Editing Michael Heseltine (section)

===Secretary of State for the Environment 1979–83===

====Appointment and political stance====
Thatcher was impressed by Heseltine's campaigning and love of headlines during the [[1979 United Kingdom general election|May 1979 election]], in contrast to most of the Shadow Cabinet. After the Conservatives had won, and mindful of her earlier promise that he need not take on the Environment job in government, she offered him the Energy Department (an important job following the [[1979 energy crisis]] caused by the [[Iranian Revolution]]). He preferred to be Secretary of State for the Environment after all, entering the Cabinet for the first time.<ref>Crick 1997, p. 198.</ref>

During the macroeconomic disputes of the early 1980s, Heseltine was sometimes associated with the Cabinet "wets" ([[Peter Walker, Baron Walker of Worcester|Peter Walker]], [[Jim Prior]], [[Ian Gilmour]], [[Lord Carrington]] and [[Norman St John Stevas]]) but was not seen as one of them, nor was he invited to their private meetings. Both [[Nigel Lawson]] and [[Cecil Parkinson]] agreed in their memoirs (1992) that he accepted in principle the need to control public expenditure. He opposed the abolition of exchange controls in 1979 and opposed [[Geoffrey Howe]]'s tight budget in 1981, suggesting a public sector pay freeze instead.<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 218–20.</ref>

Heseltine favoured privatisation of state owned industries, a novel idea in 1979 as the Conservatives were initially only proposing to denationalise the industries nationalised by Labour in the 1970s.<ref name=crick198-200>Crick 1997, pp. 198–200.</ref>

Despite his initial reluctance to take on the job, Heseltine later described it as "four of the happiest years of my life". He passed the [[Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981]], a conservation measure. He also vetoed the "Green Giant", a skyscraper on the [[South Bank]], initiated plans for the [[National Gallery]] extension (the winning entry was famously described by [[Prince Charles]] as "a monstrous carbuncle" and was never built) and signed off on the building of the [[Queen Elizabeth II Centre]] on a bomb site near Westminster; when he was unable to secure private funding as planned the Treasury were forced to pay for the building. Some of the DoE's responsibilities were hived off into [[English Heritage]], a new body.<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 240–1.</ref>

====Administering the department====
The Permanent Under-Secretary at the Environment Department, Sir John Garlick, described Heseltine's arrival as a change from "a very conservative Labour Secretary of State, [[Peter Shore]], to a very radical Conservative Secretary of State". On his first day Heseltine took him out to lunch at the Connaught and drew up a list of what he wanted to accomplish in office (the list appears in Heseltine's book ''Where There's A Will'', and was returned to him at the end of his time at the Environment). Only a quarter of Heseltine's agenda consisted of manifesto commitments and other political goals; the rest of it consisted of administrative and organisational changes. [[Peter Hennessy]] observed that Heseltine was more interested in the nuts and bolts of Whitehall reform than any minister since [[David Lloyd George]]. Heseltine was quite ruthless about moving civil servants with whom he was dissatisfied, but nonetheless staff thought he had mellowed somewhat since the early 1970s, and was more relaxed and fun to work with. His permanent secretaries Sir John Garlick and Sir George Moseley thought highly of him. He preferred to reach decisions through informal discussion rather than wading through paperwork. He instituted [[Peter Walker, Baron Walker of Worcester|Peter Walker]]'s custom of morning "prayer" meetings (ministers and PPSs with no civil servants present), now common in Whitehall but an innovation at the time.<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 201–4.</ref>

The department had a budget of £14 billion a year and employed 52,000 people. The Conservatives were pledged to cut 100,000 off the 730,000 strong civil service. On the advice of his junior minister [[Irwin Bellow, Baron Bellwin|Lord Bellwin]], a former leader of Leeds City Council, Heseltine ordered that nobody was to be hired without his personal approval.<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 204–5.</ref>

Heseltine instituted an internal audit system called "MINIS" ("management information system for ministers"), ironically, in Crick's view, as Heseltine's own company Haymarket had often been chaotically organised. Peter Hennessy likened it to "a [[Domesday Book]]". Heseltine personally interrogated the heads of department (many of whom felt he was interfering in internal civil service matters). The lengthy reports, showing organisation charts of each of the 66 directorates, expenditure, staff costs and forward plans, were made publicly available. Staff numbers were cut more deeply than in any other Whitehall department; one in twelve had gone within a year and nearly 30%, 15,000, by 1983; local government finance, under Terry Heiser, was the only department to receive extra resources. Thatcher was impressed by MINIS, and in February 1983 Heseltine was invited to give a presentation about them to other senior ministers and civil servants, in the hope that they might be adopted by other departments. There was little interest, but similar concepts were later adopted by [[Derek Rayner]]'s Financial Management Initiative across Whitehall.<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 205–9.</ref>

====Council house sales====
Heseltine was a convert to the sale of [[council house]]s, a policy pioneered by some Conservative local authorities, e.g. Birmingham. He also favoured the policy of giving away houses, a policy first mooted from the backbenches by Peter Walker in the mid-1970s, not least as some local authorities were spending more on maintenance than they were recouping in rents. Thatcher, who was concerned at the reaction from those who had made financial sacrifices to buy their homes, was initially sceptical. After taking office Heseltine issued a circular enabling councils, if they chose, to sell houses at 30% discount and to offer 100% mortgages. The [[Housing Act 1980]] enacting Right to Buy was delayed by a Lords amendment and did not reach the statute book until the end of 1980. Some councils were slow in processing applications (one even threatened to house "problem" families next door to those who bought) and Heseltine made an example of Norwich by setting up a DOE sales office there; Norwich council took him to court and lost. At the time Heseltine permitted councils to use up to 75% of sales receipts for renovating the housing stock, and was angry in later years when this was cut back by the Treasury. Heseltine also insisted on the doubling of rents to encourage buying.<ref name=crick198-200/>

During the 1980s over a million council houses, around 20% of the stock, were sold, and by 1987 Labour had dropped their opposition to the [[Right to Buy]]. This was an enormous social change, doing much to increase Conservative support amongst new homeowners and which Heseltine often cites as one of his major achievements.<ref name=crick200-201>Crick 1997, pp. 200–1.</ref> Heseltine noted that, "no single piece of legislation has enabled the transfer of so much capital wealth from the state to the people." He said that the 'right to buy' policy had two main objectives: to give people what they had wanted, and to reverse the trend of ever-increasing dominance of the State over the life of the individual. He said: "There is in this country a deeply ingrained desire for home ownership. The Government believe that this spirit should be fostered. It reflects the wishes of the people, ensures the wide spread of wealth through society, encourages a personal desire to improve and modernize one's own home, enables parents to accrue wealth for their children and stimulates the attitudes of independence and self-reliance that are the bedrock of a free society."<ref>"Housing Bill – Provisions and Enactment" in ''Keesing's Contemporary Archives'' v. 27, January 1981 p. 30644.</ref> Many of the homes sold were "street properties" rather than flats, which arguably helped to ghettoise the remaining council tenants on run-down inner city estates. In fact, in Crick's view, he deserves only limited credit; it had been a Conservative commitment since 1974, and much of the detailed work was done by his juniors [[Hugh Rossi]] (in opposition) and [[John Stanley (Tonbridge and Malling MP)|John Stanley]] (in government).<ref name=crick200-201/>

====Local government finance====
In 1979 the Conservatives were strongly represented in local government, as a result of the unpopularity of the outgoing Labour government. Four of the five council associations were Conservative-controlled. Heseltine was able to persuade them to rein in their spending by 1% each year. Whereas previously overspending councils had received extra rate support grants from Whitehall, after six months Heseltine announced a list of fourteen overspending councils who were to have their grant ''cut'', most of them inner London councils and only one of them, Hammersmith & Fulham, Conservative controlled. The move appeared blatantly political as many of the other 114 overspenders were Conservative councils. Council leaders who came to appeal to Heseltine were often humiliated by being interrogated about their budget, to demonstrate their lack of detailed knowledge, before the council treasurer was allowed to speak.<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 210–1.</ref>

From 1980 to 1981 relations with local government became increasingly confrontational, as Labour made large gains in local elections, with a new generation of council leaders such as [[Ken Livingstone]] in [[Greater London Council|London]] and [[David Blunkett]] in Sheffield seeking to generate employment through their councils. Council spending now began to rise again, largely as a result of increases by the GLC, Merseyside and West Midlands councils; whereas Labour votes tended to be poorer and eligible for rate rebates, the burden of higher spending tended to fall on businesses and middle class homeowners. Although councils had already suffered deep cuts under Labour in the 1970s, Heseltine was under pressure from Thatcher and from Conservative MPs and newspapers to cut more. Heseltine's initial suggestion, that councils who wanted to increase the rates be forced to submit to re-election, was rejected by the Cabinet, in favour of a proposal that such increases be put to referendum (in Coventry, voters had recently voted by over 7:1 for spending cuts rather than a supplementary rate increase). This proposal in turn was attacked by Conservative backbenchers, both as an infringement of council freedom and a risky precedent for national taxation, both in the Environment Committee and in the debate on a bill which Heseltine introduced and had to withdraw. Heseltine then banned supplementary rates and imposed stiffer sanctions on overspending councils.<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 211–3.</ref>

Thatcher's 1974 pledge to abolish the rates and replace them with a new form of local government funding was still in force. However, the 1979 manifesto made clear that income tax cuts took priority over rates reform. Thatcher also blocked the upward revaluation of property rating values in 1982. A review of rates reform was begun in 1981, in which his junior minister [[Tom King, Baron King of Bridgwater|Tom King]] personally spoke to every single backbench Conservative MP to canvass opinion about the various options. A Green Paper was produced in December 1981, recommending that no single alternative to the rates suggested itself. Thatcher wrote "I will not tolerate failure in this area" in the margin of the report and in the summer of 1982 a new committee was set up under Willie Whitelaw, only to come to much the same conclusion (The eventual solution, a "poll tax", was rejected both by the Green Paper and by Whitelaw's committee).<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 214–5.</ref>

Heseltine resisted demands by [[Leon Brittan]], the [[Chief Secretary to the Treasury]] with whom he already enjoyed a somewhat antagonistic relationship, that central government have power to cap the spending of local authorities. He argued that the worst offenders were the large metropolitan counties (which, ironically, he had helped to create a decade earlier) and that the simplest solution was simply to abolish them. In the event, the 1983 manifesto, after Heseltine had moved to his next job, committed the Conservatives both to abolition of the metropolitan boroughs and to rate capping. When Heseltine objected after the election, Thatcher gave him "one of the most violent rebukes I have ever witnessed in Cabinet" according to [[Jim Prior]], who believed that the issue helped fuel the hostility between Heseltine and Thatcher and Brittan, which would later exhibit itself as the Westland Affair.<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 215–6.</ref>

In opposition, in the late 1970s, Heseltine had been committed to reducing central government control over local government. In the 1980s, the opposite happened, with no less than 50 Acts of Parliament reducing the powers of local government. In Crick's view, although he opposed both rate capping and the poll tax, the overall trend towards centralisation was too strong for him to resist. During his time at Environment Heseltine also brought in compulsory competitive tendering for council services, and helped set up the [[Audit Commission (United Kingdom)|Audit Commission]], whose initial role was to act as an independent supervisor of district auditors of council activities.<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 216–8.</ref>

====Riots====
Heseltine became the troubleshooter to deal with the explosion of violence in Britain's [[inner cities]] in the aftermath of the [[1981 Brixton riot|Brixton]] and [[Toxteth riots]] of 1981. Unemployment had reached 20% in Liverpool as a whole, but 60% among young black residents in Toxteth. [[Tear gas]] had had to be used, and the Cabinet contemplated deploying the Army. A few weeks before the riots, a Cabinet thinktank had proposed that the area be left to go into "managed decline". Thatcher visited Merseyside and it was decided that a minister should go for a longer visit. Heseltine was already chairman of the Merseyside Partnership, set up by his predecessor Peter Shore, to channel government money into Liverpool (six other partnerships existed).<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 221–2.</ref>

Heseltine visited Liverpool accompanied by a dozen or so officials from different ministries. [[Timothy Raison]], a junior Home Office minister, went ostensibly to check on race matters but actually to ensure that Heseltine did not interfere in police matters. Heseltine visited council estates, often accompanied by gangs of grinning children trying to be noticed on television, and his flamboyance as a [[self-made man]] went down surprisingly well in a City famous for turning out flamboyant figures in the entertainment industry. He talked to black community leaders, who complained about [[Merseyside Police|police]] bias and brutality, and he later had an awkward private meeting with the [[Chief constable]] [[Kenneth Oxford]] about the matter. He arranged for the bosses of the leading banks and building societies to tour the area in a coach (they were reluctant until Heseltine's PPS [[Tim Sainsbury]] persuaded [[Robin Leigh-Pemberton]] of NatWest to come), and asked them to each second a bright young manager to the DOE for a year.<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 222–6.</ref>

Heseltine circulated a 21-page minute to Cabinet on his return, entitled ''It Took a Riot''. He proposed a regional office and a review of the status of the Metropolitan Counties, as well as greater government emphasis on Merseyside in future. He had prepared the ground with a small dinner for Whitehall mandarins including [[Robert Armstrong, Baron Armstrong of Ilminster|Robert Armstrong]] ([[Cabinet Secretary (United Kingdom)|Cabinet Secretary]]) and [[Ian Bancroft]] (Head of the Civil Service). However, Thatcher was not impressed, although she agreed to his appointment as Minister for Merseyside for twelve months. Neither was Keith Joseph (Secretary of State for Industry) nor Howe (Chancellor of the Exchequer), who favoured enterprise zones where businesses would be given favourable tax treatment.<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 226–8.</ref>

Shortly after his appointment as Minister for Merseyside, Heseltine gave his annual party conference speech, in which he condemned talk of repatriation and called for more public spending on inner cities. Although he felt he had taken a risk – the speech was in marked contrast to [[Norman Tebbit]]'s "On Your Bike" speech a few hours later – he received his usual standing ovation and later recorded that it was the one of his speeches of which he was most proud.<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 228–9.</ref>

In autumn 1981 he visited Liverpool again, this time with a thirty-strong task force of representatives of local employers and civil servants (unusually for the time, drawn from different departments – DOE, DTI and Employment, but not the Home Office this time – Heseltine had been pushing for greater cooperation between departments since the setting up of the European Space Agency in 1973). For the next fifteen months he visited Liverpool for a day almost every week, refusing police protection and often driving himself, persuading business and local government to work together. [[Colette Bowe]], a DTI official who was deputy director of the task force, recorded that Heseltine was the most effective minister she had ever seen at getting the official machine to do his bidding through a mixture of charm and tough questions.<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 230–1.</ref>

====Inner city development====
Heseltine faced initial suspicion from Labour-led Merseyside Council, but got on well with [[Trevor Jones (British politician)|Sir Trevor Jones]], Liberal leader of [[Liverpool City Council]]. Jones, also a self-made businessman, got on well with Heseltine, and Jones claimed that Heseltine admitted to him late one night that he was a Liberal at heart, but could not bear the thought of having no realistic chance to win power.<ref name=crick231-233>Crick 1997, pp. 231–3.</ref>

Inspired by the [[Bundesgartenschau]]en which had helped to regenerate German cities after the war, Heseltine arranged for the first of five biennial [[National garden festival]]s to be held in Liverpool in 1984 (Jones arranged for the council to delegate the bid to the [[Merseyside Development Corporation]], of which he was a director). More than 3 million people eventually attended.<ref name=crick231-233/><ref name=duffy76-96>Michael Parkinson and James Duffy, "Government's Response to Inner-City Riots: The Minister for Merseyside and the Task Force," ''Parliamentary Affairs'' (1984) 37#1, pp. 76–96.</ref>

Heseltine arranged for Liverpool to receive unused government grants for other cities (from the Urban Programme), although the money was less than had been clawed back from Liverpool through council spending cuts. He also played an important role in the redevelopment of [[Royal Albert Dock, Liverpool|Albert Dock]], the development of Wavertree Technology Park (the land purchased by £10 million of public money) and the development of Cantril Farm estate into Stockbridge Village, arranging for [[Barratt Developments]] to build many new houses for owner occupiers.<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 233–5.</ref>

Heseltine also played an important role in the development of [[Development Corporation|Urban Development Corporations]], directly appointed by the minister and overriding local authority planning controls to spend government money on infrastructure. This was a controversial measure in Labour strongholds such as East London, Merseyside and North East England.<ref name=duffy76-96/><ref name=crick238>Crick 1997, p. 238.</ref> He obtained a Treasury grant of £77 million to build the [[Docklands Light Railway]], although transport links to Docklands remained inadequate.<ref name=crick238/> He opened Britain's first [[Enterprise Zone]] at [[Corby]] in Northamptonshire.<ref name=duffy76-96/>

Some criticism was made of his time in Liverpool that he spent a lot of money but generated little in the way of new employment ("I would not blame him for that: Liverpool had defeated better men than Michael Heseltine" commented Lady Thatcher acidly in her memoirs in 1993). Local Labour politicians tended to feel that he had accomplished little, although they acknowledged his good intentions. However a more positive assessment was offered by Michael Parkinson, Professor of Urban Affairs at [[John Moores University]]: although he had been sceptical in the 1980s, by 1997 he had come to favour the policies championed by Heseltine: assignment of ministers to regions, development of housing associations and cooperatives, and the channelling of government money through business-led agencies rather than through local government.<ref>Crick 1997, pp. 241–2.</ref>