Terrific, accurate and entertaining.

I disagreed with 80% of Maggie's policies but I thought she was charismatic and a great Prime Minister.

Surely the finest Prime Minister ever? Just wish she'd been socially liberal (she was astonishingly tolerant in person, incidentally).

agree on some points.

I thought she was the worst PM ever. She is ressponsible for the current mess. Blair is Thatcher on steroids.Full of promises to turn back Thatcher's so-called "reforms" and instead dived in headlong.

Thatcher set all this up for a true madman like Blait to come along and take the mantle.

Thatcher's policies will be felt for the rest of our lifetimes. There isn't one thing she did that hasn't got long term implications. Every so-called great 'reform' like the coal mining industry has just shifted a mass of social problems onto somewhere else.

Thatcher and Reagan (all though he was basically a puppet) viewed every so-called problem in isolation which is impossible to do. The collapse in the US of the sub-prime mortgage fiasco can be sheeted back to them.

Just her social housing program of selling off state assets as at a discount is an example. And I have friends who did brillaintly out of that. IOne who got his World's End flat at half it's then worth and just sold for a million pounds.

But nothing is free in this life including discounts and poverty. Everyone pays extra to cover the cost and that's how it is now with land values and shattered communities-we're all paying to house those people in jails instead. She was another social engineer-trying to mould society into her vision of the world. In person, a feindly soft looking woman.

Every day I'm a bit more convinced about BR's reptiles getting inside bodies.

(end of rant)

And what fantastic quote he gave, including "Thatcher was a child from the `60s. The 1860`s!"

I agreed with about 80% of Mrs Thatcher's policies, including the Community Charge (Poll Tax). She revitalised Britain after the devastation caused by previous governments and brought us back from the brink of disaster. Blair wasn't really a Thatcherite. His policies followed more after Major and Howard. Thatcher gave more freedom to the individual and inspired people from the working class to aim high and achieve. The mines would have closed anyway because of changing markets and the fact that most were running out of the resource. As it was, more mines closed due to the strike than would have been closed under government plans. It was a dying industry given the final shot to the head by it's own workers. British industry overall was on the downslide. It was important for people to be able to set up new businesses which could grow in the new market. I recall the Enterprise Allowance Scheme which allowed people to set up a business and run it while still claiming benefit (as a kind of government funding) for a year before they had to make it on their own. Thatcher's carrot was much better than Blair and Brown's stick.

The 1860s joke backfires because Britain was one of the wealthiest, most successful and powerful nations on earth during that century.

I recall Mrs Thatcher saying, after she'd won the 1979 election, that "If we all work together" everything should work out fine. People often quote the second part of the sentence but conveniently ignore the first part. She was opposed strongly by various dinosaurs from day one and so no wonder not everything worked out fine. No PM has ultimate power, but she did a good job against the odds. The Tory party and the whole of the UK is still recovering from the consequences of Hestletine's challenge and Mrs Thatcher's resignation. I still think that if she hadn't resigned she would have won the second round and we might not have had Blair as PM or be in the mess we are today.

Actually, Mrs Thatcher did not pave the way for Blair's misrule. He had to abuse certain privileges and reform various laws in order to be able to pursue his policies. He also banished the hereditary peers from the House Of Lords under the excuse that they were never elected, knowing that their first loyalty, for generations, has always been to the nation rather than any political party, and that they would have prevented him from abusing democracy. Mrs Thatcher understood and respected their importance and how they, despite being unelected, protected democracy and prevented dictatorship. Blair understood this too but he did not respect it. They were an obstacle to his power and so he had them removed.

Mrs Thatcher was one of the best PMs this country has ever had. Blair is undoubtedly the worst and most self serving.

my cat talks to me and I take no notice of it.

What an excellent programme. Thanks for the heads-up, JK.

For me, Thatcherism created and encouraged the 'loadsa money' culture of greed that, continued by Major and Blair, ultimately got us in the mess we are in today.

That, and the way taking out credit and providing easy mortgages were positively encouraged, shows how very shortsighted her approach was.

The programme is on iPlayer.

If Thatcher encouraged greed, I wonder who taught us to blame everything on her rather than take responsibility for our own actions and decisions?

here's the iPlayer link to the programme:

bbc.co.uk/i/7nn9k/

Asquith, Earl Grey, Atlee, Churchill - all, surely, far more significant.

I read somewhere (Lance Price?) that although Maggie was like a Rottweiler to her 'equals', she was fair, generous, tolerant and enthusiastic to the Junior members of staff at 10 Downing Street during her reign.

Francis D wrote:
If Thatcher encouraged greed, I wonder who taught us to blame everything on her rather than take responsibility for our own actions and decisions?

that is a fair question Francis as in the end everyone is repsponsible for their actions.

However Maggie showed up one of the great drawbacks of democracy- the idiots and dummies get a vote as well !

I thought financially Maggie and especially Ken Clarke as Chancellor got it right - remember, the UK thrived in the 80s, no matter what we all think today.

Likewise, Gordon Brown was Chancellor over a long period of growth.

We cannot blame either regime for what eventually went wrong.

Socially, however, I disagreed with most of Maggie's policies.

In person she was charming and charismatic and very tolerant of individuals.

There is no point in blaming the 60s for today's bad music - "if that era hadn't been so good, today's crap wouldn't sound so bad".

I lay the blame for the ghastly situation of humanity in this century on one thing - we've got too big to care; too many of us to bother with individuals; too cluttered to cope efficiently. Like companies - small, lean, exciting ones work great; big ones get slack, lazy and inefficient.

veritas wrote:
Francis D wrote:
If Thatcher encouraged greed, I wonder who taught us to blame everything on her rather than take responsibility for our own actions and decisions?

that is a fair question Francis as in the end everyone is repsponsible for their actions.

However Maggie showed up one of the great drawbacks of democracy- the idiots and dummies get a vote as well !


Yes, that's why we have a Labour government.

Britain has a Labour government ??

not like any Labour government I've ever known.

Major was the problem. The reforms that Thatcher made which helped make UK prosperous the idiot MAJOR watered down. Blair continued the idiot MAJOR's policies until 2001.

BROWN has tried to change things towards a centralised Soviet style of Socialist Republic - hence ID Cards and military adventures and the "cult of the leader" PR ideas. He has also tried to borrow his way out of the problems - but has failed badly. He will go down as the worst PM in history - even worse than those of the 1970s.

Thatcher should be judged on how she took a bankrupt country with 3 million unemployed and turned it into the wealthy and competitive country it became in the 1990s. This was her legacy. That MAJOR and BLAIR watered it down and then BROWN kicked it into touch and destroyed this - is not her fault.

The UK was much better in 1989 - it was happy - people were happy - new jobs and industries were growing. The grass was greener and the air was cleaner. We all looked forward to a great future.
Only the EU was a blot on the horizon - yet THATCHER promised to protect us from that fiasco as well.

How the MEN who have followed since have destroyed what she achieved will likewise be a great story.

Andrew Marr is a great TV presenter - but as a historian he does not really have much sway because he always looks at supericial factors rather than real changes.

The end of MINING was a great victory for the future - the miners would have been put out of work in any case - THATCHER knew that the UK could not rely on coal and expensive coal at that. If the MINERS had won the UK would have had a far worse future and our current situation would not be as comfortable as it is.

Old industry was finished. THATCHER saw this first and tried to pull the unions into a modernising programme.

Remember that BROWN has destroyed MORE INDUSTRY in 2 years than THATCHER did in 10 years in real terms as well. In terms of RETAIL Brown has destroyed 30% of the UK - perhaps 60% of independent traders in just 2 years.

THATCHER was brilliant - I did not like the woman at all I might add. I did not like what she did - but with the hindsight of history I realise that she was right. Like the horrible medicine that used to be given out - sometimes the taste is not the reality. We needed THATCHER.

In fact we need a THATCHER now - sadly Cameron is not a MRS T. Lets hope he has the balls to sort out the mess he will inherit. Remember he is 12 per cent ahead in the polls - enough to win alot. In addition TORY voters are intentionally NOT ANSWERING for pollsters - I was around someones house last week when MORI rang - and the TORY voters wont answer these polls on principle. Therefore I reckon the TORIES are probably 17 - 20% ahead.

The growth that Brown preceded over was the growth of debt. He built his economy on credit, and then attempted to solve the debt by borrowing yet more money and creating even more debt. He cannot be blamed for the world recession, but he can be held responsible for the fact that we had nothing in the cupboard to fall back on once the recession hit the UK. He was like a teenager with a credit card who, once he's exhausted his first card, takes out a second to pay off the first. Everything appeared to be going well but eventually the debt caught up with us. I don't think I need to remind anyone what he did with our gold reserves.

But he too will blame it all on Thatcher.

Major was too grey to be responsible.
Blair was too charming to be responsible.
Brown is too dull to be responsible.
So everything must be Thatcher's fault.

I blame Adam and Eve myself - actually, no, I blame God for creating them in the first place.

JK2006 wrote:
I blame Adam and Eve myself - actually, no, I blame God for creating them in the first place.

thanks very much. I always get the blame.

Anyone watching Michael Cockerell's Great offices of State series on BBC4? Very interesting, with some good insights into Thatch, too.

Yes there is a thread about it somewhere - superb.