It was the era of militant trade unions, Red Robbo, Arthur Scargill and the Militant Tendency, the three-day week and the unburied dead. The unions were responsible for the destruction of British industry. Mrs Thatcher rescued the ‘sick man of Europe’ and gave our country the chance to recover.
Old-fashioned Corbynistas like Andrew Burnham may never forgive her (schoolchildren are still taught by their left-wing teachers to loathe her) but the country would be in a far worse state today if it were not for the massive improvements made by Mrs Thatcher’s Conservatives.
Of course we can argue it over, point by point: The miners’ strike; council house sales; privatisations; economic reform and liberalisation; lower taxes; less State spending; less State interference. To some people, these are reasons to hate her; to the majority, they are among the reasons why she was one of our greatest Prime Ministers.
Those like Mr Usurper Burnham, who want maximum State control of our lives, can’t move on. But the world is different now. He is fighting the day-before-yesterday’s battles in a desperate, pathetic spasm of self-justification.
His every utterance betrays the chip on his shoulder and if State Socialism is the answer, it’s a bloody stupid question.
