Good or bad for the country during her 18 years? She is, after all, the longest-serving PM of all time.

she was only PM for 10????

Wrong. Try 18. 1979 to 1997.

she never exerted that much influence................................surely?

John Major was PM between 90-97

Margaret Thatcher 4 May 1979 28 November 1990 Conservative First Lord of the Treasury
& Minister for the Civil Service Elizabeth II Grantham, Lincolnshire, England [73][74]
John Major 28 November 1990 2 May 1997 Conservative First Lord of the Treasury
& Minister for the Civil Service Elizabeth II Carshalton, Surrey, England [75][76]

If you disregard Sir Robert Walpole, William Pitt, Robert Banks Jenkinson - Earl of Liverpool, William Gladstone, Robert Gascoyne-Cecil - Marquess of Salisbury and Lord North then she is indeed the longest serving PM of all time.

Granted, she is definitely the longest serving woman UK Prime Minister of all time.

Not like a reporter to get the facts wrong, is it???

I'm not a reporter?

Ok so she is our longest serving leader in the 20th century!

Howay then smarty pants Talbot. Which part of my post is incorrect? I'm waiting.

apart from getting all of your facts wrong so far OO.
Thatcherism was and is a blight on this land and indirectly the cause of the current shite we're in now.sell off the countries best assets to private money grabbing capitalists.sell off the majority of the council houses making sure the poorest can't afford decent houses.
apart from that and getting the falklands back she was fine.
I hope I live long enough,I hope I dont die too soon.etc

a fine piece of work.deep dark truthful mirror my fave track I think

Well when you're pedalling round your paper round, take a fookin history book for a read, even our goldfish is rolling his eyes at this one.

Fair comment. I had a stinker yesterday.

and the day before, and the day before that, and the day before that, etc etc etc

Hope you're having a good time in India, Mr I.......

Well all of it, before you added the bit about her being female

And I do apologise about the Mail thing, I thought your reported for it, I didn't realise you only sold it!

Thatcher was the best thing to happen to this country when she took over. The Labour party had bankrupted the country and we were heading the way of darlow going round the world with begging buckets.

The lazy bastad trade unions needed bringing down a peg or two and so did the unprofitable nationalised industries. For the country to take the next step forward then local authorities, tax offices etc need to be privatised so that no fker is employed in these cushy and inherently lazy positions from which they currently bleed the tax system dry.

But didn't she also cripple the working classes and make the rich richer?

No.

She crippled the workshylazybastadskiving classes and made people who wanted to work richer.

Shes an evil vindictive witch who deserves to die a long painful death.
I dont care how much anyone tries to tell me otherwise,she turned our army on our own people in 1984.

Tidied up for you.

You'll go blind......

Two years ago this country wasn't in the shit. Four years ago it wasn't. I'm not even sure it is now.

Maggie's policies seem to have had an extremely long fuse.

Thatcher was the most divisive and unpleasent prime minister of the 20th century. The only good thing about her was that she left a legacy that made the Tory party unelectable for 3 general elections.

She decimated public services. She centralised the British State. She had no concept of civil liberties and she stood in the way of multiculturalism, gay rights and even women’s rights. She hated the advances of the 1960s and she tried (and failed) to turn the clock back to “Victorian Values”.

The divisions between rich and poor grew under her leadership and she didn’t care in the slightest.

Her smarmy relationship with Ronald Reagan, president of the US was appallingly sycophantic, and he too was dreadful. Reagan made the so-called religious right very powerful and supported vicious policies in Central America and much of the world.

Anyone who counts General Pinochet as one of their friends isn’t deserving of a ‘balanced’ judgement.

I rarely hold grudges, but there's so much about That Woman that I dislike intensel. Just to hear her voice makes my flesh creep.

I am not so vengeful that I am minded to think about her funeral. All I can say about that is that it ought not to be a state funeraL.

Does nobody else here see the irony of a woman who declared that she wanted to dismantle the state being given a state funeral ?

Thatcher would have made a great US president. They would have loved her, and by god they certainly deserved the woman, she was more man than Reagan could ever be. They say all the great politicians are dead I long for the day she becomes great.

What a top post - quality.

Oh please, what a crock of shit.

She took no shit from the IRA or them johnny foreigners who tried to pinch our little island and for that she should be respected

In more details, Jesus, talk about selective memory.

A few home truths:

The unions were running amok.
The country was entirely bankrupt due to the Labour goverment (so whats new eh!)
The miners were greedy thieves who systematically tore the finances out of the pits. Maggie didn't end them; the institutional thievery and 15% wage demands did.

Thatcher was the most divisive and unpleasent prime minister of the 20th century. The only good thing about her was that she left a legacy that made the Tory party unelectable for 3 general elections.
And the bloke that took labour to power sang her praises.

Divisive? Admittedly the workshy hated her along with the brainwashed reds who hated anything that challenged (and beat) their power base.

She decimated public services. Rubbish

She centralised the British State. She had no concept of civil liberties and she stood in the way of multiculturalism, gay rights and even women’s rights. She hated the advances of the 1960s and she tried (and failed) to turn the clock back to “Victorian Values”.
Shame shes not still in power isn't it.

The divisions between rich and poor grew under her leadership and she didn’t care in the slightest. It grew a site more under B'liar and Brown

Her smarmy relationship with Ronald Reagan, president of the US was appallingly sycophantic. If there was any sycophancy going on it was the other way on. To quote Maggie in 1982 referring to the Yanks sitting on the fence between Britin and Argentina:

"We waited for you in 1914
We waited for you in 1939
How long are we going to have to wait for you this time"

And he too was dreadful. So dreadful it was America's most prosperous time in history.

Anyone who counts General Pinochet as one of their friends isn’t deserving of a ‘balanced’ judgement. Pinochet who back the UK when our friends in France, Germany and many others stood idly by.

I rarely hold grudges, but there's so much about That Woman that I dislike intensel. Just to hear her voice makes my flesh creep.
Personally I love the woman and still fancy her at 80 odd.

I am not so vengeful that I am minded to think about her funeral. All I can say about that is that it ought not to be a state funeraL.

Does nobody else here see the irony of a woman who declared that she wanted to dismantle the state being given a state funeral ? It wll be and I will attend with intense pride that I knew the woman.

Well, you would say that wouldn't you!!

I bet he doesn't like Ritchie Humphreys either.

Mr I! You missed three very crucial words from that post....."in my opinion"........you talk as though what you say is the absolute truth, when what you really mean is that you personally admire what Thatcher did. That's your perogative of course, but some of us see Thatcher's legacy very differently. For my own part I see the devastation that she caused to innocent and decent people's lives and which billions of pounds of taxpayers' money has had to be spent on subsequently just to make the country something a bit less than a laughing stock around the world.

Politics - it's a game of opinions.

She didn't cause any devestation,the country was fooked and she had to fix it. Tough decisions had to be made in order to do that. She took them and was hated for it. There was no alternative.

Margaret Thatcher was a great leader but I hate her.

This is a pointless argument so I won't have it, but you're confusing the truth with your own opinions/beliefs, Mr I.

What you say is just such utter billiard balls - didn't cause devasation? So every community remained intact as a result of her policies? Don't think so - how come there's swathes of the country where once hard working people lived but now are full of junkies? Did that just happen of its own accord? And they were all hard decsions rather than politically calculated actions to achieve certain political ends? So in fact she was more of a charity worker figure than a politician. I've got it all wrong!

She was the vet who put the dog down, the animal was already terminally ill.

I don't see how that makes her a Hero, from any point of view.

You'll get there in the end.

Like I said, I admire her leadership qualities but she was a disaster.

There's one thing that any politician will tell you, Mr I, and that's that there is always more than one option in politics. Brush up on the basics, will you?!

Your reaching for a answer but only coming up with cliches. Tell me how you would have fixed the UK in 1979. Bear in mind you have 3 million out of work, you're spending massively outstrips income and you're up to your credit limit with the IMF.

3 million out of work in 1979, are you having a laugh? Nearer 1.5 million surely? The 3 million came a few years later. I might have looked at ways of stimulating and creating employment to generate revenue but I was only 18 at the time and couldn't have cared less to be honest.

And I'm the one who doesn't know what he's on about! Heaven preserve us.

You're not 18 now, lets have some specifics. Remember you are massively bankrupt and riddled with militant unions.

Here's a bit of a history lesson to help you along when analysing what Maggie inherited.[img]

Economically the era is characterized by numerous strikes and restrictive practices. This crippling combination (known elsewhere at the time as the 'English disease') is coupled with rapid inflation - much aggravated by an international factor (the 'oil crisis' of 1973-4) and by exceptionally high rates of tax. By 1976 the top rate of tax on earned income in Britain is 83%, but there is also a 15% surcharge on unearned income - leaving the rich with only 2% of their return from investments.

These circumstances culminate in a spate of strikes so numerous that they cause the winter of 1978-9 to be known (in a phrase from Richard III) as the 'winter of discontent'. The result is a strong reaction in the general election of 1979. [/img]

Also see here, I'm not going to copy and paste the lot.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_of_Discontent

She is still a 'lovely lovely person'.

But you're denying the legacy of history yourself and just selecting what suits your purpose. All I know is that in my experience of life the legacy of Thatcher is a pernicious and very expensive one, and all of our lives are the worse for it. It's not for me to offer up some alternative policies 30 years after the event, but I can't agree that there was only one option. Why have we had 11 years of a labour government (who I didn't vote for, for the record) not so long after Thatcher's heyday? I don't like any politicians me, but some I dislike more than others.......................

Maggie's big problem was the poll tax which in principal is a good idea but in practice was a nightmare. It coloured peoples vision of her. She did indeed take over a horrible economic situation and dealt with it. She faced down Galtieri when most advisors said that the recovery of the Falkland Islands was impossible.

As for the miners strike; Scargill was determined to emulate the miners strike of 73 and whilst the Police were admittedly well out of order in a lot of case so were the miners and Scargill's own bully boys - the flying pickets. He too picked a fight with the wrong enemy.

She gave Britain back its pride, encouraged an ideal of self reliance (accompanied with a fair degree of selfishness it has to be said) and put in place an environment where business could flourish. The new small and medium sized businesses replaced the old monoliths and Britain was a spectacular success after she had sorted out the problems. If it wasn't for the poll tax........................