Looking Left

Never in Britain's history-not even under German guns in 1940-had a new government moved so quickly and decisively to reshape the molds of power as Labor did last week. Prime Minister Harold Wilson machine-gunned appointments out of No. 10 Downing Street, by week's end had named 101 ministers, the highest total since the early 1700s. Whitehall was a shambles of furniture movers and displaced teamakers as Wilson shifted departments and created four new ministries: Economic Affairs, Technology, Overseas Development, and Land and Natural Resources.

Though Wilson had been expected to scatter his appointments across the party's political spectrum and had a certain number of personal debts to repay, he went out of his way to give Labor's troublesome, hard-core left-wingers seats in the new government-including six in the Cabinet itself.

Archers at Agincourt. Wilson may intend to isolate and contain them by bringing them into the government, but with Labor's narrow majority, some of Wilson's own advisers were clearly troubled by his look to the left. Among the leftists named:

> Frank Cousins, 60, Minister of Technology. A hulking six-footer who began working the coal pits at 14, Cousins by 1938 was a full-time labor organizer. As boss of the 1,300,000-man Transport Union, Cousins clashed with Labor's late solidly NATO-minded Hugh Gaitskell and stubbornly called for Britain's unilateral disarmament. Cousins argued that Britain had defended itself in World War II without A-bombs. Gaits-kell's withering reply: "And the British archers won at Agincourt without machine guns." Among Cousins' new responsibilities: overseeing Britain's atomic-energy establishment.

> Barbara Castle, 53, Minister of Overseas Development. A pert redhead with a flair for fashion, she came from a Yorkshire Laborite family, was an ardent member of the old, deep-pink Popular Front Socialist League. Her idea of a Sunday in the park is addressing a crowd from a Trafalgar Square plinth. She has made all the Aldermaston ban-the-bomb marches, has long had a passion for emergent Africa, the purview of her new job.

> Richard Grossman, 56, Minister of Housing. Probably the most prolific pamphleteer alive in Britain today. Grossman, a former Oxford don, has long been the brilliant, erratic idea man of the Labor Party, was a member of the Keep Left group of party rebels that sniped at the last Labor government while it was in power. His main task: to carry through the state takeover of urban land, which Labor hopes will solve Britain's soaring land inflation.

The Cabinet also leans left with Colonial Secretary Anthony Greenwood. 53, an elegant charm boy and professional rebel who quit Gaitskell's "Shadow Cabinet" in 1960 to signal his support of unilateral disarmament. Outside Cabinet rank, Wilson has given ministerial posts to another 25 hard-core leftists. The majority of Wilson's Cabinet remains right of center. In addition to early rightist appointments (George Brown, James Callaghan, Patrick Gordon Walker), he has named others, notably Labor Minister Raymond Gunter, 55, a tough, adroit trade unionist with strong views about how to reform unions. Right as well, and roaming the corridors of power as Parliamentary Secretary of the Ministry of Technology, will be, fittingly enough, Scientist-Author C. P. Snow, 59, who has exhaustively and vicariously explored Whitehall in a clutch of bestselling novels.

Up to Five. In the best British tradition. Loyal Opposition Leader Sir Alec Douglas-Home promised that the Tories would hold their fire for the first few months to give the new government a chance, even increased Wilson's majority by agreeing to keep a Tory M.P. in the speakership of the House of Commons. Since the speaker cannot vote, Wilson's effective majority thus went up from four to five. The Tories also agreed to pair off ministers in parliamentary votes, thereby enabling Laborites to leave the country on official business without endangering the government's margin.

And travel they intend to do. Foreign Secretary Patrick Gordon Walker, who lost his constituency in the elections and thus for the moment has no Commons seat, is due in Washington this week. President of the Board of Trade Douglas Jay will soon be off to Peking to open a British industrial exhibit. Commonwealth Relations Minister Arthur Bottomley barely had time to find his office before flying off to Zambia's independence celebrations, may have to go on to deal with obstreperous Southern Rhodesia.

Faced with an impending balance of payments crisis and plenty of other troubles, the Prime Minister himself was not going anywhere for a while. But as he prepared the Queen's Speech to Parliament, outlining the legislative ambitions of his new government, Wilson was clearly out to make the most of the first weeks of grace any new government enjoys. He may never have it so good again.

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