I CANNOT stay silent on the subject of Margaret Thatcher any longer while those who disagreed with her policies shout loudly.

I appreciate that her government didn’t get everything right (show me a government that has) but surely decisions and policies that were made have to be viewed in the context of the state that our beloved country was in before her election to the office of Prime Minister.

Trade unions had gone too far. The widespread strikes of 1978-79 were as a result of a weak government’s inability to control the unions.

Outside of Britain people must have wondered who was governing. We were in need of a resilient leadership who would make a difference.

Margaret Thatcher and her government certainly made that difference, so much so that after 22 years out of office people still have such strong feelings, whether positive or negative.

Councillor Mary Clarkson commented that she was dealing with housing issues today due to decisions made in the 1980s.

I assume she was referring to the Right to Buy policy. Perhaps she should speak to those she represents who took up the option to buy.

I wonder what they think of Mrs Thatcher’s policy? Successive governments have had the opportunity to make a difference for good.

I’ll leave it to the reader to decide if they’ve succeeded or not. I do hope people will show human kindness to those who grieve her passing.

GILL SHEPHERD Rippington Drive Marston Oxford

 

IT MAY have been tasteless for some people openly to celebrate the death of Margaret Thatcher but what I find even more offensive is the way some elements in the Conservative Party have attempted to portray the late baroness as some kind of demigod.

She was, of course, nothing of the sort.

It seems to me that some of the eulogies to Mrs Thatcher emanating from some Tories are reminiscent of the oleaginous paeans of praise to the “Dear Leader” that I would expect to witness in North Korea.

They are not the kind of thing I would expect to see in a mature democracy.

Margaret Thatcher was the most divisive Prime Minister I have seen in my lifetime and many of the achievements ascribed to her were partisan in nature.

She was an extremely tribal leader who arguably achieved much for those she regarded as “one of us” but who did so at the expense of the marginalised and dispossessed.

Great party leader she may have been; leader of the whole nation she never was.

It was Margaret Thatcher who famously exhorted Britain to “Rejoice!” (when South Georgia was recaptured from the Argentinians in 1982 at the start of the Falklands conflict). What more eloquent testimony to the brutality of her government could there be than that some of those whom she despised and marginalised eventually became so alienated that they actually felt moved to rejoice at her passing.

CHRIS ROBINS (Cllr) Foxdown Close Kidlington

 

I WRITE in respect of the recent death of Mrs Thatcher, some papers have just slated her and Messrs Kinnock and the insidious Kenneth Livingstone have made very offensive comments.

These two foul-mouthed individuals are typical of socialism today. Whatever your political view you do not speak ill of the dead.

In 1984 she smashed the communist unions. I heard a Yorkshire miner say that her death took place on his birthday and it was the best present he had ever had. You do not speak ill of the dead. John Tanner got on the bandwagon to slag her off, thus showing his ‘red flag’ leanings.

A truly great lady. May she rest in peace.

ROGER W TUCKER Kingsway Drive Kidlington

 

ANOTHER light has gone out in Britain with the passing of Mrs Thatcher.

While I didn’t agree with all her policies, particularly the poll tax, I greatly admired her strength and courage standing up to bullies and terrorists. Her ‘Lady is not for turning’ speech will surely stand alongside Winston Churchill’s ‘We shall never surrender’ speech in the pages of history.

People like her who are not afraid to be a minority rather than a majority are those who make me proud to be British.

I too want to keep our pound sterling, our imperial weights and measures and even our awful weather!

When Mrs Thatcher first moved into Number 10, I wrote and asked her for her autograph and received a signed black and white photo which sits on my mantelpiece and when I need strength and resolution I look to the Iron Lady.

May she rest in peace.

JANE LOPEZ-RUBIO Scott Road Oxford