I was excited to see Gordon Brown's description of the 1980s after his love-in with Lady T the other day. In particular, "I think whatever disagreements you have with her about certain policies - there was a large amount of unemployment at the time which perhaps could have been dealt with - we have got to understand that she saw the need for change. I also admire the fact that she is a conviction politician...I am a conviction politician like her".
Perhaps unemployment could have been dealt with. How time has mellowed the PM. In 1989, Gordon Brown published the 182-page Where There Is Greed; Margaret Thatcher and the Betrayal of Britain's Future, suggesting a few other areas of disagreement:
"Brown's account of the achievements of Margaret Thatcher is a detailed and damning reckoning of a truly remarkable decade in British politics. Where There Is Greed tells how a government with unique opportunities to prepare for the 21st century wasted ten years and £120 billion in pursuit of economic doctrines of the 18th; how the rhetoric of increased competition resulted in the destruction of our international competitiveness; how a party officially committed to the concept of the family left huge numbers of families impoverished and divided; how the doctrine of the unfettered market has invaded and eroded fundamental provsions for health, education and welfare; how the basis of our future industrial success has been undermined through the neglect of our national infrastructure, the gradual attrition of essential research and training and a catastrophic and culpable failure to invest when unprecedented billions were available; and how our civil liberties have been subject to assault on all sides."
This sounds terrible. And the conviction politician? On page 3 he spells out his position very clearly: "The argument of this book is that Mrs Thatcher's failures are rooted as much in doctrinaire prejudice as in her inability to see beyond the short term". On page 69 he sneers at "Mrs Thatcher's housewife-stateswoman's book of sins".
What a clever and deeply cynical man.
Friday, 14 September 2007
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1 comments:
Yes, what follows is on my blog (along with many pieces about why Thatcher is wildly overrated by Left and Right alike), but I feel that it is a point worth making at every opportunity.
At the end of the day, assuming that there ever is another General Election (thanks to the dear Legislative and Regulatory Reform Act), people will have the vote at the next one who were not born when she left office, and by the time of the one after that she will be dead.
So, Left and Right alike, get over her!
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