Blair rules out a state funeral for Thatcher

Saw this article and for a moment my heart rose but alas they are just talking about the planning not an actual current event .

All a storm in a teacup apparently.


And before you all get your hopes up that there is no smoke without fire

I read that Thatcher will probably get the biggest state funeral of all time. and rightly fucking so, best PM Britain has ever had.

Yeah, her achievements easily outweigh those of, say, Churchill.

with the exception of WW2, they certainly do. you are right jimbo (makes note on calendar)

Churchill's achievements were in a different field, Thatcher's were no less impressive.

you weren't even born for the first part of her reign!
a few of us are gonna have a massive party to celebrate when she buys it. bring it on!

Churchill did get a state funeral in 1965.


Not even the Queen Mum got one, she had a ceremonial one, so regardless of what anyone thinks of Mrs Thatcher, protocoll states that seeing as she is actually not a reigning monarch, there is no state funeral.
And quite rightly so.

and this from a man who fondly imagines he is a better harbinger of the Scottish zeitgeist than me. Sheesh! Go on Schotte, I dare you to wear an 'I love Maggie Thatcher' badge on Sauchiehall Street and see what reaction you get.

'With the exception of World War II'. Quite a big exception to be honest. Churchill also achieved quite a lot more besides that, but I can't be arsed to google it all now and post links.

not many on this site i dont believe were born under churchill either. your point being?!

disgraceful "celebrating" anyones passing.

Pah. Ya'll just wait to see how many closeted Thatcher-lovers come out of the woodwork when she kicks.

Did you see the orgy of love that Ronald Reagan got? People climbing all over each other to say the most memorable thing about how great he was. Disgusting.

god you bore me fucking senseless you know that with your idiot notions. get of your high horse just once - you dont know everything and sure as hell cant put other peoples opinions down just as you somehow think you can.


fairly unpopular post-war PM you must agree.

She had her faults, but in fairness the British economy was on it's knees because of the unions, and the almost hyper inflation Callaghan and the Labour party allowed to ferment before she came to power.

your point taken; which means I guess we have very different memories of Thatcher and her era, mine being more 'hands on', so to speak

re.celebrating someone's passing we've had this discussion before...

i'm already out as a thatcher lover. best thing to happen to britain in the latter half of the 20th century. (bit dodgy on her foriegn policies though and her hard stance against the ira was more personal than thought through, but major sorted that out.)

quite right too!
they should declare the day she finally descends to the lowest level of hell a day of national celebration, with loudspeakers blasting out "Ding Dong, the Witch is Dead (which old witch - the wicked witch!!)"
all right-thinking folk will be dancing in the streets, singing hallelujah

She just knew that to make a good omellette you have to break some eggs.

Ask the Thatcher haters what was wrong with her, and usually there was a very good reason that she caused the upset, with a long term view.

What do you hate about Thatcher then Topsy?

nah mate its usually the people that couldnt be arsed working for a decent wage and so instead of being allowed to sit on their arses all day waving pickets and causing massive damage to the country thatcher rightly so waved them away. just wished the fireman had done the same when she was there and we could have avoided that a few years ago.

No doubt will be sommat including Miners, poll tax or free milk!

Nowt wrong with poll tax. Just cos someone has more money doesn't mean they use public facilities more. Probably less if truth be told. The taxation system already has income tax to make sure the rich pay more.

The miners, well, they bore the brunt. The fact was that the unions had far too much power, and the UK was fucked while it remained that way.

Free milk... well who gives a toss really...

@Weemun,

It is interesting how the free milk got every one going when it was stopped in the 70s and 80s...seems strange now that the Great Left did marches shouting "Milk Snatcher"...

Bloody hell...for the great debates in Politics.

By the way, I did get my free milk since I was at school in the 70s...and it was rank/vile...too much cream on the top...

was even worse when it had been standing in the sun half the day

That was soooooo true

@br - I think all of us who got free milk got the same warm crap.

I thought Thatcher can only die if a stake is driven through her heart, the problem is nobody can find it.

Britain did not need a 'loving' PM at that stage.

Exile has just made exactly the type of remark I am on about. Tell me whether Britain was in a better position before or after Thatcher!

The milk in my school was lovely. But it stopped when I was 7. Then only the single parent kids got it.
Damm my non-divorced parents!
Anyhoo, no state funerals for non-heads of the state, in the UK that's the reigning monarch only (so I'd have quibbled even Churchill).
Plus the majority of people wouldn't be able to tell the difference between a state and a ceremonial funeral, Mrs Thatcher is certainly eligable for a ceremonial one so she'll have a big send-off.
Because of my general respect for the dead, I won't be joining any street parties upon her de-lifeing.

Fuck! I thought the old bitch had snuffed it. Please refrain from Thatcher funeral stuff. I got me hopes up there.

Bloody hell! Where do I start? The worst thing she did was to steal the resources of a whole nation from right under our noses. She privatised far, far too cheaply and sold the nation's resources mostly to her cronies for what had been bought and paid for with the taxpayer's money. I defy anybody to tell me that the railways got better. Didn't anybody think it was strange, for example, that British Gas and BT were advertising over and over and over again on TV at a quarter million quid a 30 minute slot in the late 80's and early 90's for what were effectively privatised monopolies? What was the point? The point was that her other cronies in advertising and TV got gelt for nothing. Our gelt. My gelt. I'm still fuckin' furious about it. I say the nation should save it's cash. Take her out in a bin-liner and throw it on the dump. When you know where her rotting carcass is, please let me know and I'll start to fill my bladder.

what do I hate about Thatcher? what's *not* to hate, really?
* doubling of unemployment (to 2 million) with her crazed "monetarist" policies within a couple of years of coming to power
* the subsequent "massaging" of the unemployment statistics, so that when they rose to 3.6 million in the official figures so many unemployed people had been excluded from the statistics that many economists estimated it was nearer 5 million
* the resulting decimation of communities, particularly in constituencies she didn't have a hope in hell of winning anyway (and if she did stand a chance, then she just moved the boundaries)
* the pronouncements from her and her ministers (e.g. Tebbit *spits*) that millions of people should just get on their bikes and look for jobs - where the fuck are you supposed to look when their policies had closed down all the factories or similar employees who could give jobs to normal working folk?
* the heartless massacre of the coal-mining industry
* yes, the breaking up of the strength of the unions - not by moving towards a system similar to the one we all enjoy and benefit from here in Germany, which might have been a good thing - but by gleefully destroying any hope and any vestiges of dignity that good honest working-class people might have had
* her opposition to sanctions against the Apartheid regime in South Africa
* Long Kesh, Bobby Sands, and the refusal to grant political prisoners their appropriate status
* the privatisation of a multitude of national industries - the chaos that is now the rail system in the UK is a long-lasting example of her legacy
* cruise missiles at greenham common
* the poll tax
* the Westland helicopter affair
* the abolition of the democratically elected governing body of London (the GLC), just because she didn't like their policies
* the general reactionary climate she fostered in the country at the time, which led to people like Victoria Gillick (*double spit*) being able to mount a serious challenge to women's reproductive rights
* the introduction of the local government act (1988? 89?) which included the notorious clause 28 - which prevented the depiction of homosexuality as a "normal family relationship" in schools; not least the vagueness of the clause meant that teachers were placed in an impossible situation when pupils came to them to talk about their gayness; which meant in turn that thousands of gay people grew up in unhappy isolation
* repeated attempts to bring in student loans and to barr the way into higher education for people from less affluent backgrounds

ok, now I'm tired after typing all that - maybe i'll remember some more stuff later on, but that'll do to be going on with

One quibble the Rail Privitisation was done under the Major Administration!

Edited:

I did read her book and she tried to justify her policies on South Africa (wrongly in my opinion) and it is interesting in subsequent years how the same Right wing where advocating sanctions for Iraq and co. whilst they years earlier argued that Sanctions only hurt the litte man and not the regime.

Just shows no ideology is completly consistent.

Na Ja...I will still continue to wear my Maggie T-shirt.

Stanford
Who does really where a Maggie T-Shit...

and the poll tax affected you because...?

westland was more yer other mans fault.

yes cos we are so much better off with too many people going into higer education and coming out with worthless degrees than we would have been were some people encouraged to go straight into work.

typical left wing. blind to the bigger picture.

Okay, time to own up. Who sent the PM?

there were a number of problems with the poll tax:

* poll tax "replaced" rates, but the charge for rates was already included in the rent for those of us who were renting at the time - the effect, therefore, was that less affluent people (who made up the majority of renters, rather than home owners) were automatically worse off (because there was basically a fat chance of your landlord reducing your rent to take out the rates portion) - at the time it came in I was vice-president of our students' union, and I saw myself the hardship that a lot of students had to endure
* the rates were levied at a level set by the democratically elected local councils; labour tended to charge higher rates and provide a higher level of public service; as a result of the poll tax their source of funding was taken away from them - in other words, it was yet another step in the erosion of democracy in the UK. Local councils after the introduction of the poll tax had to rely on grants from central government. Labour councils were no longer able to implement the policies that the local people wanted them to implement - because bitchbrains now held the purse-strings.
* previously the rates had been set based on the size of the house - but now you paid a tax based on the number of occupants: an increased tax burden on the poor

in any case, the UK doesn't have the poll tax any more, they have council tax instead (which is basically, as I understand it, very similar to the old rates system). So I suppose in the end the Poll Tax did do *some* good, because it ultimately led to her fall from power. And not a moment too soon.

that's as may be (I didn't look it up), but privatisation of the rest of that nationalised industries (lecky, gas, water, etc etc) started under her. She set the policy of selling off the crown jewels in motion, Major just carried it on. Without her, there would have been no precedent for Major to do it.

Schotte going on about a leader and her influence when he must have been just out of nappies when she got stabbed in the back by her own lot would be a bit like me talking about how good Harold MacMillian was. I have no fuckin' idea... I was just out of nappies when he went.

However, I do remember a speech which may or may not be attributable to MacMillian (1,000 credibility points up for grabs):

speaking as a waster student myself i can happily say that your average student couldnt spell "hardship" never mind experience it. hardships for students are getting up at 8am. i hate students.

if its that bad, work and save up so you can fund being a student yourself as any reasonable grafter ive ever met has done. much fairer than making everyone pay for every fee you will incur at uni.

Fair enough. Same could be said of Thatcher though.

ive read more than enough about it and certainly asked why my countrymen moan about the poll tax to formulate an opinion. or if you dont think i can, can i with the same thought ask you to refrain from telling us about your clan's amazing british history. (you havent witnessed it all either)

yes, the poll tax did directly affect me, i was in rented accommodation at the time
in fact, I was on the peaceful demonstration that was charged by mounted police horses and left some people scarred for life
have never been so terrified in my life

but that's really beside the point, isn't it?
even if i hadn't been around at the time, it would still be possible for me to feel compassion for those that were subject to the unjust tax

Fuck off!!! Never, ever, ever before 11am. There was never such a time as 8am. It's just a myth, an urban legend. Even the lecturers didn't bother until the afternoon.

Oh run along and drink yer fizzy pop, child. You know nothing. You weren't there. It was fuckin' awful. I promised myself back in 1980 I would piss on her grave, and I bloody will if it's the last thing I do. Death's too good for her.

It is amazing how Maggie still attracts devotion or hatred...let's talk about Health or Callaghan instead...

only joking...

Back to Maggie

you might not have seen hardship, I'll accept that. Part of the reason for that is that young people from poorer families no longer have the access to higher education that we enjoyed in those days (admittedly this is not all thatcher's doing, mind), because you are in effect asked to take out a mortgage on your education. if you don't have affluent parents to back you up, then that's a risk that people may not now be willing to take

i was lucky, so was my brother, we both got full grants - but my two nephews, for instance, who could have both done well and probably benefited from going to university decided to leave school after their A-levels because they simply couldn't afford to take their education any further

sounds like youve learnt your lesson at least!


i do more before 8am (to steal a quote from a tshirt i once saw) than most people do all fucking day! students who do nothing all day and cant be bothered going to lectures and still moan that they dont get grants as opposed to loans should be shot at dawn (id certainly be awake then to see it)

In the grand scheme of things though Topsy, the UK came out stronger. Would have been great to keep employment down and inflation running along at over 10%. Unions walking out on a weekly basis over the slightest thing that happened to piss them off.

Germany is in it's current predicament due to the strength of the unions, and the overbearing worker's rights. Being incompetent here does not seem to be a sackable offence, fucking useless permy bastards!!

I agree that quite a few things on your list are valid points, but you have to look at the bigger picture. The reason that Britain can now keep inflation, growth and unemployment relatively stable is down to Thatcher.

Yeah right ... funny how as students we always managed to find money for Fags, booze and pot !

i choose not to pay because I couldn't be arsed and I wanted to spend the money in the pub... As did practically everyone else I studied with.

She does not know yet and is currently googling to find out why she is going with the popular opinion of the liberal lefties on the board.

Thatcher was great, went a bit off the rails at the end but she put Britain back on the map, stopped the UK being the laughing stock of Europe, did all the work undoing what the previous government (the unions) had done. Destroyed the unions, gave people opportunitys to achieve greater things without having to gone to the "right school", allowed people the opportunity to own their own homes, own shares, have private pensions (that the current govt takes 7 billion a year out of in "not a tax". The list is endless.

The main people that seem to hate her are those think everything should be state controlled, the state should look after everyone and not allow anyone to be "too rich".

Topsy mate,

Please let's not attribute Global Warming and everything to Maggie.

Maggie got rid of the free grant and replaced it with a loan...which was paid back on graduation. She'd left government by the time it had come in fully around 92 and then it would have been aprx. 9k debt for someone taking out the full loan every year. The figures for youngster going to Uni continued to raise during this period despite this detterent (granted this was and still is skewed to the middle classes).

So I don't see how you can not afford to continue when you were given largely free money...by the way the interest rate was very low and you could deferr each year paying back the loan on Graduation by arguing that you earned no money...(if you did that successfully for 15 years the debt was cancelled).

I did just that and strung it out for 9 years before realising it was time to pay back - middle aged guilt at doing the system.

Not sure what timeline your on but to argue that in the late 80s and early nineties Uni was beyond the poor was and is complete bull...