Word: heath
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With that Churchillian challenge, Prime Minister Edward Heath in a television speech last week took his case for entry into the Common Market to the British people. His approach, which was expressed more fully in a White Paper that he personally presented to the House of Commons, was a startling departure from the postwar British norm. Ever since their "finest hour" in the 1940s, the British have shied away from stirring rhetoric and appointments with history as if they were too drained by earlier exertions to cope with monumental actions or decisions...
...word and deed, Ted Heath now has forced upon his countrymen a truly historic decision. They can join the six-nation European Economic Community, renouncing a legacy of insularity that began in 1558 when England lost Calais to the French. Or, in the words of the White Paper, they can "stand aside from this great enterprise and seek to maintain our interests from the narrow -and narrowing-base we have known in recent years...
Final Snag. Even at the last minute, those pessimists had very nearly been right. Despite the recent Paris accord between French President Georges Pompidou and British Prime Minister Edward Heath about the desirability of Britain's admission, the negotiations hit one final snag. The issue was New Zealand, whose English-descended dairy farmers depend heavily on United Kingdom markets for their economic survival. The New Zealanders urgently wanted guarantees that after the mother country joined the Common Market and passed behind its protectionist agricultural tariffs, their cheese and butter exports would continue to their best customer...
...Heath's strongest argument may well be that Britain has no place else to turn. As Britain has already learned, the Commonwealth is too far-flung and economically disparate to be a workable trading community. The dreams of a North Atlantic Free Trade Area, which would have initially embraced Britain, Canada and the U.S., and eventually Australia and New Zealand, have died for lack of interest among the potential partners. EFTA, the nine-nation trading bloc that Britain organized as a counterpart to the Common Market, has for all its economic success, failed to develop sufficient cohesion to compete...
When Britain's Prime Minister Edward Heath takes his hand off the tiller of the ship of state, he grabs the tiller of his 41-ft. sloop Morning Cloud. In fact, critics feel, he shows more devotion to Morning Cloud than to Britain. Opposition Leader Harold Wilson has called Heath a "part-time" Prime Minister, and the daily Sun has accused "Skipper Ted" of "sitting bronzed and beaming at the helm while the economy of the U.K. sinks slowly." The squalls of outrage really blew up when Heath, intent on winning a place in the ocean-going Admiral...