And she never gained a majority of the votes cast.





No argument from me there.

What better day to bury bad news?



[url=http://www.teachers.org.uk/node/16317Gove sanctions unqualified teachers to teach in academies[/url



Happy with them making profits though.



Edumacation is safe under the tories.

Quote El Barbudo="El Barbudo"Ajw71 is making a classic error of logic.'" Erm, 8 polls which all rank Thatcher in the top 5. The logical conclusion from this is that she was one of the best prime minsisters. Pretty simple really. Quote El Barbudo="El Barbudo"There are probably polls out there about who was the [uworst[/u Prime Minister ... and I'd put money on the witch being top of that one. I am not going to look for such a poll because it would probably have as many failings as the ones that Ajw71 has mentioned.... and prove nothing.'" Check the other end of my polls for your answer. Thatcher is nowhere near the bottom in any of them. Quote El Barbudo="El Barbudo"I think I'll stick with General Election results ... in which more people thought that someone else was better to run the country than she and I very much doubt those people have changed their minds.'" Strange point this, as you can say this about every single prime minister since 1945. www.politicsresources.net/area/u ... ntvote.htm In every single election since 1945, more people thought someone else would be better as PM rather than the person who was elected. This isn't unique to Thatcher as you imply.

Quote El Barbudo="El Barbudo"Ajw71 is making a classic error of logic.'" Erm, 8 polls which all rank Thatcher in the top 5. The logical conclusion from this is that she was one of the best prime minsisters. Pretty simple really. Quote El Barbudo="El Barbudo"There are probably polls out there about who was the [uworst[/u Prime Minister ... and I'd put money on the witch being top of that one. I am not going to look for such a poll because it would probably have as many failings as the ones that Ajw71 has mentioned.... and prove nothing.'" Check the other end of my polls for your answer. Thatcher is nowhere near the bottom in any of them. Quote El Barbudo="El Barbudo"I think I'll stick with General Election results ... in which more people thought that someone else was better to run the country than she and I very much doubt those people have changed their minds.'" Strange point this, as you can say this about every single prime minister since 1945. www.politicsresources.net/area/u ... ntvote.htm In every single election since 1945, more people thought someone else would be better as PM rather than the person who was elected. This isn't unique to Thatcher as you imply.

The lack of calcium has clearly had an effect.. It just reminds me this, how horrible, mean and nasty the Tories under Thatcher were. They were also incredibly useless. Caused a war, country bankrupt, riots all over the shop, supporters of apartheid, just how anyone with the slightest bit of sense could think Thatcher was anything other than a nut job needs to take a good long look at themselves.

So because she became unpopular in some quarters at the end of her tenure we are supposed to forget all the good she did?



Doesn't really work like that.



If I cured cancer, the common cold and won 3 nobel peace prizes then slept with Kate Middleton. I might become unpopular for commiting adultery but I've still cured cancer, the common cold and won 3 nobel peace prizes.

In the cold light of hindsight she didn't do much good though.



She sold off the family silver, put millions out of work, wrote off at least one generation, spend billions trying to prop up the ERM, cost lives by defending tiny islands thousands of miles away, started the housing boom, destroyed communities and put us on the long slow slide to being a nation that knows the price of everything but the value of nowt.



So no, I don't forget the good she did, I never saw any good and if you'd have lived through it you wouldn't either.

There wasn't any

All the good for who exactly? Not me or my family, nor the ordinary man on the street or his family. A lot like todays lot.

Only to a simpleton

She wasn't just "unpopular in some quarters", she couldn't find an ally even in her own political party and still she tried to hang onto power - thats what power does to a person when you have no opposition, it corrupts.



So wrapped up in her self esteem was she that those tears outside Downing St were actually real, she really could not believe that her own party had just fired her, as far as she was concerned she was doing a great job and leading us down a road towards her utopian vista - it was just everyone else, EVERYONE else who didn't want to go there.



You need to go back to your books and read up on what a right wing dictatorship could look like in the early 90s, I keep mentioning Pinochet because he was an absolute hero of hers and a definite role model, you could do worse than to read up on that regime in order to realise where we were heading as a country while you were still pre-school, and then (and I never thought I'd say this) thank Heseltine for growing some balls and standing up to her.



Thatcher should also thank Heseltine for letting her slip out of Downing St in a car with Dennis, her best friend Pinochet would have had her shot.

On the other hand, it does seem that Ajw71 is proof of the dumbing down of the education system and the success of the promotion of the 'greed is good' ethos.

Quote Ajw71="Ajw71"Erm, 8 polls which all rank Thatcher in the top 5. The logical conclusion from this is that she was one of the best prime minsisters. Pretty simple really. Check the other end of my polls for your answer. Thatcher is nowhere near the bottom in any of them. Strange point this, as you can say this about every single prime minister since 1945. www.politicsresources.net/area/u ... ntvote.htm In every single election since 1945, more people thought someone else would be better as PM rather than the person who was elected. This isn't unique to Thatcher as you imply.'" You still don't get it, probably deliberately trolling. You said those who disagreed with you were in the minority. The election results show that they are not.

Quote Ajw71="Ajw71"Erm, 8 polls which all rank Thatcher in the top 5. The logical conclusion from this is that she was one of the best prime minsisters. Pretty simple really. Check the other end of my polls for your answer. Thatcher is nowhere near the bottom in any of them. Strange point this, as you can say this about every single prime minister since 1945. www.politicsresources.net/area/u ... ntvote.htm In every single election since 1945, more people thought someone else would be better as PM rather than the person who was elected. This isn't unique to Thatcher as you imply.'" You still don't get it, probably deliberately trolling. You said those who disagreed with you were in the minority. The election results show that they are not.

Please explain how the results of the general election in 79 can be a yardstick to measure how great Thatcher was? She hadn't even served a term in office yet.



In 1945, more people wanted someone else as PM instead of Clement Attlee. Was he not a great prime minister either?



To think you tried to discredit my polls. Talk about clutching at straws.

please explain







she single handedly managed to destroy the infrastructure of a nation which is now struggling because of it

Halifax don't have any call centres in India. All UK based.



However.



Some are based in Leeds, and have a mix of people, some of whom are of Indian origin. These guys always got confused for being in India.



I speak as someone who's been on that side of the phone. With Halifax. And as they still pay my rent and bills every month, I'll say no more.

Most people agree that Thatcher had many faults, the a point of debate is what would have happened if Labour had remained in power?



Manufacturing would have slowed down regardless of who was in government, emerging economies in the Asia had already started to eat away at our large scale manufacturing base. Like it or not our inefficiency was not helped by the unions. Ineffective management didn't help either.



On the sell off most of the huge nationalised industries were union-dominated, under funded, inefficient and massive loss makers. It would have cost billions to drag them into the modern era - so to sell seems like a prudent cause of action.



With regards to mining - it could not compete with coal from other countries, it importance was massively overstated due to the high profile that Arthur maintained due to regular threats of strike. The numbers of miners had declined significantly over the previous twenty years.

...because of heavy investment in automation (just like lots of other industries that were labour intensive in the 1950s and 60s).



Just to give you an idea of the investment my brother-in-law worked underground at Bates Pit in Blyth Northumberland until the 84/85 strike, in the year before the strike the pit, which mined coal several miles out under the North Sea, had invested £1million in "intelligent" roof supports which were basically self adjusting, and massive pumping equipment - it was descibed as "state of the art" in the mining industry, anywhere in the world.



In the first month of the strike the pit was closed as maintenance was not completed as scheduled, it flooded and all of that equipment was lost underground.

As has been pointed out before, W Germany managed to continue with a strong manufacturing base, despite most industries being heavily unionised.







The cheap, brown coal that we imported from Australia and India may have cost less per tonne than British coal but it was of such poor calorific value that the price difference was negligible when costed on an energy-produced basis and helped push up the cost of producing British steel. Further factor in the extra welfare payments required and it had a negative impact on our economy.

Wasn't there an outcry at some point because we were importing coal mined by children?

Hey, it was "cheap" who cares?

As has also been pointed out before the relationship between the unions and the employers is significantly different to that of what existed and still exists in the UK. This relationship changed significantly at the time of the last major recession in Germany and the balance of power shifted to the employers, the unions in Germany have a very limited power base i.e. they seen the light whereby unrealistic pay and condition demands lead to loss of jobs. It helps when the bosses are also realistic about their own worth.

The relationship between German trades unions and management has never really changed at all, it never needed to and as has been proved here on numerous occasions, when British unions are invloved in decision making, there's far more chance of a equitable outcome. But please don't let that prevent you from your knocking of everything related to the trades union movement

Here's a little thingie to chuck in: how much did the decision by Rupert Murdoch to ban all independent trades unions from NI titles at Wapping, and replace them with an in-hpuse staff association, contribute to a culture of criminal and unethical behaviour being allowed to continue for such a long time?

More widely, [url=http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jul/30/economic-policy-adam-smith?INTCMP=SRCHthis is fascinating on what Adam Smith might thing of the current situation.[/url