R.I.P. The Iron Lady

Whatever my politics may be I cannot let the demise of the UK's ONLY female prime minister go without mention. As a child growing up on a council estate in the 60's & 70's my parents generation worked hard & were sick to death of 3 day weeks, household rubbish piling up on the street not being collected, wage freezes and the ubiquitous strikes.

So when Mrs T came along talking what seemed immense common sense and refusing to allow the country to be bullied into financial ruin by misogynist, arrogant, workshy union nutters, a sigh of relief was palpable around our estate. There were an awful lot of working class people in the 70's & 80's proud to call themselves Thatcherites. As many as who hated her & everything she stood for. And goodness me she is still managing to really rile people even though she's gone!

She was absolutely not to eveyones taste. She believed utterly & completely in self awareness, self responsibility & self motivation. It's up to you mate - don't expect help from anyone else. She made difficult decisions; she looked at out of date & unprofitable industries and told them modernise or die - and they chose death. I was essentially anti Thatcher in my youth. As an ambitious teenager in the 80's in Liverpool still working out my own politics, I assumed I stood firmly on the left but was pushed further to the right than I expected to be as I was harangued daily by newspaper sellers not just selling but forcing Socialist Worker upon me and by angry rude bucket rattlers shouting at me to "Support the Miners!" - and who often followed me down the street, verbally abusing me after I refused a screech in my face & a bucket rattling; No I will choose to NOT support the miners with my hard earned cash thanks.

What was it Winston Churchill said? "If you're not a liberal at twenty you have no heart, if you're not a conservative at forty you have no brain". Hmm. I like to think I still have both.

And lest we forget, whatever you may think, someone's mother & someones grandmother has just passed away.