Why Thatcher is hated

[Cliphead]

You have enriched yourself thanks to the policies of Margaret Thatcher yet you hate her for breaking up communities. I presume this "break up" manifests itself in people losing their jobs. No matter then that these jobs were working for inefficient heavily subsidised nationalised Industries and closed shop union controlled enterprises (like the Times newspaper group). OK fine fair (if misguided) point. How then does your concern for jobless communities square with you working in an industry making loads of money for yourself paying little tax only to create systems that take people out of jobs?

There's a common theme running through the threads you've participated in over the past couple of days "You have enriched yourself thanks to the policies of Margaret Thatcher", or variations on that statement. I did not 'enrich' myself because of her policies I spent most of her time in power not involved in IT particularly and out of the country anyway building my business in Europe and North America. Seems like you have a bit of jealousy thing going on, do contractors earn more than you do? Is that what's bothering you?

As Britain learnt to come to terms with the idea of "no such thing as society" a tenet of Tory policy, unemployment shot up under the Conservatives to levels not seen since the Great Depression. This brought misery to communities and individuals and that legacy can still be seen today. I don't have political views as such and certainly not party political views but since I live in the UK these days I can't help but look around and see the effects of the past political as well as current political policies and mismanagement.

Thatcher was no saint or saviour and it's no surprise people of a certain generation actually hate her misplaced and a waste of energy as that might be.

I'm no hypocrite just being pragmatic based on experience.

[DodgyAgent]

Close them yes, feck the unions, but gradual with plenty of alternatives, programmes, training and encourage private sector to come in to take the place. This has probably happened now in a lot of places but it should have been planned much better so it was seamless.

The UK was bankrupt where was the money going to come from to pay for all this? and what makes you think private business (any of which that happened to be of any significant size was in the grip of the Trade Unions) had the wherewithall to help out having been so milked for taxes?

[minestrone]

who. gives. a. flying. fook.

[proggy]

I presume they are all socialist run councils with socialist run schools. If the poor of asia can build businesses and Eastern Europeans can travel thousands of miles to pick fruit then why cant they do it? or do you believe that the rest of us owe them a living? I presume you care so much about them that over the years you have volunteered vast amounts of your tax free earnings from building job destroying IT systems to support them?

No they are call centers etc private sector, it just took 20 years. When a whole community is totally reliant on one industry then to close that over night with no real help of plan b is not what a good government should do. If a small company closes and a handful of people lose their job then tough it won't cause the whole town to become a drug ridden depressed ghost town. I am arguing about the pragmatics here you are talking ideology.

[doodab]

you are talking ideology.

I think you mean bollocks.

[NotAllThere]

I saw first hand the misery people experienced bcause of her policies...

And on other pages you can see the misery people have experienced due to Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. And David Cameron.

I quite like that John Major though. Oh yes.

[Cliphead]

And on other pages you can see the misery people have experienced due to Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. And David Cameron.

I quite like that John Major though. Oh yes.

I didn't say otherwise.

[DodgyAgent]

There's a common theme running through the threads you've participated in over the past couple of days "You have enriched yourself thanks to the policies of Margaret Thatcher", or variations on that statement. I did not 'enrich' myself because of her policies I spent most of her time in power not involved in IT particularly and out of the country anyway building my business in Europe and North America. Seems like you have a bit of jealousy thing going on, do contractors earn more than you do? Is that what's bothering you?

As Britain learnt to come to terms with the idea of "no such thing as society" a tenet of Tory policy, unemployment shot up under the Conservatives to levels not seen since the Great Depression. This brought misery to communities and individuals and that legacy can still be seen today. I don't have political views as such and certainly not party political views but since I live in the UK these days I can't help but look around and see the effects of the past political as well as current political policies and mismanagement.

Thatcher was no saint or saviour and it's no surprise people of a certain generation actually hate her misplaced and a waste of energy as that might be.

I'm no hypocrite just being pragmatic based on experience.

I have used the enrichment argument to point out that above any other group IT contractors benefitted more than anyone from the Thatcher reforms. No one has been able to argue otherwise. So as long as they continue to pile hate on her I will continue to point out their hypocrisy. The best that you people can do is to claim that you had "left the country", which having run away hardly gives you any cause to criticise someone who held her ground to create an environment that contractors (like you) have prospered from ever since.

I am not sure what you mean by "IT particularl"y but I fancy you are too ashamed that you were part of this group of affluent professionals that became very rich whilst paying little tax to build systems that removed jobs.

[DodgyAgent]

No they are call centers etc private sector, it just took 20 years. When a whole community is totally reliant on one industry then to close that over night with no real help of plan b is not what a good government should do. If a small company closes and a handful of people lose their job then tough it won't cause the whole town to become a drug ridden depressed ghost town. I am arguing about the pragmatics here you are talking ideology.

You still have not suggested how she would have squared such policies with the Trade Unions and the IMF.

[Cliphead]

I have used the enrichment argument to point out that above any other group IT contractors benefitted more than anyone from the Thatcher reforms. No one has been able to argue otherwise. So as long as they continue to pile hate on her I will continue to point out their hypocrisy. The best that you people can do is to claim that you had "left the country", which having run away hardly gives you any cause to criticise someone who held her ground to create an environment that contractors (like you) have prospered from ever since.

I am not sure what you mean by "IT particularl"y but I fancy you are too ashamed that you were part of this group of affluent professionals that became very rich whilst paying little tax to build systems that removed jobs.

Please don't make assumptions about me as you have no clue about my career or personal circumstances. I've paid max rate for years because I like to sleep at night and didn't join any suspect schemes to minimise tax liability. I didn't 'run away' from the UK I looked for opportunities elsewhere and was successful in doing that. I would be successful in anything I decided to do because of who I am and how my parents brought me up.

You continue to throw around generalities and you have no real argument to put forward. As one or two others have pointed out in different ways you really don't have a grasp of past policy and how it really affected this country. I'll leave it there and leave you to your blinkered views.