'Which Prime Minister would you resurrect?' poll

Optimist

stevemcol wrote: »

Margaret Thatcher.....Margaret Thatcher!?!
Are our memories so short? If you traced the routes of this whole mess, that is where all clues would lead. The current crop of idiot bankers were brought up with all the empty values of 1980s Britain.
She was a tyrant. The tories of that era, and today, understood the cost of everything and the value of nothing.
Margaret was interested in the middle classes and the super rich; anyone else could find a suitable gutter and live happily ever after.

No wonder I end up disagreeing with 60% of MSE posters, on most subjects :rotfl:

You were obviously luckier than me as I fear I missed this veritable shangri-la, this wonderful caring society that some seem to think existed prior to Mrs Thatcher.

I do remember lots of strikes, waiting 12 months to get a phone installed. People preferring to buy Japanese cars because the British built ones broke down often. Ah yes happy days....

redux

It is somewhat stunning that this would imply that Thatcher is more popular now than she's ever been.

Especially when you consider that about a third of the electorate has changed since she left, and when she was actually in power, she became the least popular PM since records began.

Her colleagues were promising within 18 months to get rid of her, but didn't manage it until rather later than that. Her belief in abandoning consensus, her efforts to eradicate or marginalise anyone who might represent a threat to her, drifted the party to greater extremes, reduced the quality of people becoming involved in politics and left us with the sad bunch of self-interested pocket-filling careerists we see now.

And the policies which made her famous were drifted into as a mixture of expediency and almost accident. Privatisation had barely even been dreamt of at the beginning.

Inflation doubled in the first 2 years, from 10 to 20 per cent, and it was back up near 20 per cent a decade later. She trebled unemployment in the first couple of years, as many had predicted. Britain went into the ERM at a much too high exchange rate and fell out, Some people seem to be forgetting some of those things, or at least have been taken in by the myths built up as excuses.

Gordon_the_Moron

Fran wrote: »

Do you remember the Poll Tax riots?

Poll Tax

Yes I do, can someone explain to me how council tax more than doubling between 1997 and 2007 was not as bad as the poll tax?

stevemcol

Gordon_the_Moron wrote: »

Yes I do, can someone explain to me how council tax more than doubling between 1997 and 2007 was not as bad as the poll tax?

Taxation increasing is not the same as taxation being unfairly applied.

aliEnRIK

john52 wrote: »

Thatcher??? I'm afraid Thatcher has a lot to answer for as she alone wiped out the whole industrial belt which this country depended on, especially in areas in Scotland, Wales and NE England. Privatising everything she could think of was not the answer and we are all paying for that now. We're actually now more or less a "service" nation producing hee-haw and it's all thanks to her. I agree that an option of "None of the above" would have been more appropriate, but the numpties who voted for Thatcher have short memories, or have yet to remove the blue glasses!!

Absolutely true. I feel people voted in this poll without really having a clue what they were voting for
I too would have gone for the 'NONE OF THE ABOVE' option personally (Had it existed)

wallbash

aliEnRIK wrote: »

Absolutely true. I feel people voted in this poll without really having a clue what they were voting for
I too would have gone for the 'NONE OF THE ABOVE' option personally (Had it existed)

I knew exactly who to vote for , voted for her ( in truth , for my local Conservative ) at every general election.
So yes , some of us do have a clue.

aliEnRIK

wallbash wrote: »

I knew exactly who to vote for , voted for her ( in truth , for my local Conservative ) at every general election.
So yes , some of us do have a clue.

I didnt mean 'everyone' clearly

However, as youve responded. Could you please detail why you voted for her? She destroyed communities and really didnt care at all for the working class. I assume you are the same?
And as we are still paying for her privatising and probably will be for as long as the uk exists, how do you justify that? we could go even further and say that she is partially to blame for the way things are in the uk right now because if she hadnt privatised everything we would not be struggling as much as we are as a country now.

sharrison01

aliEnRIK wrote: »

I didnt mean 'everyone' clearly

However, as youve responded. Could you please detail why you voted for her? She destroyed communities and really didnt care at all for the working class. I assume you are the same?
And as we are still paying for her privatising and probably will be for as long as the uk exists, how do you justify that? we could go even further and say that she is partially to blame for the way things are in the uk right now because if she hadnt privatised everything we would not be struggling as much as we are as a country now.

Why would you think that privatising everything was such a bad thing? The government is a business and the biggest type of business that there is and surely any good business would sell of those areas that are losing them money? Do you really think that the inefficient and failing government companies would still be around right now with the increased competition from globalisation? Selling off those costly sections of the government was fantastic foresight for what was inevitably coming and lets not forget that she was not the only advocate of privatisation - Blair/Brown's attempted sale of extremely profitable revenue streams like The Dartford Bridge/Tunnel was hardly a good move.

Thatcher recognised that globalisation would mean that many UK companies could not compete long term because their costs were far greater than those in places like the Far East. However, she recognised that while our products could not compete, developing countries could not come close to competing with us in terms of services and particularly financial services. This caused one of the biggest booms in the economy in the 90's/00's because London became the financial centre of the world. Sadly the last government made little use of this.

And before the financial sector gets pointed at for the current mess, strong UK financial services has not made our recession any worse than those countries with weaker financial sectors. If anything in a global recession it has helped us even more as everyone is still turning to London for help and not Frankfurt/Tokyo/Singapore or any other city and this is propping up our economy...

aliEnRIK

Ill get back to you on that post sharrison, just got in from work

Im curious though, what do you believe Thatcher would do now to get us out of the mess? Theres nothing left to sell, thats for sure

Please dont start quoting what labour have done though. Ive already said I wouldnt have voted for ANY of them

wallbash

aliEnRIK wrote: »

I didnt mean 'everyone' clearly

However, as youve responded. Could you please detail why you voted for her? She destroyed communities and really didnt care at all for the working class. I assume you are the same?
And as we are still paying for her privatising and probably will be for as long as the uk exists, how do you justify that? we could go even further and say that she is partially to blame for the way things are in the uk right now because if she hadnt privatised everything we would not be struggling as much as we are as a country now.

Red Robbo, Aurthur Scargill , Leftwing loony councils ( esp Liverpool)
Thats a good start.

By the way 'assume' what you want..... just pleased that she is still number one. Will 'assume' that will upset you , for that I am pleased.