If Thatcher was so bad?

Question

Would the country all go back to loveliness if all she did was undone? Now I have NO idea about her, I wasn't even born, but she can't have been as awful as some people make out.

Answer 1

She was a brilliant leader of our country throughout the world and it's only the old dyed in the wool labour people who keep on grinding their axes - well so they should and chop off the heads of the incompetent crew they foisted on us in Westminster now! The worst state of the economy for 16 years and even worse to come - don't think that this is as far as price rises go and also redundancies - the pot has been boiling for four years and is only just now beginning to spill over! Come Christmas this will be a very sorry country indeed!

Answer 2

She was evil incarnate, all the poison and bile of the Daily Mail type of tory bigot made flesh. The Falklands War was her blood offering to her master Satan. I sincerely hope I live long enough to spit on her grave.

Answer 3

You're right.... you were not born then.  Search poll-tax and see what she was about.  She was a master at taking the p|ss out of the working class. She was a nightmare that lasted 14 years !

Answer 4

Depends what you politics are but if like capitalism, home ownership and no unions then shes your woman.

Answer 5

Don't believe all of the g*y, left wing, liberal a.ss holes on here, Maggie was our last great politician who stood up for Britain and the British. The country has been in rapid decline since she left politics, so much so it is totally unrecognisable.

Answer 6

Not much more I can add from the majority of your answers. Personally the memory of the miners strike and the needless devastation it cased will haunt me forever. Many lives were destroyed and with it society as we once new. This Country has never recovered from her evil and ruthless tirade that shook the very core of decency. I doubt she would feel the flames of h**l, as she is heartless and void of anything resembling decency and I hope the ice cold winds haunt her and chill her bones forever.

Answer 7

The problem with our system is that nothing done by one lot of politicians is ever undone. They just pretend to whinge but keep it as the original was done to squeeze more money out of us in the first place and anything that gives them more of our money is cool by them.

Answer 8

if you were upper-class, had some money stashed away lived in a massive house you were laughing ( the Poll Tax was a godsend ) when thatcher-thatcher, milk-snatcher, took the GB helm.

But if you were working class, lived in your right-to-buy council house, were already on your knees from the constant interest hikes, you lost your job through no fault of your own, applied for assistance only to made to wait 6-8 weeks for any money due, while your children starved & Maggie in her speeches told you to get on your bike & find a job, as newspapers WERE full of jobs.

Thatcher being the original meany that became the idol of many a bad PM ever since had the foresight to sneak in a change of law;

All jobs are to be advertised, regardless of whether they were filled internally or even if they no longer existed.  

They had to be advertised.

How could the millions of out of work folks, find a job decent job for life when the odds were already stacked against them?

She started the slow creep toward the failure of GB by selling anything of value, that we as a nation owned All sold off, for huge sums of money which in turn ONLY cut the taxes of high-earners, as they continued to feather their nests, at many a lowly union workers expense.

Those who liked maggie, had money & she always looked after her own.

She was the bane of my parents life & they disliked her underhanded tactics from the plaque she presented to the tyrant pinochet to her bullying of miners, her name was a swear-word in our house.

& I can't actually think of anything good that came out of her time as PM.

Answer 9

If opinions of Thatcher tend to be highly polarised, that was because she polarised the country at large.

Ironically, Thatcher came to power in 1979 under the election slogan "Britain Isn't Working", with campaign posters showing thousands of people queuing outside a jobcentre. At the time, there were 700,000 unemployed people in Britain - this figure would rise to 3.6 million while she was prime minister. Unemployment was considerably worse under Thatcher than at any time since the 1930s.

Scotland, and England's North were ravaged, while Thatcher's rich friends down South enjoyed tax perks and new economic freedoms.

The hugely unpopular Community Charge, also known as the poll tax, finished her off for good. She was ousted by her own party in the end.

In the City, they practically worship her as a god. In working class areas, especially in the North, she is seen as a demon who stole jobs and destroyed communities. There isn't really much in between.

Answer 10

Unfortunately, with just a handful of sensible exceptions which have scored heavy down thumbing, your question has brought out all the lefties with their anti-Thatcher rhetoric. Of course, securing a lot of thumbs up from the same culprits.

If the Tories had been in power over the last ten years, we wouldn't have had this insane lending and borrowing. I was around at the time of the Thatcher Government, and I can assure you that she saved this country from Union tyrrany, and from the financial basket case that Labour had turned the country into, as they always do, and have done again.

Note the vile language and spite, that is churned out from the lefties.

Unfortunately, and this isn't your fault, the education system is full of left wingers who instill this anti-Thatcher, anti Tory attitiude in young people. Moreover, their view is supported by the likes of the BBC and the Guardian. Accordingly, many people come on this site thinking that it is smart to regurgitate this attitude without understanding what they are talking about.

Answer 11

St Margret of Grantham

may she bestow once again her bounty, wisdom and gentleness upon our tortured nation

god bless maggie

edit

irony people

edit

michael

good old grocer heath, the one who sold our soul to europe, i remember pipeman of the year harold as well

Answer 12

She went to war against her own country,she labelled decent working class citizens as the enemy within.One of her best friends was the murderous Pinochet.She is the reason that the Conservatives can never be trusted again.

Answer 13

She makes my blood run cold. Vile woman.

Answer 14

She was the Devil Incarnate Kat.

Her philosophy changed every aspect of British life for the worse.

Before her there was more solidarity betwen people and respect and understanding for the more vulnerable members of society. She made it O.K. to prize personal wealth above all else. She stated "There is no such thing as society , only individuals and their families". NO SUCH THING AS SOCIETY??????

Under her government the North of England suffered hugely as the South got richer.

Health Service funding was decimated.

Education funding was cut.  Grants were abolished.

Public industries built up on the backs of centuries of the working man were sold off at a profit to fatcats.

Tax cuts for the rich and the introduction of unfair poll taxes etc.

Trade Unionism became  a dirty word.

The rot set in.

Everything bad about society now started under her regime.

May she rot in h**l.

Answer 15

Was that Thatcher woman great? No she most certainly wasn't. I think she was the worse British Prime Minister in modern history. What other idiot would decalre that Britain should move from being a manufacturing economy to a service-based ecomony? So you close the factories (producing real tanglible products that can be sold) and encourage everybody to sell cheap American burgers? What a stupid concept - one that we're paying the price for today! Look at British industry - or what's left of it. Plenty of McDonald's everywhere though.

As someone who was nearly bankrupted by Thatcher's policies, I can categorically state that she was as evil as her public image made out. She was a selfish autocrat who used trade unions as the scapegoat for society's ills (something that was utterly wrong but the tabloid press did a good of propogating the myth because the tabloids were - and are - owned by rich barons with only one agenda) and didn't really like the concept of true democracy either. If she did she wouldn't have ridden roughshod over her own cabinet members.

I hated Thatcher at the time and to this day I hate everything she represented. The Thatcher era heralded a new sense of "stuff you, Jack, cos I'm alright" greed and I for didn't buy it.

I was ecstatic the day the Blair administration buried the Tories in 1997 - despite the fact that Labour has subsequently let down badly those who helped them to power in the years since.

Answer 16

You weren't born then? You were lucky. I remember long unemployment for my father because he worked in the decimated construction industry; how she sold BT to buy votes in the form of low taxes for one election; 'won' a war for another, but the joyous memory of her tears when she was ousted was BRILLIANT.

Yes, she was that bad and she created a whole generation of selfish, money-grabbing tossers who widened the gap between the rich and poor by not investing in anything unless it gave them immediatee profit.

I'm waiting for her death, and if she has a state funeral, I'll be one of the first to sign a petition of protest. I'm not paying anything towards that woman's funeral.

And after reading the comments, I'm amazed how people have needed that uncompromising, vile, self-centred woman to stand behind to be proud to be British. We already were proud. We HAD had production and primary industries to be proud of, but now, thanks to her, we are the US's *****.

Answer 17

you ask the Miners what she was like...shut the mines...sack the workers - sell off the council houses...negative equity...the list is endless...she was a nightmare!!

Answer 18

Kat, She caused severe and lasting financial hardship in millions of working class homes including the one I grew up in.

Poverty levels rose from 9% to 23% during her term and unemployment reached levels not seen since the 1930's.

Meanwhile the rich were given endless tax breaks. The policies she introduced were the very start of a lot of the modern day problems we have.

I am quite frankly agog that people just seem to think ' strong, decisive leader' and remember some golden age.

No she wasn't awful...she was evil.

EDIT-Michael I see why you are head honcho round these parts.....

Answer 19

she broke the power of the unions she sold off the lazy and inept nationalised companies so even now you have cheaper gas and electricity than you did then [even with the recent price increases] she made britain a power to be reckoned with and gave us some of our pride back --which is sadly lacking now

Answer 20

She was a strong woman who didn't suffer fools gladly. She actually put this country back on the map and now look what this bunch of morons have done. A country needs a strong leader and you wont find one in the present shower of sh1te.

Answer 21

Kat.  Look up  Geoffrey Howe, he was loyal to her until she stabbed himin the back. But it was the worst thing she ever did (for herself) because he caused her downfall by standing up in Westminster, stating his case and then resigning from the cabinet.  He told it how it was. ( No pun intended.)

He was one of the better politicians of those times, but it was a shame he didn't do it earlier.

Haz and JOMOMO  have told you how it was for the people, nothing i can add to their posts except to say she also sold us even further down the river which is now known as the EU.

Here is a link for you re. Howe.  

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/1990/...

EDIT.

Oh yes, I forgot the abhorrent POLL TAX.  : --  (

Answer 22

The evil ***** sold off all of our national assets to pay for buying the police to put down the miners!

When she sold of the gas, oil, water and electricity industries to her pals for a fraction of there true worth it set the wheels in motion for the hyper prices that we have now!

By selling off council houses at a fraction of there true value she initiated the unprecedented rise in house prices that still exist today.

She managed to turn a whole generation into self seeking and selfish people with no thought for others other than 'how can we make money from them'.

During her term in office the economy of this country was devastated and my personal private pension was literally decimated (10% of what it should be). 4 million on the dole for so long that they became institutionalised to it.

Whole communities ripped apart by the closure of the coal mines, ship yards and steel works.

Too much to list here.

Never since the second world war did the gap between the rich and the poor become so pronounced.

Edit.

How many of you are actually old enough to remember what happened under Ted Heath and then under Margret Thatcher?

Less than two years under Ted Heath and we were in the Common Market and then years of depression, under Mrs. Thatcher, record interest rates, unequalled house reposessions, unequalled bankruptcies.

Answer 23

She was excellent and the only one with "balls" to do anything. She would have stood up to Nu Labour! Because she is a woman people hate her. Look at Bliar and Brown - because they are men they won't be hated for long.

Multiculturalism would not have happened either!

Answer 24

Be thankful you were not born then and sadly we are still living with some of the consequences today.

Answer 25

She broke families and grown men.  She broke the unions.  Don't even get me started.  The miner's strike is something I will never forget.  You can't begin to imagine the total devastation it brought to the families.  

Answer 26

Personally I think that she was the one of the best political leaders we have ever had - she never backed down from a situation, she took the action she felt was necessary and in the best interests of the country.

She balanced the books economically, something no one else has ever done, and left a legacy of strong economic growth.

In 1979 when she won the election I was 10 and we did suffer in the early 1980's with unemployment etc but as my economics teacher told us this was mainly unavoidable due to the mess her predecessors had made in running the economy.

The electorate knew this and that is why she was re-elected for a record number of times.

In my experience those who make her out to be some kind of demon tend to be of the "socialist" persuasion and live in the north of the country where pit closures and the union activity caused a lot of unemployment and bad feeling.

Answer 27

she was great in every respect

Answer 28

She was one of the finest two prime ministers this country has ever had the other being Winston Churchill.

The country would have been finished if she had not come to power when she did, you only have to look at the prime minister we have now to see howe great a person she was.

Europe did not boss us around when she was in charge

Answer 29

Mrs Thatcher i believe was one of our greatest PM's, but as you can see from the answers divides people like no other.

And many see her as capitalism gone mad. But what she did do was break the unions stranglehold on this country. Before then nationalised industries were bloated, with too many people, too much bureaucracy and she basically stopped it. In fact she did a lot more, but people have short memories, and unfortunately only remember the things like stopping the free milk for children, but if you are objective and actually see what she managed to achieve i think here legacy will be for all to see.

much of our industry was expensive to produce because the wages could not be controlled. So businesses went bust because they had work forces either constantly on strike, or making goods that basically could be got cheaper abroad.

Its called market forces, and it was and is inevitable.  If you run a nationalised industry that gives no incentives to people to perform then it grows fat and lazy and that i am sorry is what happened to many of our industries.

Michael   i know plenty of people who were council tenants who benefited from the right to buy policy, she did it to free up people to be able to buy, instead of just being part and parcel of the never ending council house sector. I would have bought mine had i been able.