 Douglas @-@ Home accepted the foreign affairs portfolio in Heath 's shadow cabinet . Many expected this to be a short @-@ lived appointment , a prelude to Douglas @-@ Home 's retirement from politics . It came at a difficult time in British foreign relations : events in the self @-@ governing colony of Rhodesia ( formerly Southern Rhodesia ) , which had been drifting towards crisis for some years , finally erupted into open rebellion against British sovereignty . The predominantly white minority government there opposed an immediate transfer to black majority rule before the colony had achieved sovereign statehood , and in November 1965 it unilaterally declared independence . Douglas @-@ Home won the approval of left @-@ wing Labour MPs such as Wedgwood Benn for his unwavering opposition to the rebel government , and for ignoring those on the right wing of the Conservative party who sympathised with the rebels on racial grounds . 
