joyfull anniversary
 

25 years ago today Margaret Thatcher the greatest post war prime minister came to power she did more good in her 11 years than any other pm before or since
i will spent the day watching decision 79:election night on bbc parliment

may the bells ring out this joyfull day


https://www.cableforum.co.uk/images/...2004/05/32.jpg

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Did more good than what? A dose of the clap? I don't think I'd even stretch it that far.

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I'm not really an expert on Thatcher (or politics either really), but as I rememeber, she did pretty well to pull the country out the s**t, when everyone with a job wanted to strike, but she screwed up towards the end, I can't rememeber why.

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Yes she pulled Britain out of a recession caused by the previous labour government, but only temporarily, somehow she managed to get unemployment figures up to around 3 million, that takes some doing for a country not in recession.

(Oh, and for an old hag that pushed the idea of self reliance, I'll be a little ticked off if she get's a state funeral when she dies at the taxpayers expense)

I find it amazing that she's only the 3rd most hated person in Britain.

http://www.channel4.com/entertainmen...tons/vote.html

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At least the right a**ehole is at number 1!!

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Spit,spit.Oh well it's your time SDA.Me I've got better things to do this nice sunny afternoon.I'm never going to give the old hag another thought except to say this.She too would have sent us to fight in Iraq and her stance over terrorism was spot on.

Incog.

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If you could see me right now - my middle finger is held aloft at her picture.

She can get to France for all i care.

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Margaret Thatcher seems to stir strong emotions one way or the other. She was either the greatest of all post-War PMs, or the bitch queen of hell bent on wrecking Britain. Sadly, I rarely hear anyone, whether expressing a positive or negative opinion of her, give any of the reasoning behind their point of view.

This could be a very interesting thread, very aptly timed to coincide with the anniversary of her gaining office. But if it is to be interesting, IMO we need to get some real discussion of the issues going, and avoid lapsing into a kind of tired re-working of a mid-80s Ben Elton stand-up routine.

So, Thatcher lovers and Thatcher haters alike, please tell me: why? :)

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Thatcher was the greatest PM I have lived under so far. Blair is such a waste of space in comparison

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i would agree about blair , but do you not think thatcher was for the rich getting richer ???????????

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:sick:

Words can not express the hatred I feel for her and the cons.
The damage has been done, a generation lost.

Nuff said.

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are we doing so much better under labour though , personally i think not :(

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I'm a bit young to remember what it was like living with Thatcher (i'm 23, I was 9 when she left office), so I can only go by what i've seen, read, and heard. I look back at the whole "Winter Of Discontent", and how severely messed up the country was (I'm so thankful I was born a couple of years after), so in my mind she was a good leader to pull ourselves out of that mess. She introduced poll tax, which didn't go down too well, but I doubt that makes her that much of a tyrant. I asked a bloke I work with: "What exactly did she do at the end which was so bad", and he did explain it to me, but for some reason it completely escapes me. But I might ask him again tomorrow, as I would like to know again.

I think that it is a very fine line between being a very powerful resolute leader, and a needless domineering old battleaxe. I'm guessing she started off the former and ended up the latter, which didn't help. In my mind anyone in a position of such much power, like the PM must be a strong, resolute person. On that basis, I think we have had worse haven't we?

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here here !!!! the thing about Thatcher was that she a very strong pm who
would never be bossed around by the unions who by the point she came
to power had hijacked the Nation

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:notopic: What's with the multiple fonts? :notopic:

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Well, not nuff said really. Why do you hate her? What were the 'cons' of her premiership? What damage has been done? Why has a generation been lost? Speaking as a thirtysomething (and therefore one of 'Thatcher's Children') I can say for myself that I don't think I'm lost.

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Maggie did a lot to be admired for, the Falklands war for one and she always said the lady wasn't for turning. However I always think of her as Maggie the Milk Snatcher cos she stopped the milk in schools. Maybe a generation will blame her for osteoporosis ;)

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Doesn't seem that bad, At least over here a woman can rise to that position and keep her place. Keeping in mind when she was in power as well it is something good and not bad. A lot of the 1st world/rich countries still have never had a women at the top. Lets list them

-USA
-France?
-Germany?
-Italy?
-Spain?
ummmm Well i am not sure about other countries or even if i am right about the above. Help people, especially YOU!

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1) She's a hypocrit who extolled the virtue of self sufficiency while she married above her station to an alcholic with a roller,

2) Privatisation, how many train crashes will it take?

3) It's all very well taking a tough stance on terrorism but she managed to indirectly swell the ranks of the IRA far more than Bloody Sunday ever did.

4) Where is Britains manufacturing industry?

5) Poll tax, everyone above 16 above a pitiful wage threshold had to pay it, or risk a spell in chokey.

6) The Belgrano? Why?

7) Wasn't she best buddies with Pinochet?

8) We are a mass importer of coal .. yet she saw fit to close down our own mines.

9) Milk for kids! (thanks debsy ;))

I could go on for hours, but I'd rather not waste any more effort on her, I experienced the meteoric rise in unemployment under her when I left school and I can't say it's an experience I'd want to relive.

The flags will be out over here the day she's takes the elevator down but I can guarantee you it won't be in mourning.

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Here Here....

:clap:

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1. The two are not necessarily mutually exclusive. If she actually loved Denis, (and it seems from her reaction at his death that she really, really did) why would it represent an abandonment of her principles to marry him, just because he was rich?

2. An act of the Major Government, not Thatcher. Incredibly stupid, but not something you can attribute to her.

3. Not something I'm qualified to comment on, really - you are in a better position to know than me! :)

4. Do we need a manufacturing industry? (This is a serious question about globalisation, I'm not being facetious)

5. A good principle, incompetently applied. The idea that everyone pays for services they use is sound. The Poll Tax, however, took far too little account of ability to pay.

6. The invasion - why?

7. Yes. Same as any world leader is best buddies with whichever despotic madman it is expedient to be best buddies with. It stinks, but it's how world affairs works so I don't think it's fair to single her out for it.

8. Our coal imports will drop as our aging power stations are decommissioned. Coal is not an environmentally benign fuel, either to mine or to burn. We are better off without it.

9. How far should the Government of a mature democracy go in enforcing nutrition on the population? (Another serious question - it's all to easy to caricature someone as a demon, especially in policies relating to children. defend the policy of free school milk.)

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Have to say though, I admired her for a few things, she wouldn't tow the line like Tony does with George Bush. Maggie would defo tell him like it is and not take any argument, hmmm maybe she wasn't such a bad old bird.

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I prefer to think of it as just another rung up the ladder for her.

You think once she was out of office she had no influence? Major was just a weak minded caricature of her.

There's a great song about her, (one of many), the chorus goes something like "I'd like to shove her, I'd like to shove her, I'd like to shove her .. off Mt. Errigal!"

At the time I'd say the jobs were definately needed.

If we're going to answer questions with questions, why was it sunk 200 miles outside the exclusion zone?

It's difficult not to single someone out when they're the topic of conversation.

"Will drop" being the operative phrase, a lot of the miners back then would now be approaching retirement age, why not phase out the mines gradually over a longer period of time? (As opposed to announcing 20,000 job losses)

It's not a case of them choosing not to offer such a facility, it's the fact that they removed it, I could just picture a tory minister stealing sweets from children (and then giving them to someone who already had a bag full ;))

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Ok, here's some comments and reasons:

MT started off being one of the best things that happened to this country and ended up being one of the worst.

1) The Unions. The fact is that by the end of the '70s the Unions were *much* too powerful, the tail was now wagging the dog and British manufacturing was in a disastrous state. Management had practically lost control of its own business and the Unions were demanding more and more for less and less.

MT unfortunately decided that she wasn't going to just re-dress the balance, she was going to effectively break the Unions' power entirely. Having said that, the Unions didn't particularly help themselves, they *could* have side-stepped her somewhat and moderated their position (which probably would have been better for all in the long run), but instead leaders like Arthur Scargill decided to confront her head on which was a "win or bust" policy and when it comes down to it, the government has the greater power, so the unions lost.

2) Privatisation. Again by the end of the '70s, British industry was in a total mess. Due to a lack of investment, lack of incentive and lack of interest, our manufacturing, transport and production capabilities were in a mess. Our coal and steel was too expensive, our cars and railways were a joke and our water and telephone and power production capabilities were controlled by monolithic organisations that had lost touch with what they were supposed to be doing in the first place.

So things definitely needed a shake-up, but whilst coal, steel, car manufacturing and telephones *can* be run privately, rail, water and power *cannot* and should not be run as profit making companies.

What would have been best was for these to be hived off as independant, non-profit making organisations dedicated to running matters efficiently instead of trying to make money for shareholders.

3) The Poll Tax was another **** up. Local authority spending was another example of the mess the country had got into, but trying to charge the rich and the poor the same amount of tax was guaranteed to get people up in arms.

All of these are examples of things that a) needed to be tackled and b) were tackled in the wrong way.

Unfortunately MT demonstrated that arrogance in power doesn't necessarily mean that people won't vote for you, and, regrettably Tony Blair hasn't even needed three terms in office to realise this and pick up where Thatcher left off.

"Mrs Thatch! Mrs Thatch... Oh little bit of politics there...!!

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Actually the Belgrano was sunk 40 miles "outside the 200 mile exclusion zone", not "200 miles outside it".

Admittedly the Thatcher government made a mistake by claiming it was heading *towards* the zone, not away from it, but since there was already a task force sailing from the UK on a war footing, whereas the submarine was still operating on the previous "don't fire unless fired upon" instructions, it was reasonable to update the submarine's instructions to be the same as those of the rest of the fleet.

For a reasonable and (AFAICS) impartial report of the sinking, see:

http://216.239.59.104/search?q=cache...+sinking&hl=en

(sorry it's a google cache link, but the original doesn't want to work).

This states that "even the Argentine Defense Ministry issued a report in 1994, in which they recognized the sinking as a legitimate act of war."

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I never voted for her especially after her efforts as education minister.Bifta is quite right about the milk business.She wasn't forcing a nutrition issue,she was removing it as a choice.Plus the removal of good healthy school dinners has in my opinion done a great deal of harm to the learning of children since.Too many of our children no longer even eat one good healthy meal a day and live of a diet of junk because of the privitisation off school dinners.

Under her the rich got considerably richer and the rest of us could go to hell BUT I think her record as far as unemployment goes is what has forever condemed her in my eyes.Plus under her Government there were 17 education bills-she just couldn't leave it alone.Mind the present government is in very serious danger of matching that record.

However the really galling thing about her is that she never acknowledged the glass ceiling for women and the fact that women are achieving any kind of equality in the workplace is not down to any effort on her behalf.Quite the opposite.I think it's going to be a very long time until we get another woman Prime Minister because of her.I wanted a woman at the top-the pity was that it was her that got there first.


That enough reasons towny?

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Is the argument against Thatcher about the Belgrano, because she ordered it to be destroyed, or because she lied about it?

Wether she was right to attack it, it wasn't wrong or illegal. The Argies were warned that they might be attacked even outside of the exclusion zone. They declared war on us, and in a war, any instrument of the opposing forces' military is a legitimate target here, there or anywhere in between.

The lying part was obviously a bad move. Especially because apart from the moral standpoint, there wasn't a reason to do it. Still as far as lies go, it wasn't the worst, and she obviously must of did some good, as they voted to keep her in power.

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My parents done well under Thatcher. They doing an awfully lot less well under Labour.

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you know i think that's the case for most of us TigaSefi :(

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My mum's a hell of a lot better off under the recent Labour government than under MT or JM. I think theres around 2 million others that are in the same boat as her too. :erm:

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Back in the day, the conservatives managed to bump unemployment up to around 3 million, now, under Labour it's around 1.4 to 1.5 million, not far off though :D

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My house apparently is going up £100 a day under labour.

However my taxes are going up £200 a day + speeding fines if I drive at 33 mph + parking tickets if the traffic dips below 32 mph

Currently it costs me £23 to get my bin emptied once a week. Thats £12.50 per carrier bag of non recyclable/composable compressed actual waste. BAH

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I thought unemployment was under 1 million now :confused: :o

Nikko, I wish I had an income that would allow me to pay £200 a day taxes let alone increase by £200 a day. :erm:

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Taxes are going up £200 a day? How so? You can't really blame Labour for being fined for breaking the law, and I don't pay council tax (which I think goes towards more than just emptying your bin) so it costs me nothing to get my bin emptied, long may Labour stay in power :D

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December 03 - Feb 04 = 1,426,000

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:blush:

Still fairly good though.

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OK OK - £200 a day may be a bit inaccurate - it just seems like it.

I do pay council tax - I have no kids, dependants, or anything that justifies £23 a week for emptying the bin. Thats all they do - empty the bin.

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.............and keep the streets clean, put you out if your on fire, give you assistance if your in an accident, take you to hospital in an ambulance, lite the streets for you....................

Council tax is high, I agree, probably too high, but you can't lay that at the door of Tony Blair, where as the Poll tax could be traced back to the top, MT Mr Howard, and Mr tebbit (if I'm informed correctly) :rolleyes:

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Presumably they do provide the bin? And the Fire engines etc etc...

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As dellwear pointed out, your council tax goes on a lot more than emptying the bin, e.g.

78 pence will go to the County Council to pay for services such as social services, care in the community, education and libraries
11 pence will go to the your local Police Authority.
10 pence will be kept by the council to pay for services such as refuse collection, travel passes, care for the environment, health and safety, planning, leisure and recreation.
1 penny will go to town and parish councils to pay for things like community centres, footpaths and extra street lighting

so in fact, only 10% of your council tax goes on collecting your rubbish.

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Yes -the Poll tax was down to MT - it cost her the seat.

Subsequently its gone up and personally I get naff all back. Locally the streets are NOT clean. Extra contribution is included for the Fire service. My income tax and NHI fund the NHS which include ambulance response. Locally they have a massive deficit which precludes any streert light improvements (including bunging in a new bulb)

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Thats fine, bifta - but I do not use any of those except getting my bin emptied.

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I'd complain to your local counciller about that, not every borough has mismanaged their funds.

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Ah, spoken like a true thatcherite, sod you jack, I'm alright!

How do you know when you might require the Police?
How do you know you won't get hit by a bus tomorrow, be crippled for the rest of your life and need some form of care?
Have you never used a footpath in your life? Or are you just planning a boycott of them for the rest of your natural?
Do you have no interest in the care of your environment?
What do you do if one day you want to use your local sports centre? (making sure you get their via no footpaths of course)
What are you going to do when you get old? Pay full fare on the bus?

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Every year I complain, and every year they pursue me through the courts to pay up. The law does not define value or correctness - its just the law.

I always pay it just before they make the Court Order - I consider it an interest free loan.

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The odds on getting hit by a bus round here must exceed those of the lottery - its 17 million to one that one operates, much less hits you

Getting a police response doubles those odds unless you 1, pass a speed camera or 2, fall into the 'at risk category' - over 9 break ins at your house or a death in your postcode

I would not venture down a footpath unless i had a 750cc trials bike like the other users


the sports centre is still waiting for the fire brigade, but i understand under the recent poll tax increase they are holding an enquiry to rebuild it from the ashes

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Time to move house I think :D Complain to your MP instead, obviously your local council is worse than useless.

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Unfortunately my MP is Labour and is unable to join up the dots on the diagram I sent him pointing out the errors of the (Labour) council.

As a side point, the local lot are Infamous for removing the Free bus pass for OAP's as a cost saviing excersise.

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Nikko, think I understand what you mean. As a single person seems to be a lot of money shelling out and don't seem to get much back for it. Must remember to put my bin out this week so I feel I'm getting something for my money at least :D

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Thanks Debs - I was beginning to think it was just me.

Back on the absolute topic - Thatcher did a lot of good in the '80's given the poor inheritance she had. I am old enough to remember strikes, 3 day week, power cuts, raging inflation and a new administration (Heath/Wilson/Heath/Callaghan) about every 10 minutes. MT was a tough cookie and put things back on track. Then the daft mare forced Poll Tax through in the face of all sensible opinion and completely blew it overnight.

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Hmm, and how much does your little process cost every other council tax payer? Money that could be going to pay for local services instead of paying for the legal process?

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Headline-grabbing statistics do little to paint the bigger picture of the success or failure of any government. For example, quoting 1.4 million unemployed under Labour implies that it is their policies that are responsible, when unemployment levels have actually been falling steadily since 1993 (one year into the last Conservative administration). In fact, the peak in 1993 came at the end of the recession of the early 90s and when you take a look at the last 25 years as a whole you see a rapid rise from 1979 to 1983 (although levels were rising before 1979), followed by a downward trend to where we are today. Taking a long-term view, it is possible to argue that Thatcher's reforms, after some short-term upheaval, have been for the long-term benefit of the UK.

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And if the unemployment figures are still falling, surely Labour aren't doing too much wrong in that dept. And just how did we end up in the worst recession 'for 50 years' under the tory govt. ?

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A lot of third world countries have developed considerably since Thatcher days.

Funny thing is we help a lot of these third world countries and then the businesses that were founded and run in the uk outsource all there work to these countires that have now developed enough. Eventually that will kill manufacturing in th UK. However i believe Thatcher started this process, labour have just let it run out of control.

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But what about services? Less tax is a common component of the tories so individuals are bound to do a bit better

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So long as you're not self employed.

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This link is interesting:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3681973.stm

It appears even those who hated her have to admit this country is changed for the better as a result of what she did. Norman Tebbit has an interesting take on the 3m unemployed as well:



...She is blamed for creating three million unemployed. Of course, she didn't. She exposed the fact that three million people were on the payroll who were not doing a job. It wasn't always their fault. But in many cases we were over-manned. People were doing jobs which didn't need to be done and, of course, that was very painful.

And as for Labour doing well to keep unemployment falling, how about these words from the same article, by historian Andrew Roberts:

Of all the many things she created, including New Labour, the greatest was a Britain strong, proud and free. (My emphasis)

So, how has Labour managed to keep unemployment falling? By abandoning the policies that Thatcher successfully fought off in three general elections and by embracing market forces just as she did. In a very real sense, the spirit of Margaraet Thatcher is still at 10 Downing Street.

As for the recession - brought about by a combination of factors, but largely the disastrous entry of Sterling into the European Exchange Rate Mechanism at an unsustainably high rate.

A weakened Margaret Thatcher, in the twilight of her premiership, was ambushed by Europhile Tories in her cabinet and all but frogmarched into the ERM, something she was personally ambivalent about. Clearing up the aftermath required a number of crippling hikes in the Bank of England Base Rate which inevitably hammered the economy.

This is a prime example of Europhile stupidity of the kind that could be exhibited by any of the main political parties in this country. There are still those in the Conservative Party that, incredibly, think the Euro would be a good thing, Blair is famously in favour of it (but is thankfully held in check by Brown and others) and as for Charles Kennedy ... *shudder*

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Personally I'd rather have people working (even if we are "over manned") then claiming benefit and sitting at home committing crime and causing mischief. I'm sure the 1.6 million others that were out of work because of MT cost cutting exercise would agree with me, I know my family would rather be working than sponging.

As for the rest of the article, yes I'd agree with you that new Labour is a bit of a hybrid, but there nothing wrong with that, your not telling me that the previous conservative governments have never taken policies from other parties and implemented them.

On the other issues, I cant honestly believe that the country would be in the state its in today if the conservatives were still in power, their lack of investment is still crippling the railways and the NHS, in fact the NHS may have even crumbled if the Tory's were still in power. You cant keep on asking for something to work without paying for it.

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The issue of mass unemployment is, as Tebbit said, a painful one. I think if anything, it is probably still too soon to properly evaluate the effects of Maragret Thather's premiership on the UK. At the scale of individual families who were devastated by mass pit closures, the disappearance of our shipbuilding industry and the like, she was and always will be a hate figure. But 50 years from now, there will be few people alive with any real experience of those days, and all that will be left will be to assess, on a wider scale, the effect of her reforms on the country as a whole. I think you would be hard pressed, even now, to find an economist who will argue that the structural reforms of the 1980s have been bad for Britain in the long term.

Over-manning is a strange issue. You might say it is preferable for someone to have a job in an over-manned industry, but preferable for whom? It is not to the benefit of the country as a whole, if he is not contributing anything to the wealth of the country. And if a job in an over-manned state-run monolith is acceptable, then why is it considered political suicide for any Government to make people perform work to 'earn' their benefit (a scheme proposed by the Tories in the early 90s, IIRC, was decried as 'workfare' by Labour)?

Mass redundances were politically risky and personally painful for a lot of people, but today's unemployment figures prove that it was the right thing to do. The majority of people found new jobs, performing tasks that needed performing. That is better for the UK economy as a whole and also for the self-esteem of the individuals concerned.

As to New Labour, and the causes of New Labour - I'm not saying there is anything wrong with the fact that they stole the Tories clothes. I'm just observing that, in evaluating whether Margaret Thather was A Good Thing or A Bad Thing, it has to be highly significant that eventually her 'arch-enemies' had no choice but to become like her in order to get the British people to elect them.

For the other issues:

Railways: The result of more than 50 years of neglect by both Labour and Conservatives, as Labour has now acknowledged. Privatisation was possibly the biggest single ****-up but Labour's dithering, dabbling and u-turning over the last seven years has been disgraceful and arguably fatal on more than one occasion.

NHS: I am very suspicious of parties that, seven years after taking office, are still happy to blame the previous administration for the state of services that they are elected to run for us. The state of the NHS today is the responsibility of the Labour Government, which has learned the hard way what the Tories knew all all along: that massively increasing spending on unreformed public sector services is just throwing good money after bad. Labour can only challenge the Trade Unions so far, because at the end of the day the Trade Unions still pay Labour's bills. They just don't have the stomach to do what Thatcher did, which was to sacrifice her personal popularity, and short term political gain, for the long-term benefit of the country.

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But they managed a large reduction by simply using different criteria to count the unemployed, as they do with the R.P.I.

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Werent the tories just as guilty of doing that?

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But as a self employed person of 23 years standing, the last 5 years have been the most financially difficult for me. Massive hikes in NI. contributions, long before the rest of you. Gordon Brown's, £5 to £6 Billion annual raid on dividend tax relief has hammered pension funds, which are (where) one of the few tax efficient ways I could save for the future.
To be honest over the past 20 years or so the incumbent government has made little difference to me personally until a few years ago.
I don't object to paying taxes, however I fear that historically, Labour knows how to tax but has little idea of how to spend prudently. Their time in power almost always coincides with an explosion of totally none productive paper shifters and bureaucracy.

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Lies, damn lies, and statistics.:D