Grey to Black for the Tories

The bikini couldn't have weighed more than a couple of ounces. The girl up on the runway showing it off last week at a London charity fashion show was Debutante Caroline Maudling, 18. Her father: Chancellor of the Exchequer Reginald Maudling, known to British newspaper readers just now as the man who must announce the new budget to Parliament this week. When the bikini-clad picture splashed across the papers, the Daily Mirror headlined it as "Caroline Maudling's Budget Look," while the Daily Express observed that "Far from damaging her father's career, she probably added hundreds to the votes he will get next election day." That was just about the only hopeful electica prediction the Tories got all week.

A Maneuver That Failed. The worst news came from London. For years, London's local government has been solidly in Labor hands because of the capital's working-class majority. Last July, on the Tories' initiative, Parliament created the Greater London Council, to include the growing, sprawling suburbs--separately administered until now--where the Conservatives are much stronger. By this device, and by redrawing voting districts, the Tories hoped to capture the administration of Greater London, which contains one sixth of the British population. Labor bitterly condemned the gerrymander. As it turned out, the Tory maneuver failed. Last week when the voters went to the polls in the first Greater London Council election, they handed the Labor Party a thumping victory.

Of the Council's 100 seats, the Conservatives who had hoped for at least a majority, won only 36 to Labor's 64. Other local elections throughout the country confirmed Labor's current lead with the electorate. The outlook for the Tories in the forthcoming general elections (the Conservatives' present fiveyear mandate expires Nov. 5), changed from dark grey to deep black.

A Hope for Fall. Three hours before the polls closed in London, Prime Minister Sir Alec Douglas-Home ended months of suspense about the timing of the elections. He announced that the present Parliament, already the longest in peacetime since Queen Victoria, will not be dissolved until fall. Labor Party Leader Harold Wilson explained the delay with deadly brevity: "It is now quite clear why Sir Alec did not go to the country in June. I think he realized he had no chance at all."

For a better chance in the fall, Douglas-Home hopes to heal the Tory party's rifts, notably about the government's recent repeal of "resale price maintenance," a system of manufacturer-pegged retail prices like U.S. "fair trade" laws. And he is also counting on the additional time to put himself to the electorate.

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