnappers-with-beer.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180924121223/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1585069/How-Alec-Douglas-Home-foiled-student-kidnappers-with-beer.html |archive-date=24 September 2018 |access-date=2 April 2018 |work=The Daily Telegraph}}</ref> In July 2009 [[BBC Radio 4]] broadcast a dramatisation of the event entitled ''The Night They Tried to Kidnap the Prime Minister'', written by Martin Jameson and starring [[Tim McInnerny]] as Douglas-Home.<ref>{{Cite news |date=11 July 2009 |title=Afternoon Play |url=http://docs.newsbank.com/openurl?ctx_ver=z39.88-2004&rft_id=info:sid/iw.newsbank.com:UKNB:LTIB&rft_val_format=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:ctx&rft_dat=12962AD6A036DB50&svc_dat=InfoWeb:aggregated5&req_dat=102CDD40F14C6BDA |url-access=registration |work=The Times |via=newsbanks.com}}</ref>}}

[[File:Harold Wilson (1967).jpg|thumb|upright|alt=Middle-aged man, clean shaven, full head of greying hair|[[Harold Wilson]], Leader of the Opposition and Douglas-Home's successor]]
The term of the Parliament elected in 1959 was due to expire in October 1964. Parliament was dissolved on 25 September and following three weeks of campaigning the [[1964 United Kingdom general election|1964 general election]] took place on 15 October. Douglas-Home's speeches dealt with the future of the nuclear deterrent, while fears of Britain's relative decline in the world, reflected in chronic balance of payment problems, helped the Labour Party's case.{{Sfnp|ps=none|Young|2007}} The Conservatives under Douglas-Home did much better than widely predicted, but Labour under Wilson won with a narrow majority. Labour won 317 seats, the Conservatives 304 and the Liberals 9.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Rose |first=Richard |date=17 October 1964 |title=Percentage drop in the Conservative poll was biggest for any party since 1945 |work=The Times |page=6}}</ref>