Margaret Thatcher set Britain’s decline in motion – so why can’t politics exorcise her ghost? MPs on all sides pay homage, while her failures – which lie behind many of the crises we face today – are forgotten.
by bottish
Margaret Thatcher set Britain’s decline in motion – so why can’t politics exorcise her ghost? MPs on all sides pay homage, while her failures – which lie behind many of the crises we face today – are forgotten.
by bottish
23 comments
> Even more strikingly, her iconic status is also being sustained by Labour’s most senior figures. Last November, the shadow chancellor, Rachel Reeves, said: “My generation of women, of course we have been influenced by her.” In December, Keir Starmer said that she “sought to drag Britain out of its stupor by setting loose our natural entrepreneurialism”. Last month, the shadow foreign secretary, David Lammy, said she “was a visionary leader for the UK – no doubt about it”.
> These homages from the party she tried so hard to destroy are often justified by the need to appeal to Tory voters and journalists in the run-up to the election. It’s a familiar, if humiliating, Labour ritual. Whether this also drives leftwing voters away from the party is a question that neither its current leadership nor the media show much interest in asking.
Failures are only in the eye of the beholder. You obviously are not wealthy.
Is this article seriously trying to suggest that Britain wasn’t in decline long before Thatcher was in power? Three day week was a fucking economic highlight was it?
If you imagine a pot of soup and it needs a bit of salt to make it taste good, then Thatcher added that salt.
It was obvious the salt was needed and just about anyone would have added that salt.
She got credit for adding the salt as if it was genius, it wasn’t and then for ever after she kept adding salt.
Salt and salt and more salt. And people praise her for getting the obvious stuff right and try to ignore the heavily populist, divisive stuff she did to stay in power.
When someone is very bad at their job they don’t get everything wrong. In fact they probably get most things right. But they get enough wrong that it’s a disaster. That’s Thatcher. She got lots right but so would anyone. But they wouldn’t fuck things up like she did
It was better than using oil taxes to put the countries workforce on the dole.
They are not forgotten in Scotland. No one will forget the Milk Snatcher.
I’ve been saying the same thing for fecking years. You can also look to the US where many of its deep rooted problems (and idiocies) are due to that silly cunt Regan – who like Thatcher followed the policy objectives or guidelines of right-wing fruitcake Milton Friedman (Nobel Prize, ma erse).
Not to worry though, apparently all will be well in Scotland when ‘Sir’ Keir The Dull Red ~~Tory~~ Thatcherite takes over and Ian ‘Bawheid’ Murray is appointed our Viceroy . :/
Mighty Margret was the greatest president the uk has ever had.
It’s been 34 years and 8 prime ministers since Thatcher was last the leader of the country. As much as she has a legacy, she’s a distraction from the failings of politicians since her time.
>why can’t politics exorcise her ghost?
Money. They want to be on a Thatcherite gravy train when there’s next to nothing left to sell off.
Ayrshire doesn’t forget
Weird article…
All polls show a favourable attitude towards Thatcher, others also believe she tutned around what was a horrific looking future from the 70s onwards.
No love here though due to her policies costing my grandfather his home.
To be honest I think David Cameron and George Osbourne did even worse damage to the UK.
They should be remembered the same as Thatcher. Nearly all their policies on reflection have turned out badly for us.
Andy Beckett is a Guardian columnist … and a clueless hack. Thatcher made your skin crawl and she had no panacea; but she made changes which had been ducked by her predecessors for previous 40 years. Results: mixed.
I wonder how impartial and well balanced this will be!
The guardian.
Never mind then.
Thatcher deserves both praise and condemnation.
She dragged the country into the modern age away from a slow decline into obscurity, the coal mines were going to be gone anyway (they were unprofitable and an environmental nightmare) – you don’t maintain the status quo just because.
The unions had become far too strong at the time and thankfully she tamed them, did she go too far though?
The poll tax was arguably a fairer way of taxation, but very poorly implemented.
Then there was selling off all the housing stock with absolutely no plan in place to replenish – and has led to the housing issues we see four decades later.
Honk!
Despite her actions, she did not set the decline in motion. It was already in motion. We had started to lose, and were losing the Empire which brought about £230 trillion to our GDP. Annually, our GDP is now £25-30 trillion.
It was managed decline, or abrupt hyper inflation inducing decline.
Labour have been conducting managed decline as well as the Tories and every other party would need to do the same, unless they had a solid plan to reinvest and get the UK reindustrialised and exporting – which against the extremely low prices of China and India is not happening, unless you want to work for £10 a month.
Edit: And if you think I’m exaggerating about the wages, actually Google how much a monthly wage for the low skilled factory work is in India/China, and consider how much cheap shit people in the west buy from these countries. Temo? Amazon? “Oh its only £20, I won’t return it”
It’s because the period immediately before she came to power was terrible, and then she lead the country to victory in a war. My boomer parents were young adults at the time and they describe it, emotionally, as feeling like a time of hopeful resurgence.
On an emotional level, I think the country during her time represents the same thing to boomers as the time under new-labour does for millenials. It’s a not-perfect-but-better period where we had hope.
Anyone chasing reliable boomer votes, will use her name.
hilarious. its been over 30 years since she was in power. Plenty of time to change course
Decline in motion?
* 3 Day week
* rolling blackouts
* Inflation at 25%
* IMF bailout
* Winter of discontent
Let’s be honest here, this bitch is that, a bitch. But Britain was fucked before she took power. 3 day weeks, winter of discontent. All the economic policies she’s blamed for, had to happen. The nationalized industries weren’t producing anything anymore. They were jobs programs in a time when the money didn’t exist for them. Modern Britain’s woes are from Brexit simple as.
But she was a cunt in NI so she can still rot.
