28

THE NEW TOWNS

sufficient guarantee that, the restrictions removed, they would continue to
discharge their responsibilities, not merely with efficiency and imagination,
but also with a real desire to make their New Towns the happiest and most
comfortable communities in Britain. Social planners and Socialists cannot
ask more from public servants.

8. CONCLUSION

This pamphlet has sought to show that the New Towns have more tham
justified themselves. Their success, indeed, makes it hard to understand why
further projects of this kind have not been started, especially since the net
cost to the Exchequer has proved so relatively small. One of the first tasks:
of a new Labour Government should be to select new sites for this purpose.
There remains, however, one obstacle that I have not so far discussed.
There is, even in the Labour Movement, a curious attitude towards New
Towns that amounts almost, if one can use this word, to jealousy. I hope
it has been shown that this is based upon misconceptions about the total
cost and about the means of financing them. Yet, if further progress is to
be made along these lines, that attitude must be replaced by a more positive
enthusiasm for what social planning has achieved.
Socialism, among other things, is a matter of priorities. There will
never be enough money, materials and man-power to do all the improvements
to our social system that we all know it needs. It is a question, therefore,
of deciding where to concentrate the resources available at a given time.
In specific terms, it means deciding whether to build a new community centre
in Tredegar or Cwmbran. in Motherwell or East Kilbride, whether the
Hertfordshire County Council builds a new school in St. Albans before
meeting the needs of newcomers in Stevenage and Hemel Hempstead.
To such questions there is always the ready answer. The New Towns
are doing very well. Why should they be given privileged treatment when
they already have so much that other areas lack? Why not devote resources
to blighted areas before improving New Towns?
We should, of course, do both. And the claims of New Towns are not
so great that to make a success of them would impose serious hardships
elsewhere: their total cost is a small proportion of what is annually spent on
housing. education and public buildings.

Priority for New Towns

Yet there is a case, and I think it is a strong one, for not stinting New
Towns of the marginal money they need to carry out their original plans.
First, all our experience of urban development teaches that if a town is
starved of amenities in its early years, it bears the marks of that malnutrition
all its life. The face of our industrial towns bears witness that arrears are
seldom if ever made up: consider the difficulties now faced by local