Lord Waldegrave reviews Lord Heseltine's 'From Acorns to Oaks'
January 1986: Michael Heseltine (right) leaving the MoD following his resignation | Image by: Trinity Mirror / Mirrorpix / Alamy Stock Photo
3 min read
Although a generous memoir full of praise for those with whom he has worked, at the heart of this book lies a powerful and explosive settling of accounts
Combining a very long life with unabated energy almost puts Michael Heseltine in the very top category of British politicians. He has outlived Winston Churchill and William Gladstone, but we shall never know whether he could legitimately have joined the superstar club because we – the Conservative Party, including me – were too timid to give him the prime ministership, and so we and the country never found out.
He published a good autobiography in 2001, but this new book is not a rehash of old material. His life has been full of new action in the last quarter century: in business; in the development of his stunning garden and arboretum at Thenford (he must have planted even more trees than Gladstone, who felled trees as a hobby, cut down); and in renewed political activity both in the fields of urban regeneration and of industrial policy, thanks to invitations from post-1997 governments of both parties. His unwavering support for Britain’s membership of the EU keeps him campaigning to this day.
He is also an enemy with a long memory
So there is much new. The cliché that everything in Britain is ‘broken’ trips off every pen just now: rather few have practical plans, proven in action, for actually mending anything. Michael does. I remember him, berating us fellow Cabinet members: “Have you actually achieved anything this week to make Britain a better place?” Few of us had very convincing answers. His legacy – local mayors, Canary Wharf, renewal in Liverpool, and many, many practical initiatives up and down the land – will outlast him.
Michael is – as I personally know – a very loyal friend. The book is full of generous praise for those in every field, public and private, with whom he has worked. He is also an enemy with a long memory, whether you are the Mr Stride who refused to let him continue fishing his father’s beat on the River Towy after the latter’s death long ago, or the Britannia Hotels who refused to talk to him about the Adelphi Hotel in Liverpool. (“It was little wonder to me that they are regarded as one of the worst hotel chains in the country.”)
But at the heart of this book lies a much more powerful and explosive settling of accounts. When he wrote his autobiography in 2001, neither Charles Moore’s definitive biography of Margaret Thatcher nor John Nott’s autobiography with a page missing under compulsion from Lord Hanson’s lawyers, nor various Freedom of Information revelations from Cabinet papers, were available for his then-account of the Westland affair which caused his spectacular resignation in 1986. It now seems incontrovertible that Charles Moore is right: “If the (select) committee had known and published what had really happened… it is hard to see how Mrs Thatcher would have been able to remain in office.”
It is perhaps the final proof of Michael Heseltine’s stature as a man, and a public servant, that suffering the astounding injustice and corruption of the Westland affair he did not retire to his great garden and wash his hands of politics forever. On the contrary: he returned to serve and benefit his country, a task from which he has never resigned.
Lord Waldegrave is a Conservative peer
From Acorns to Oaks: An Urgent Agenda to Rebuild Britain
By: Michael Heseltine
Publisher: Biteback
