Book review: George Younger

George Younger did us few favours by shielding Scots from unfettered Thatcherism, argues Michael Fry

By David Torrance

Birlinn, £30

IN THE new Scotland, David Torrance has done as much as anybody to get the art of political biography going. It was something never much cultivated before or cultivated well, but no doubt biographers will have more to write about in future. This study of George Younger is Torrance's most attractive work to date, enlivened by the access he has had to private letters, political papers, diaries and personal memories.

When Younger left the Scottish Office in 1986, he had served there longer than any other Secretary of State during the century of its existence, and so might be presumed to have pushed its possibilities about as far as they could go. Yet there was also more turmoil in Scottish politics than there had ever been that century, so the accustomed tranquil background to the practice of its traditional arts (that is, getting more money out of London) existed no longer.

Younger might have said, "Après moi, le déluge," though, so far as I know, he never did. All the same, the historian is entitled to ask not only about his, on the whole, effective and unfailingly good-humoured discharge of his duties, but also how far he foresaw and how well he judged the trends of his time. Within a dozen or so years of Younger's going, after all, we did have a revolution in Scottish Government.

As a supporter of devolution at one stage, Younger could hardly have been unaware of the pressure still there for it, even after the failed referendum of 1979. It seems the central question about him is what he was going to do to counter that pressure after he had personally turned against devolution. But I am not sure that is, in fact, the central question addressed by Torrance in this book.

Of course, there was a wholly different side to his political life as a member of the Cabinet in London – a Cabinet by no means always united behind Mrs Thatcher, and indeed at certain points quite keen to get rid of her. The hopes of the dissidents must have been high as late as 1982, by which time Thatcherism had brought much pain with little gain.

Then came the Falklands War. A key faction of wet loyalists, led by Willie Whitelaw and including Younger, decided that whatever befell they would henceforth remain loyal to the Prime Minister. As the early problems receded and the big financial and industrial reforms kicked in, the last thing she would have wanted to hear about was Scotland, to her a problem of the past. Loyalty – to school, regiment and all those old Tory things, no doubt to party too – was a major part of Younger's own make-up. He ensured she did not hear about Scotland.

Back in St Andrew's House that meant never rocking the boat. Expenditure was restrained, but to nowhere near English levels. Routine Scottish bills took up all the parliamentary time. The erosion of old industries brought frantic efforts to attract inward investment, which always impressed Scots more than the fruits of what native enterprise they still had. Stroppy Labour-run local authorities caused problems with the rates, a tax Younger disliked. When somebody suggested the community charge, he felt relieved. He was gone from the Scottish Office before it came in.

Torrance does identify the period 1983-6 as crucial to any judgment of his subject: "The opportunity provided by the landslide majority was inexplicably squandered. Instead, the Scottish Secretary increasingly became the victim of events and generated little by way of original policy."

What else could Younger have done? Well, he could have pushed some privatisations in Scotland, of which there were precisely none during his seven years (a long time in politics) at St Andrew's House. The creation of popular capitalism, a big change in English society, left Scots cold, not least because it never happened here. It would have been a long shot, admittedly, in a political climate always inclement for the Conservatives. But it would have offered at least a chance of revival, whereas the actual policy of steady-as-she-goes offered none.

This more than anything makes me wonder if Younger ever really believed in Thatcherism and whether at heart, beneath his bland charm, he was content for the Scottish Tories to decline rather than do anything different. Torrance's judgment on these years is that Younger had been able to "temper the winds of the free market"; apparently he approves.

The overall verdict that Younger adequately ran a system as he found it can be accepted. But there are also times when systems do change, need to change and are better for being changed: then different qualities are wanted from the men in charge. This truism does not get much of an airing in Torrance's book.