A meeting with Italy's Premier

DURING my recent visit to Rome I was privileged thanks to the good offices of the Italian. Ambassador in London, Signor Roberto Duci, one of the brightest lights in London's diplomatic firmament to be received in private audience by the Italian Prime Minister, Signor Andreotti.
We spent an hour alone in his office in the Maio Chigi, seated in twin chairs facing each other in front of his desk without distraction from interpreters, secretaries or the other impedimenta who float around the great.
1 first met Signor Andreotti some years ago in Rome -when I was arranging a colloquium between members of the Conservative and Christian Democaratic Parties with a view to establishing some permanent link between them.
It has long seemed to me that the natural counter to the international socialist union was a link-up between the British Conservative Party and the Christian Democrats of Italy, France and Germany.
Unhappily the idea has not made much progress. When 1 first raised the question five years ago I was told that a link was not suitable as the Tory Party did not have a Christian ideological base and lacked a coherent socio-theological theory.
I replied that I presumed that meant that Conservatives were Christians in practice and Christian Democrats Christians in theory, and that was as far as we got. That door has still not opened, and on this occasion the Prime Minster explained to me that a link up with Conservatives was difficult since the Tory party was a specifically anti-socialist party.
I do not demur from this, but feel that it is equally true of the Italian Christian Democrats, However, I suppose in the current delicate political balance in the Italian Parliament between Communists and Christian Democrats it is not prudent to say so.
Signor Andreotti is young and vigorous in appearance, despite a rather rigid stance which is the result of the arthritis from which, like the Pope. he suffers.
In a party lacking in personalities and fallen on evil days of weakness and corruption, he stands out like a giant, the one contemporary Christian Democrat who bears comparison with the great Alcide De Gasperi of the immediate post-war era.
Signor Andreotti is not only a skilled politician but also an historian and man of letters, and has written an interesting study of the reign of Pio Nono. He is now tackling the most tricky task of Italian politics seeking an accommodation with the Communist tiger while avoiding the fate of either. being gobbled up or taken for a ride.
At the present moment Italy has a minority Christian Democrat government which survives owing to a self-denying ordinance by the Communists who abstain from voting against the government on confidence issues, thus ensuring its survival. Signor Bcrlinguer, the Italian Communist leader. is anxious to bring his party into the government but recognises that he cannot bring this about at a stroke: Signor Andreotti needs Communist support but knows that at the present time he could not form a coalition with the Communists without splitting his own party down the middle. So a protracted poker game is going on between the two, with Signor Andreotti so far the winner.
Behind these manoeuvrings lies an unresolved question: is there such a thing as Democratic Cornmunism or is it an illusion? Signor Andreotti does not rule the concept out a priori: for him EuroCommunism is much more than a chimera, but he judges that the time is not ripe for at formal entry of Communists into the government.
Yet like all statesmen he is looking to the future and foresees a time when this may be able to come about. Meanwhile he is hopeful that the alliance with the Left will give his party time to rejuvenate itself, bring in new blood and shed the aura of corruption that still surrounds it.
If this can be done, then Signor Andreotti is the one Christian leader capable of bringing it about; but as I survey the Italian political scene I confess I am pessimistic about success, The Prime Minister's other pressing concern at the moment is the revision of the Concordat between Italy and the Holy See, and both sides are agreed that modifications should he made.
Signor Andreotti told me that there was no difficulty about removing the provisions recognising Catholicism as the State religion, nor of the repeal of the clauses safeguarding "the sacred character" of Rome, which are not enforced anyhow, but that the revision had run into difficulties on two points.
The first concerns marriage jurisdiction, which under the Concordat is shared between Church and State and where nullity is exclusively under the control of the Church courts, whose procedures are different and in many ways less exacting than those of the State, The other concerns education, where provision is made for the teaching of the Catholic religion in State schools but from which parents with conscientious objection may contract their children out. The lay parties would like to see a system of contracting in, by which parents could opt for religious instruction should they so wish.
Signor An.dreotti has a pragmatic approach to these matters, but others are less detached. The ideological fires are akeady flaring up and settlement seems increasingly unlikely. Small hope of progress here. then, but I left the audience much more hopeful for the political Future of Italy than when I went in: this reasonable, skilful, and patriotic man will be able to bring order to Italian politics if anybody can.