Edited and full versions of Margaret Thatcher's 'The lady's not for turning' speech, delivered at the Conservative party conference in Brighton on 10 October 1980 And for the people of Ireland, and especially the north, the Thatcher years were among some of the worst of the conflict. She was immensely brisk. Adam Smith's invisible hand ended up raising two fingers to her moral project. Literature had nothing to do with politics, the Italian writers said. She was not a writer. That's because, 23 years after she was ejected from Downing Street by her own party in a move whose psychic wounds linger on, the country we live in remains Thatcher's Britain. Her centralism, unequalled in Europe, descended under Blair into a morass of targetry, inefficiency and endless reorganisation. The proportion of children living in relative poverty more than doubled during the 80s, and the damage has never been undone. with concern about global warming, having done more than any other politician They are a more energetic and impressive group than their predecessors, often with experience outside politics that makes them impatient and independent-minded. Bob Slayer, one of the genuine alternative comedians on the scene, likes to note the irony of what's become of comedy. She may have got it slightly wrong. Since 1990 a selection of statements is listed. She was 87. Her defenders always insisted that sentence had been misunderstood, but it stuck because it seemed to capture something essential about the Thatcherite creed: its embrace of individualism and apparent disdain for the collective. Maybe my memory is fanciful. The Big Bang of City deregulation, the Tell Sid scramble for buying and selling shares, the sense that money is the highest value, wealth the greatest sign of worth all these were hallmarks of the Thatcher era in its mid-80s pomp. Statistics now confirm what many people have always recognised: that inequality is divisive and socially corrosive. 'It's a wonder nobody has taken a gun to that woman.' While "one nation" Conservatives condone some forms of redistribution, their libertarian . The three of us watched as the gentle horticultural ritual was feebly enacted, then regarded the Iron Lady being helped into the back of a car and trundling off. Contrary to an increasingly common belief, "a woman who is successful" is not synonymous with "a feminist". Three aspects of it never completely leave my head. Margaret has spent her life fighting for social justice and equality. But for others, the change in landscape is all too real. It fell to Blair to do something about the latter, while giving free rein to the former. To have achieved all this alone would have made Margaret Thatcher a towering, transformational figure, one who altered the physical fabric of the nation. Everyone knows that. She went to a fee-paying school and to Oxford at her father's expense, gliding easily into the upper echelons of student politics. Sir Bernard Ingham was Margaret Thatcher writ large. as far as can be known. studying Thatcher's speeches . Here, for instance, was what the Guardian reported upon the death last month of Hugo Chavez: "To the millions who detested him as a thug and charlatan, it will be occasion to bid, vocally or discreetly, good riddance.". Scotland was her mission impossible. She was lucky in surviving the IRA's bomb. From 1979 to 1990, Margaret Thatcher held the office of Prime . see them re-imposed at a European level with a European super-state exercising We liked disliking her. In January 1983 she Nicknamed the "Iron Lady," Thatcher served as the prime minister of England from 1979 to 1990. Promises. Above all has been the hollowing out of the labour market. Margaret Thatcher's Speech to Congress. Reversing Britain's long-term economic decline. speech in July 1945, delivered in a town close to Grantham while she Here shovels the earth during a tree-planting ceremony . In the prime Thatcher years they required a severity of will to carry through that would now, if called on, bewrapped in so many cycles of deluding spin as to persuade us it hadn't really happened. All rights reserved. We might speculate that an adviser had offered Thatcher a selection of good lines, or that she had asked to see some. For those miners and their families to be referred to as the "enemy within" by Thatcher was something they would never forgive and, if there is rejoicing at her death in those communities she set out to destroy, it can only be understood against this background. It destroyed the public's power to determine via parliament the services and prices of gas, electricity, telephone. "The original alternative comics just did it because they had to," he says. How dare her apologists and beneficiaries of her legacy refer to trade unions like the NUM as "corrupt" in the face of their bonuses and tax cuts! This was hardly the first or even the worst example of a dig at Thatcher tinged so needlessly with sexism. Making sure the verdict wasn't purloined by others. Rishi Sunak 20 July 2022 9:30pm. I made this argument at length last year when Christopher Hitchens died and a speak-no-ill rule about him was instantly imposed (a rule he, more than anyone, viciously violated), and I won't repeat that argument today; those interested can read my reasoning here. She all but erased his political legacy to stamp her own image on the nation, so Britain before and after Thatcher were two different countries. She was right, he was wrong. Prime Minister Thatcher delivered the fourth speech to Congress by a British prime minister. She worked to enhance its corporate power. She became leader of the Conservatives the year I was born and prime minister when I was four. Every quality had its obverse, but she had a myth-making charisma to capture the world's imagination. One might even credit Thatcher with a willingness to jettison the old rules and conventions that used to prevent individuals deciding their own destiny. A growing body of research now shows that the quality of social relations is among the most powerful influences on the happiness, health and wellbeing of populations in the rich countries. As I see it, and as one who had the pleasure of knowing both, they would recognize the huge opportunity created by the presence of each in the respective national and international policy-making role. Second, it's now easier to see the scale of the setback she inflicted on Britain's idea of its own future. She continued for some reason to consider me worth talking to. She and her successors John Major and Tony Blair presided over a quarter century of unprecedented prosperity. Maggie! But she also provided great material. Margaret Flowers is a leading activist, doctor, teacher, and co-founder of PopularResistance.org, a website that aims to inform and inspire grassroots movements around the world. To project the ideas of strength and . Of all the things to criticise Thatcher for, calling her out for being a woman seems like something of a wasted bullet. Your local electricity "board" could be a very unfriendly place. In 11 years, Thatcher promoted only one woman to her cabinet, preferring instead to elevate men whom Spitting Image memorably and, in certain instances, accurately, described as "vegetables". Thatcher's passing is marked by street parties in Brixton, Belfast, Bristol, Derry, Glasgow and Liverpool, and seething bitterness among the mining families and communities she was allowed (including by scab union and Labour leaders) to destroy. a new dominance from Brussels". And that made it easy to mock her. Norman Tebbit, one of Thatcher's acolytes and fellow "Munsters evacuee", said when the National Union of Mineworkers eventually succumbed to the military onslaught and starvation over which she presided: "We didn't just break the strike, we broke the spell." But other villages have never recovered, their heart and purpose ripped out. April 8, 2013. She famously changed the law after Bobby Sands was elected in Fermanagh and South Tyrone. Second was the particular hostility towards Margaret Thatcher and her local ministerial spear-carrier, energy minister and incumbent MP of 13 years' standing, Hamish Gray. Maybe it was the sound of the estuary pronunciation robbing her of her aspirational airs, a prototype of the Bouquet/Bucket joke. John Major, the "detoxification" successor, was fated to implement many of her unattempted reforms. Later that year she introduced the broadcasting ban on Sinn Fin, which prevented viewers and listeners hearing my voice. On taking office she showered money on public sector unions, and her "cuts" were only to planned increases, mild compared with today's. March 7, 1991 - Receives the US Medal of Freedom from President George Bush. Indeed, many of the policy innovations associated with Thatcher had already been pioneered by her predecessor. The price we all continue to pay for Thatcherite policies is to live in a less cohesive and more antisocial society, in which community life is weaker, people feel less able to trust each other and fewer of those in government have the experience and compassion to represent or understand the vast majority. Today's Tories walk in Thatcher's footsteps, battling with their estranged cousins in Ukip over who is the rightful heir to her Eurosceptic legacy. When all the public amenities were flogged, the adverts made it seem to my childish eyes fun and positive, jaunty slogans and affable British stereotypes jostling about in villages, selling people companies that they'd already paid for through tax. Typifying these highly dubious claims about Thatcher was this (appropriately diplomatic) statement from President Obama: "The world has lost one of the great champions of freedom and liberty, and America has lost a true friend." Draining down those 11 years to their memorable essence, what does one light upon? The leading feminist Natasha Walter called Thatcher "the great unsung heroine of British feminism". Britain's relative decline came to an end, although that was more due to slowdowns in countries such as France and Germany than an acceleration in UK productivity growth. And on the 11th June, we even won some nine seats we failed to gain in 1983. Whatever Tory historians like to claim, this was the critical turning point. When John Lennon was told of Elvis Presley's death, he famously responded: "Elvis died when he joined the army," meaning of course, that his combat clothing and clipped hair signalled the demise of the thrusting, Dionysian revolution of which he was the immaculate emblem. She remained in power till I was 15. She adopts an endearing and sentimental tone using ethos, repetition, and . On her return to London, she sent me a warm and complimentary letter, a prize in my personal archives. John asked a nearby chippy loading his white van. Perhaps there is resentment because the clemency and respect that are being mawkishly displayed now by some and haughtily demanded of the rest of us at the impending, solemn ceremonial funeral, are values that her government and policies sought toannihilate. In towns and valleys poleaxed by the Iron Lady, there may be glasses raised at her passing. The last time I met her was after all this was over. I can't articulate with the skill of either of "the Marks" Steel or Thomas why Thatcher and Thatcherism were so bad for Britain but I do recall that even to a child her demeanour and every discernible action seemed to be to the detriment of our national spirit and identity. We had an all-out blistering row that delighted the organisers. She considered European Commission president Jacques Delors a campaigner for . She denounced Nelson Mandela and his ANC as "terrorists", something even David Cameron ultimately admitted was wrong. Government policy during the 1980s was little more than a war policy, aimed at defeating or isolating republicanism. The Collected Speeches of Margaret Thatcher by. Thatcher's use of rhetorical devices supports her eulogy because the concept of Reagan being more. Until then Thatcher had shown the strength of her weakness: a dislike of consensus and aversion to debate, leading to decisive action. Oil helped Thatcher paper over the cracks, but Britain's age-old problem finding a way to pay its way in the world remains. Bernard Ingham, journalist and civil servant. The first is what changed in the temper of Britain and the British. Had pollsters and the 24/7 media forced leaders to follow opinion, not lead it? The south of England and the City of London were the future; the revenues from North Sea oil would pay for the unemployed in the old zones of manufacturing industry. Rhetorical Analysis Of Margaret Thatcher's Speech 722 Words | 3 Pages . She, for one, never underestimated her friend from California, then a state of some 24 million. ", This attitude that men are fun but dumb, women are smart but strident, a view of the sexes that seems to come straight out of a Judd Apatow film led to various quotes of hers that some like to twist into proof that Thatcher was an unwitting feminist. Nelson travelled to South Africa where he helped negotiate a deal that saw the UDA, UVF and Ulster Resistance acquire AK-47 automatic rifles, pistols, grenades, and RPG rocket launchers in late 1987 or early 1988. As a child she unnerved me but we are not children now and we are free to choose our own ethical codes and leaders that reflect them. The truth lies somewhere between these extremes. September 25, 2020. She attacked the Treaty of Maastricht in a Their target was "the enemy within" working-class power and the so-called culture of entitlement. Any attempts at revisionism do no favours to her, women or feminism. The Crown's Version of Margaret Thatcher's 1990 Downfall Takes a Lot of Liberties with . If the Falklands war was the making of Thatcher, then the poll tax was her achilles heel not least in Scotland. In 1976 it still did not help and in the same year they had to take a loan in the International Monetary Fund (IMF) [] . In 1979 it had a mile or so of shipyards, a sugar works and factories that still made rope and ship's fittings. Margaret Thatcher Essay: Health Category. The Cameron generation wrongly see in the 1980s a revolution to emulate, starting with an economic crisis just like hers, as a chance to reshape everything. 1971 was the year of Ted Heath's Conservative government, which was trying to make huge savings to the budget. These include, "We have to show them that we're better than they are", and "Women can get into corners that men can't reach!" she warned that she was not "Fatcha" was an instant punchline back then: simply saying it was enough to get a laugh. Margaret Thatcher's speech writer will miss funeral but 'shed a tear' When the mourners gather for Baroness Thatcher's funeral tomorrow, one important figure from her political past will be . Thatcher's infamous failure to recognise the existence of society was a double failure. successfully rolled back the frontiers of the state in Britain, only to A decade later they were wiped out in terms of Scotland-based Westminster constituency representation. Its strategies included the shallow and ineffectual 1985 Anglo-Irish Agreement which was about creating a political alliance involving the Dublin establishment, the SDLP and the British to defeat Irish republicanism. CD icon next to them in the second column of the results list. The dockers. Although the "right to buy" and the privatisation of utilities by selling shares to new small investors was often justified as giving rights to "the little people", the reality is that the less well-off fell ever further behind the rich. On the day Thatcher died, the Daily Mail ran a piece claiming that Coco Chanel "was a feminist before the word existed". In the pantheon of this comedian's attacks on Thatcher, it was a retort that probably won't be treasured longer than the best lines from The Young Ones. The welfare state, with its unemployment and housing benefits and free healthcare, actually protected wages: employers could not force workers to accept low pay or unpaid overtime because of the job's healthcare provision, as they do in the US. I wouldn't say I have got myself a Kennedy-type speech-writer yet . Whathappened at the hands of this woman's indifference to sentiment andgood sense in the early 1980s brought unnecessary calamity to the lives of several million people who losttheir jobs. In a world where most media talking heads come from the top few percent of income earners, unions are not only important in wage bargaining, they also provide some of the few well-informed voices whose job it is to speak on behalf of the less well-paid. Oxford CD-ROM explains how the statements were assembled and edited The news last week that they are instead considering cutting or freezing the minimum wage surely undermines any pretence that the government is acting either coherently or in the public interest. Far from "smashing the glass ceiling", she was the aberration, the one who got through and then pulled the ladder up right after her. The Bruges speech was given by British prime minister Margaret Thatcher to the College of Europe at the Belfry of Bruges, Belgium, on 20 September 1988.Thatcher was opposed to any moves to transition the European Economic Community (EEC) into a federal Europe that would take powers away from its members. one TRIBUTES were paid last night to Sir Bernard Ingham, the longstanding press secretary to Margaret Thatcher and a columnist in The Yorkshire Post until just a few weeks ago. In January 1976, Thatcher delivered a speech at Kensington Town Hall in London, and spoke about the Iron Curtain the political boundary that separated Europe during World War II. Thatcher's threat to butcher the mining industry, destroy the fabric of mining communities and in particular the trade union to which miners had a bond of loyalty, was met with the fiercest resistance any government has met in peacetime. This is accomplished by this baseless moral precept that it is gauche or worse to balance the gushing praise for them upon death with valid criticisms. She failed to replace those jobs with well-paid equivalents. Each was characterised by her attention to detail. It'd be disingenuous to omit that there were a fair number of ding-dong-style celebratory messages amidst the pensive reflections on the end of an era. She needed followers, as long as they went in her frequently unpopular directions. The spell of community. Research papers can be complex, so best to give our essay writing service a bit more time on this one. "Labour is stuck because they do not want to carry on the slimming down of the state and devolution of power but nor do they really want to reverse it," said one central Tory figure. A distinction is often made between two traditions of British Conservative thought: the paternalist "one nation/middle way" tradition, and the more libertarian one that is associated with Margaret Thatcher. Behind "omnishambles" headlines, her revolution is being pushed forward on new fronts in schools, health, planning, policing, probation and welfare. What's more, it was moulded to the wall as one commentator recalled and you had no right to change it, not without becoming entangled in a state-managed bureaucracy. Simon Heffer, journalist, historian and friend of Margaret Thatcher, recommends the best books to read to gain an understanding of the United Kingdom's first female prime ministerand explains why she was the most influential British leader of the modern era. A massive programme of social housing would be a good place to start, stimulating the economy. When I was a kid, Thatcher was the headmistress of our country. It may be wrong to imagine that she intended to de-industrialise Britain, but the policies followed by her government had that effect. Some places have become heritage parks, remembering an industry now vanished. If anything, it becomes more compelling to commemorate those bad acts upon death as the only antidote against a society erecting a false and jingoistically self-serving history. The British inflation was in 1975 up at 24, 11% [] and with the union's constant claim for higher salaries, nobody expected it to drop to a normal level. In 1979 she inherited a nation that was the "sick man of Europe", an object of constant transatlantic ridicule. It isn't sad for anyone else. Well, everything really, even her name. It always struck me as peculiar, too, when the Spice Girls briefly championed Thatcher as an early example of girl power. Nor, contrary to myth, did Thatcherism emerge fully formed in May 1979. The author Nassim Taleb traded equations on a whiteboard with Gus O'Donnell, then head of the civil service, as they debated econometrics; at another, I watched entranced as Lord Heseltine argued urban policies with Harvard's Ed Glaeser. For some, the only consequence of that shift, still visible today, will be a changed brand name or higher bills. "They did their thing with no chance of making any money, so they stood up in crappy pubs and said, 'I hate Maggie'. Margaret Thatcher Curriculum Vitae. At times the Conservative party is so anarchic as to appear almost ungovernable, like a plethora of pressure groups pushing pet causes rather than a united group ruthlessly focusing on political success. Knocking up a flan for Denis or helping Carol with her algebra or Mark with his gun-running, are jarring distractions from the main narrative; woman as warrior queen. The prime minister was intensely interested in the campaign, and asked many penetrating questions. speech to the House of Lords in June 1993. I was on my own. At an international conference in Lisbon in the late 80s, the British faction, among whom were Salman Rushdie, Martin Amis, Malcolm Bradbury and myself, referred back to Thatcher constantly in our presentations. speech which caused the Soviets to dub her "the Iron Lady", one Sir Bernard died after a short illness, his family said. That speech was a rare instance of a politician saying something tangible. She had just finished the first volume of her memoirs, which she insisted was all her own work. It was a visit warmly welcomed by President Reagan, with a resplendent state nner on the first evening. Or perhaps it was just because I was a little kid and more interested in them Weetabix skinheads, Roland Rat and Knight Rider. The state retained control of some nationalised industries the railways, for example but BT, British Airways, British Steel, British Gas and the British Airports Authority were among the big companies sold off. She preferred markets, and a strong but minimal central state that backed their rule. The evidence shows that greater equality provides the foundation on which higher standards of social wellbeing can be built. It came very hard, getting the words and paragraphs in the right order, a task for which, she eventually admitted, she had hired some help. Her policy decisions entrenched sectarian divisions, handed draconian military powers over to the securocrats, and subverted basic human rights. Out!" Under this heading, Thatcher left a dark legacy that, like her successes, has still not disappeared behind the historical horizon. Her gender led her into government and the shadow cabinet, despite Edward Heath's aversion to her. This site follow the same rules (and shares an editor). None present eyed her meanly or spoke with vitriol and it wasn't until an hour later that I dreamt up an Ealing comedy-style caper in which two inept crooks kidnap Thatcher from the garden but are unable to cope with the demands of dealing with her, and finally give her back. Miners had always known that eventually any of the colleries would close and were always prepared to accept that as a fact of life and find employment somewhere else within the industry, but Thatcher's attack was wholesale. Margaret Thatcher might seem to some like an unlikely pioneer of the need for climate action but, in the late 1980s, she made a series of remarkable speeches and interventions on the subject and . rejecting Commission proposals at the Rome European Council with the words Perhaps we suspected that reality had created a character beyond our creative reach. talked of "Victorian Values". Governments can rarely claim to have stimulated the arts but Thatcher, always rather impatient with the examined life, drew writers on to new ground. We had had a strange relationship. Animals and Pets Anime Art Cars and Motor Vehicles Crafts and DIY Culture, Race, and Ethnicity Ethics and Philosophy Fashion Food and Drink History Hobbies Law Learning and Education Military Movies Music Place Podcasts and Streamers Politics Programming Reading, Writing, and Literature Religion and Spirituality Science Tabletop Games . In fact, Margaret Thatcher was known for her lack of a sense of humour. Her unforgettable presence, but also her policy achievements. Creative destruction was capitalism's necessary agent, so equilibrium was bound to be restored.
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