:00:22. > :00:24.The Conservative Party's historian, Lord Lexden, delivered a lecture
:00:25. > :00:28.at the Carlton Club to mark the 150th anniversary of the three
:00:29. > :00:36.times Conservative Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin.
:00:37. > :00:39.Ladies and gentlemen, one of these days, I'm going to give a lecture
:00:40. > :00:46.Which will enable me to be suitably irreverent.
:00:47. > :00:51.This evening, in this lecture, I will attempt to discuss
:00:52. > :00:57.four aspects of Baldwin's life - his impact on the politics of his time,
:00:58. > :01:01.the nature of the conservatism he espoused, the destruction
:01:02. > :01:05.and subsequent recovery of his reputation and the effect
:01:06. > :01:08.that his family background and career as an industrialist
:01:09. > :01:16.The title of the lecture, as Lord Strathclyde mentioned,
:01:17. > :01:20.Stanley Baldwin In A Year Of Anniversaries.
:01:21. > :01:25.Stanley Baldwin, Tory leader from 1923 to 1937,
:01:26. > :01:28.dominated British politics in the interwar era.
:01:29. > :01:32.He achieved that domination by altering its direction.
:01:33. > :01:36.He removed Lloyd George, the architect of victory
:01:37. > :01:40.over the Kaiser, from the helm of national affairs with a short
:01:41. > :01:43.speech, lethal in its political effect at a famous meeting
:01:44. > :01:45.which took place on the 19th of October 1922
:01:46. > :01:53.at this club, then housed in palatial premises in Pall Mall
:01:54. > :01:57.that were to be destroyed 18 years later
:01:58. > :02:02.by a Nazi bomb, necessitating the club's move to the fine house
:02:03. > :02:05.in St James' Street where I am speaking.
:02:06. > :02:09.The Carlton Club meeting, attended by most Tory MPs,
:02:10. > :02:13.was the pivotal moment in the career of Stanley Baldwin,
:02:14. > :02:17.then a little-known politician with brief Cabinet experience.
:02:18. > :02:21.It was also a turning point in British political history.
:02:22. > :02:24.Lloyd George and the section of the Liberal party which included
:02:25. > :02:28.Winston Churchill that supported him had decreed plans with the then
:02:29. > :02:33.Conservative leader Austen Chamberlain, son of a famous father,
:02:34. > :02:35.to perpetuate the coilition government that had
:02:36. > :02:41.They had it in mind to create a new centre party into which
:02:42. > :02:48.His speech at the Carlton Club led his fellow MPs
:02:49. > :02:55."I preserved the Tory party," Baldwin said.
:02:56. > :03:00.One of his colleagues, Lord Swinton, wrote later
:03:01. > :03:03.that "By his speech at the Carlton Club,
:03:04. > :03:06.SB stood out as the man of the future."
:03:07. > :03:09.We all recognise that this was a new force released
:03:10. > :03:13.Someone with a new style of eloquence, more effective
:03:14. > :03:17.because of its simplicity and control.
:03:18. > :03:21.Just seven months later, Baldwin moved into number ten.
:03:22. > :03:24.He was to serve three terms as Prime Minister,
:03:25. > :03:27.the last two being separated by a term as
:03:28. > :03:31.Deputy Prime Minister in the early 1930s in coalition
:03:32. > :03:37.with Ramsay MacDonald and small groups of Labour and Liberal MPs.
:03:38. > :03:42.Baldwin, the almost unknown Carlton Club rebel of 1922,
:03:43. > :03:46.swiftly established himself as a statesman of first rank,
:03:47. > :03:49.even in the eyes of members of the Labour Party.
:03:50. > :03:52.They had a high regard for him, not least because
:03:53. > :03:55.of the goodwill he showed them as they settled
:03:56. > :03:58.into their new role as the second party in the state
:03:59. > :04:00.following the decline of the Liberals,
:04:01. > :04:06.Many Liberal voters became Tory supporters, attracted by
:04:07. > :04:10.Baldwin's emollient style and policies.
:04:11. > :04:14.It is impossible to imagine him shouting raucously
:04:15. > :04:17.across the House with baying Tory hounds behind him
:04:18. > :04:26.Consensus was the hallmark of his politics.
:04:27. > :04:29.Social reform, the principal practical ingredient
:04:30. > :04:32.of the conservatism with which he won the three largest
:04:33. > :04:36.election victories in the party's history.
:04:37. > :04:41."Toryism expounded by him lost many of its repellent features,"
:04:42. > :04:45.one leading journalist said in explaining his wide appeal
:04:46. > :04:50.Even in the two elections which Baldwin lost,
:04:51. > :04:55.those of 1923 and 1929, the Tory party had the largest share
:04:56. > :05:02.Under Baldwin, Britain finally became a fully democratic state.
:05:03. > :05:07.He gave women the vote on the same terms as men in 1928.
:05:08. > :05:11.The Baldwin years saw major advances in housing, education,
:05:12. > :05:15.public health, insurance and pensions, foreshadowing a
:05:16. > :05:19.distinctive Tory welfare state whose life was cut short when Churchill
:05:20. > :05:23.placed responsibility for most of these areas of policy
:05:24. > :05:29.in the hands of Labour ministers in his wartime coalition after 1940.
:05:30. > :05:34.Atlee completed after 1945 what Churchill allowed
:05:35. > :05:37.his party to start as wartime partners.
:05:38. > :05:42.All that had happened before the war was lost to memory.
:05:43. > :05:46.Who now recalls that with Baldwin in power, new houses were built
:05:47. > :05:49.at the rate of 1000 a day, a million in all,
:05:50. > :05:53.in just four years in the early 1930s?
:05:54. > :05:55.Who now remembers the creation of the first
:05:56. > :06:02.Under Stanley Baldwin, the social services budget became the largest
:06:03. > :06:08.item in public spending for the first time.
:06:09. > :06:12.Britain's welfare provision became the most advanced in the world.
:06:13. > :06:18.Baldwin's Britain was disfigured by much grinding poverty.
:06:19. > :06:24.In 1925, he visited the Glasgow slums, describing them as terrible,
:06:25. > :06:29.though to his surprise, he had an amazing popular welcome with
:06:30. > :06:36.Such conditions were not transformed in Baldwin's time, but they were
:06:37. > :06:40.tackled with greater vigour than is often realised.
:06:41. > :06:43.Baldwin's conservatism was progressive in character
:06:44. > :06:48.and national in tone, as befitting a man who loved Scotland,
:06:49. > :06:52.the home of his maternal MacDonald forbears,
:06:53. > :06:56.and who devoted much time in the 1920s to Ulster's affairs,
:06:57. > :06:59.with which he also had distant family connections,
:07:00. > :07:02.while showing tact and skill in dealing with the leaders
:07:03. > :07:06.of the newly created Irish Free State.
:07:07. > :07:10.Thanks to him, goodwill was created between the leaders
:07:11. > :07:13.of the two parts of Ireland in the 1920s.
:07:14. > :07:16.Sadly, it was destroyed by De Valera's confrontational
:07:17. > :07:23.It was Baldwin, not Disraeli, who first spoke of the need
:07:24. > :07:28.to unite rich and poor in one nation.
:07:29. > :07:32.The famous Tory phrase was to echo down the years.
:07:33. > :07:37.Disraeli wrote movingly in the 1840s about Britain's deep social divide,
:07:38. > :07:44.Baldwin worked hard to try and heal it.
:07:45. > :07:48.Addressing his party, on the 4th of December 1924,
:07:49. > :07:53.in the aftermath of its biggest election victory ever, he said,
:07:54. > :07:57."We stand for the union of those two nations of which
:07:58. > :08:00.Disraeli spoke two generations ago.
:08:01. > :08:05.Union among our own people to make one nation of our own people,
:08:06. > :08:09.which if secured, nothing else matters in the world."
:08:10. > :08:14.After his death in 1881, the Tories put Disraeli
:08:15. > :08:17.on a pedestal above their other leaders.
:08:18. > :08:21.By the end of his career, Baldwin had been placed beside him.
:08:22. > :08:25.Lord Crawford, a former Cabinet minister and Chief Whip,
:08:26. > :08:31.wrote in his diary on the 5th of May 1937, that Baldwin "has established
:08:32. > :08:37.comparable only to that felt for Disraeli."
:08:38. > :08:40.He was an idealist who told his party what it ought to do
:08:41. > :08:47.He insisted in the 1930s that India must have
:08:48. > :08:52.full internal self-government, facing down strong opposition
:08:53. > :08:58.A rift appeared between the two colleagues who had worked together
:08:59. > :09:03.in Government after Churchill's return to the Tory fold in 1924
:09:04. > :09:12.After 1930, Churchill adopted the role of die-hard imperialist
:09:13. > :09:15.while Baldwin adhere to the liberal views which
:09:16. > :09:18.both of them had previously espoused.
:09:19. > :09:22.The rift deepened with the years and ended in bitterness
:09:23. > :09:27.Baldwin, for his part, never spoke harshly of the man
:09:28. > :09:31.whose political career he had rescued.
:09:32. > :09:35.They disagreed too on the most important change in economic
:09:36. > :09:38.policy that occurred during the Baldwin years -
:09:39. > :09:41.the reintroduction of tariffs on imported goods to try and
:09:42. > :09:47.protect the country's prosperity at a time of world depression.
:09:48. > :09:52.Wrangling on this issue within the Tory party went on for years.
:09:53. > :09:57.It nearly brought Baldwin down in 1930-31 as Churchill and others
:09:58. > :10:02.colluded with press barons who wanted Baldwin's scalp and formed
:10:03. > :10:05.their own political party to try and destroy him.
:10:06. > :10:09.He turned the tables on his unelected persecutors
:10:10. > :10:13.with famous words, accusing them of seeking power without
:10:14. > :10:17.responsibility, the prerogative of a harlot throughout the ages.
:10:18. > :10:19.It became the best known, perhaps, of
:10:20. > :10:23.the many vivid phrases that Baldwin produced.
:10:24. > :10:27.Baldwin's final dispute with Churchill was the most bitter.
:10:28. > :10:33.The issue, of course, Britain's rearmament in the 1930s,
:10:34. > :10:36.which was to have a devastating impact on Baldwin's reputation
:10:37. > :10:42.During his years of power, Baldwin emerged victorious
:10:43. > :10:45.from his many Commons clashes with Churchill.
:10:46. > :10:49.Lord Swinton, who served in Government under both of them,
:10:50. > :10:53.recalls that Baldwin always got the better of Churchill
:10:54. > :10:56.when Churchill was attacking him in the House of Commons.
:10:57. > :10:59.Churchill admitted this to me many years later.
:11:00. > :11:01.I said, "Winston, you fought him for years
:11:02. > :11:06.and years when he was PM and party leader and you never won a round."
:11:07. > :11:10.Winston grunted, but he did not dissent.
:11:11. > :11:13.In the mid-19th century, some Tory candidates described
:11:14. > :11:17.themselves as liberal conservatives in their election literature.
:11:18. > :11:22.The term had died away long before Baldwin's day,
:11:23. > :11:25.but a liberal conservative is what he was,
:11:26. > :11:30.firmly to the left of centre in the party's spectrum.
:11:31. > :11:32.He drew on the liberal tradition in British politics
:11:33. > :11:41.The first Tory in the Baldwin family was his father, Alfred,
:11:42. > :11:44.a Conservative MP in later life but a Liberal activist
:11:45. > :11:50.A cousin of his father's, Enoch Baldwin,
:11:51. > :11:56.He married into a liberal family, the Ridsdales.
:11:57. > :12:00.He had a brother-in-law who was a Liberal MP.
:12:01. > :12:05.His mother's family, the McDonalds, had links with the early socialists.
:12:06. > :12:09.He may not perhaps have been unduly surprised when his eldest son,
:12:10. > :12:13.Oliver, a homosexual who lived openly with a partner
:12:14. > :12:17.during the interwar years, joined the Labour Party.
:12:18. > :12:20.Their relations were sometimes strained.
:12:21. > :12:24.His father never expressed a word of criticism, only affection,
:12:25. > :12:28.even when Oliver joined him in the Commons as Labour MP
:12:29. > :12:33.for Dudley in 1929, a seat he held for two years,
:12:34. > :12:38.losing it at the next election in 1931.
:12:39. > :12:41.Stanley Baldwin is the only party leader to have faced a son
:12:42. > :12:47.Oliver returned to the Commons for another two-year stint
:12:48. > :12:51.after his father's retirement as a Labour MP for Paisley in 1945,
:12:52. > :12:56.before becoming governor of the Leeward Islands,
:12:57. > :12:59.from which he had to be recalled in 1950 when gay scandal threatened.
:13:00. > :13:05.Stanley Baldwin was the first Prime Minister whose voice was heard
:13:06. > :13:13.Most people never knew what his predecessors had sounded like.
:13:14. > :13:18.He followed their example by addressing large public meetings.
:13:19. > :13:22.50,000 came to listen to him at Welbeck in Nottinghamshire
:13:23. > :13:27.Microphones and public address systems meant that his words
:13:28. > :13:33.could be heard by such vast crowds as those of Gladstone
:13:34. > :13:36.and others before him had never been.
:13:37. > :13:40.Through the newly established BBC, he spoke to millions in their homes,
:13:41. > :13:45.talking straightforwardly and avoiding point-scoring.
:13:46. > :13:48.As a broadcaster, he was in a class of his own.
:13:49. > :13:51.No other politician of the time matched his skill.
:13:52. > :13:54."He might have been sitting in the chair beside me"
:13:55. > :13:57.was a typical comment made to one of his ministers.
:13:58. > :14:01.Roosevelt followed were Baldwin had led with his famous fireside chats
:14:02. > :14:08.He was seen as well as heard throughout the land.
:14:09. > :14:11.The Tory party, streets ahead of its opponents
:14:12. > :14:15.in organisational terms, dispatched film vans across
:14:16. > :14:20.the country spreading images of the Prime Minister about his duties.
:14:21. > :14:24.Wherever he went, newsreel cameras and newspaper photographers
:14:25. > :14:33."Bovril does this sort of thing, but ought Baldwin do it?"
:14:34. > :14:37.The answer was emphatically in the affirmative.
:14:38. > :14:41.This year provides us with a golden opportunity to reflect on this
:14:42. > :14:45.unusual, much loved man of deep humanity and understanding who
:14:46. > :14:50.became one of our most successful peace time Prime Ministers.
:14:51. > :14:54.2017 is replete with Baldwinian anniversaries.
:14:55. > :14:59.He was born 150 years ago in 1867 as Disraeli prepared to double
:15:00. > :15:02.the electorate to 2 million through the enfranchisement of
:15:03. > :15:12.He first held Government office 100 years ago in 1917,
:15:13. > :15:17.when he was nearing the age of 50, a notably late start for a minister.
:15:18. > :15:20.He retired from political life as Earl Baldwin
:15:21. > :15:24.of Bewdley KG amidst almost universal praise at a moment
:15:25. > :15:28.of his own choosing, a rare thing in politics,
:15:29. > :15:33.80 years ago in 1937, an event commemorated by the fine
:15:34. > :15:38.portrait painted by Oswald Birley which hangs in this club.
:15:39. > :15:44.He died 70 years ago in 1947 at the age of 80.
:15:45. > :15:48.It is surely fitting that this array of anniversaries should be marked by
:15:49. > :15:52.the erection this year of a statue of him in Bewdley, Worcestershire,
:15:53. > :15:56.his beloved birthplace which gave its name to the constituency
:15:57. > :15:59.which he represented for nearly 30 years
:16:00. > :16:02.and where he is still remembered with affection.
:16:03. > :16:06.Funds to meet the costs of the statue are accumulating
:16:07. > :16:09.following the launch of an appeal in the House of Lords
:16:10. > :16:12.at the end of January and in Worcestershire last month.
:16:13. > :16:16.The halfway mark has been passed with the backing of a long list
:16:17. > :16:21.of patrons drawn from all parties and headed by the Prime Minister.
:16:22. > :16:24.The sculptor is Martin Jennings who possesses a formidable
:16:25. > :16:31.reputation, being best known for his statue of John Betjeman
:16:32. > :16:35.The case for a public memorial to this Tory statesman,
:16:36. > :16:39.who remoulded British politics, today seems overwhelming.
:16:40. > :16:43.But that was not how the matter was seen in 1982
:16:44. > :16:45.when it was proposed that a statue should be placed
:16:46. > :16:48.alongside those of other Prime Ministers
:16:49. > :16:53.Tories were indifferent, the Labour Party, then led by
:16:54. > :16:57.Michael Foot, was hostile and the plan was abandoned.
:16:58. > :17:01.Baldwin, once the recipient of so much praise,
:17:02. > :17:05.It happened swiftly following the outbreak of
:17:06. > :17:11.the Second World War in 1939, two years after his retirement.
:17:12. > :17:18.Relentless, unsparing denigration began.
:17:19. > :17:22.Indeed, few political reputations have soared so high or
:17:23. > :17:30.Bishops of the church of England do not normally sing the praises of
:17:31. > :17:36.Tory politicians, but they bestowed lavish blessings on Baldwin
:17:37. > :17:43."He is really a very great man, a genuine member of
:17:44. > :17:48.the goodly fellowship of the prophets," infused Hensley Henson,
:17:49. > :17:55.At the coronation of George VI, on the 12th of May 1937,
:17:56. > :17:59.Baldwin's carriage was greeted only slightly less enthusiastically
:18:00. > :18:04.then that conveying the new monarch and his consort.
:18:05. > :18:08.Yet, a few years later, after the outbreak of war
:18:09. > :18:11.when the now lame and arthritic former Prime Minister was travelling
:18:12. > :18:15.on a packed train, no one would give up their seat for him.
:18:16. > :18:20.An infamous act of pettiness took place.
:18:21. > :18:24.The iron railings and gates around his country home
:18:25. > :18:27.were removed on the utterly spurious pretext that
:18:28. > :18:32.the war effort would falter without them.
:18:33. > :18:35.He became accustomed to unpopularity.
:18:36. > :18:39.On his last visit to London in 1947, a few bystanders
:18:40. > :18:45."Are they booing me?" he asked a companion.
:18:46. > :18:51.The cause of this sharp reversal of fortune is no mystery.
:18:52. > :18:54.It became lodged more firmly in the public mind
:18:55. > :18:57.than anything else relating to Baldwin.
:18:58. > :19:00.He was charged retrospectively with failing to rearm Britain
:19:01. > :19:05.in the mid-1930s as the fascist dictators in Germany and Italy
:19:06. > :19:09.began to make themselves ready for war in Europe.
:19:10. > :19:13.The case for the prosecution had no stronger advocate
:19:14. > :19:17.than Winston Churchill, the unsuccessful Tory rebel of the
:19:18. > :19:21.1930s, who came to be regarded as infallible as a result
:19:22. > :19:28.Baldwin was too old and infirm to rebut the charge.
:19:29. > :19:32.It stuck, grossly unfair though it was.
:19:33. > :19:36.His second son, Windham, amassed the relevant documents and
:19:37. > :19:41.replied in detail in a persuasive book, My Father: The True Story,
:19:42. > :19:46.Historians have endorsed his conclusions
:19:47. > :19:53.The results can be seen most clearly in the authoritative study
:19:54. > :19:56.by Professor Philip Williamson entitled
:19:57. > :20:00.Stanley Baldwin: Conservative Leadership And National Values
:20:01. > :20:06.In this year of anniversaries, the injustice of the attacks
:20:07. > :20:11.to which Baldwin was subject must be firmly underlined.
:20:12. > :20:14.It was Baldwin who, in the face of a largely hostile public
:20:15. > :20:19.opinion and sustained attacks by Labour in Parliament,
:20:20. > :20:23.began an ambitious rearmament programme to deter the dictators,
:20:24. > :20:35.In 1934, the year after Hitler came to power,
:20:36. > :20:41.he ordered 41 new RAF squadrons and another 39 the following year.
:20:42. > :20:45.At the 1935 election, he sought and won a mandate
:20:46. > :20:51.to remedy the deficiencies which had accrued in our defences.
:20:52. > :20:54.Further steady increases in air strength followed.
:20:55. > :20:57.Rearmament had grown massively by the time of
:20:58. > :21:07.Baldwin's political career then is a story of triumph and tragedy.
:21:08. > :21:11.The triumph deserved, the tragedy unjust.
:21:12. > :21:16.Outside politics, his success was almost unbroken.
:21:17. > :21:21.He loved his native Worcestershire as passionately
:21:22. > :21:24.as that county's other famous contemporary son
:21:25. > :21:29.Edward Elgar, though curiously they had little to do with one another.
:21:30. > :21:32.As a young man, he served the county diligently
:21:33. > :21:38.His parents, Alfred and Louisa Baldwin, were devoted
:21:39. > :21:41.to each other and to him, their only child.
:21:42. > :21:47.His mother was a published author and a member of a remarkable family,
:21:48. > :21:50.the McDonalds, who combined devotion to Methodism
:21:51. > :21:55.with a rich creative talent in painting, prose and poetry.
:21:56. > :21:58.He was Richard Kipling's first cousin and close friend,
:21:59. > :22:03.who flattered him by saying, "Stan is the real writer in the family."
:22:04. > :22:06.Baldwin knew the works of the great British authors -
:22:07. > :22:09.Dickens, Scott and Browning particular favourites - inside out
:22:10. > :22:12.and quoated then repeatedly in the countless speeches
:22:13. > :22:16.he delivered to learned societies, religious gatherings,
:22:17. > :22:20.universities and many other bodies outside politics.
:22:21. > :22:22.Speeches that helped to increase his stature
:22:23. > :22:25.as a national rather than a party figure.
:22:26. > :22:29.No other Prime Minister has addressed so large a range
:22:30. > :22:35.In Downing Street, he was often found dipping into the classics.
:22:36. > :22:38.Perhaps Virgil one day, Cicero the next.
:22:39. > :22:41.He was formidably well read, the equal of Anthony Eden
:22:42. > :22:44.and Harold Macmillan, surpassed only by Churchill
:22:45. > :22:49.in an age when national leaders had well-stocked minds.
:22:50. > :22:55.however, during the years of education.
:22:56. > :22:58.After collecting several prizes at the start of his career
:22:59. > :23:02.at Harrow, his interest in studies slackened.
:23:03. > :23:06.He was caught sending pornography, described as Harrow filth,
:23:07. > :23:09.to a cousin at Eton, for which he was beaten by
:23:10. > :23:14.His parents made light of it and the effects of the disgrace
:23:15. > :23:17.may not have been profound but whatever the cause,
:23:18. > :23:21.his academic promise was not fulfilled.
:23:22. > :23:26.It was no indication of his real talents.
:23:27. > :23:31.Later, the university was proud to have him as its Chancellor
:23:32. > :23:33.and the Carlton Club's portrait of him shows him
:23:34. > :23:42.After Cambridge, he returned home to join his successful father
:23:43. > :23:45.in the family ironworks in Worcestershire.
:23:46. > :23:48.The impression is sometimes given that it was a sleepy,
:23:49. > :23:52.unenterprising little concern, leaving Baldwin with plenty
:23:53. > :23:56.of time for rural diversions like leaning over pigsties,
:23:57. > :23:59.the kind of setting in which he would be depicted as Prime Minister
:24:00. > :24:05.as if country pursuits were his predominant preoccupation.
:24:06. > :24:09.It is true that he loved and idealised rural England and walked
:24:10. > :24:12.through miles and miles of it, though he greatly disliked hunting,
:24:13. > :24:18.But industry was his calling and he excelled at it.
:24:19. > :24:20.Far from standing still, Baldwin's firm
:24:21. > :24:26.was constantly diversifying to keep ahead of changing markets and
:24:27. > :24:30.expanding through the acquisition of other businesses which included
:24:31. > :24:34.steelworks in the Midlands and collieries in Wales.
:24:35. > :24:38.By the time he entered Parliament in 1908, Stanley Baldwin
:24:39. > :24:42.was a leading industrialist of 25 years' standing
:24:43. > :24:45.and a managing director of Baldwin's Limited
:24:46. > :24:55.How did Baldwin the industrialist influence Baldwin the statesman?
:24:56. > :25:00.The chief purpose of his public life was to extend to British society
:25:01. > :25:05.as a whole the stability and harmony that existed in his own firm
:25:06. > :25:08.where management and men worked closely together,
:25:09. > :25:13.where strikes were unknown, where an income continued to be paid
:25:14. > :25:16.if work was disrupted by strikes elsewhere.
:25:17. > :25:21.In his first broadcast in 1924, he said that
:25:22. > :25:25."my one desire is to get people in this country to pull together,
:25:26. > :25:31.and the love of brethren in place of class strife."
:25:32. > :25:36.A heavy responsibility, in his view, rested with the rich.
:25:37. > :25:37.He himself gave a fifth of his wealth
:25:38. > :25:42.anonymously to the state after the First World War.
:25:43. > :25:45.As Tory leader, he insisted that the rich must contribute more
:25:46. > :25:49.in taxation in order to help secure the union
:25:50. > :25:53.of all classes about which he constantly spoke.
:25:54. > :25:58.Strong religious convictions led him to the same conclusion.
:25:59. > :26:01.He saw himself as God's instrument for the work
:26:02. > :26:05.of the healing of the nation, often invoking the deity
:26:06. > :26:10.in his speeches, the only Tory leader ever to do so.
:26:11. > :26:13.Baldwin worked for peace and industry with a dedication that
:26:14. > :26:19.none of his predecessors had shown, signalled memorably in a celebrated
:26:20. > :26:23.speech in the Commons in 1925 which ended
:26:24. > :26:28.with his famous call, "Give peace in our time, oh, Lord."
:26:29. > :26:34.In the following year, he did everything possible to avoid
:26:35. > :26:39.the general strike, the severest test of his consensual style
:26:40. > :26:43.and when it collapsed after nine days, he quickly rebuilt relations
:26:44. > :26:47.with the moderates who then led the trades unions.
:26:48. > :26:51.One seasoned political observer wrote,
:26:52. > :26:54."I don't think he ever stood so high politically as at the defeat
:26:55. > :27:01.There was one other such peak in Baldwin's career.
:27:02. > :27:07.It came ten years later in 1936 when he handled the abdication
:27:08. > :27:10.crisis with a skill greater than anyone else
:27:11. > :27:14.could have shown and prevented it inflicting damage on the unity
:27:15. > :27:22.of the country which had always been his chief object to enhance.
:27:23. > :27:25.Harold Nicolson, well-known writer and MP,
:27:26. > :27:30.recorded that those in the Commons on the 10th of December 1936,
:27:31. > :27:34.when Baldwin explained Edward VIII's decision to abdicate,
:27:35. > :27:38."were conscious of having listened to the best speech
:27:39. > :27:41.that we would ever hear in our lives."
:27:42. > :27:45.Now, there was nothing solemn or po-faced about this
:27:46. > :27:56.News of a Tory by-election defeat in Rotherham was brought to him
:27:57. > :28:01.in the Commons, on the Commons front bench in 1934.
:28:02. > :28:07.He had once changed trains there and used the lavatory
:28:08. > :28:14.For several minutes, he muttered away, repeating words that had been
:28:15. > :28:25."If square seats don't bother them, they've got rum bums in Rotherham."
:28:26. > :28:29.Stanley Baldwin and would have been dismayed by some features
:28:30. > :28:34.The Christian faith which meant so much to him
:28:35. > :28:41.The persistence of divisions amongst us.
:28:42. > :28:46.The weakening of the links between the parts of the United Kingdom.
:28:47. > :28:49.But he would, I think, have taken comfort from the extent
:28:50. > :28:55.of the humanity and tolerance in Britain today and be delighted
:28:56. > :29:00.by the extraordinary prosperity we enjoy which neither him
:29:01. > :29:05.nor any of his contemporaries ever imagine.
:29:06. > :29:10.Anthony Eden, who regarded Baldwin as his political mentor,
:29:11. > :29:15.wrote in 1962, "no British statesman in this century
:29:16. > :29:18.has done so much to kill class hatred."
:29:19. > :29:22.That, above all, is how Stanley Baldwin would wish
:29:23. > :29:26.to be remembered in this year of anniversaries.
:29:27. > :30:24.August 2013, the Government loses a vote to bomb the President Assad
:30:25. > :30:28.foresees in Syria. It is clear to me that the British Parliament,
:30:29. > :30:29.reflecting the views of the British people, does not want to