Margaret Thatcher's Policies Benefited Britain

Margret Thatcher is one of the more overrated Prime Ministers Britain has ever had, and I can give a list of points why. As a disclaimer, I’ll say I am not British, however, I am Canadian, and the Government here is quite similar to the UK. Margret Thatcher’s economic policies were deeply influenced by her longstanding hatred of Socialism and all things left. Her political foundation was built on privatization and so-called free markets. Indeed, a Daily Mail article not four days old reads “Thatcher tried to sell off the NHS but I blocked it”. MP Ken Clarke had fights with Thatcher over her trying to switch the healthcare system to the privatized American style system. Her “Right to Buy” scheme as passed in the Housing Act of 1980 ended up crashing the UK housing system and in-part destroying the manufacturing industry. Although Council House purchases tripled from 1986 to 1982, they ended up creating a housing bubble, with a third of ex-council homes being owned by a wealthy elite. People bought houses on the cheap and then were crushed by high mortgages and drastic price leaps in housing prices along with a mercurial housing market. The construction of these homes has shifted in the past 30 years from local authorities to private enterprises. The prices for a home in the UK have leaped into the stratosphere in the past ten years. If you look at the graphs for the housing sales, they drop off dramatically towards the end of Thatcher’s run, and, after a short rise, they drop to a very low level. Thatcher’s unbounded financial sector took advantage of the system for many years. Tony Belton, a Labour councillor in South West London said that, "Speculators have made millions out of exploiting public assets. " Along with her detrimental housing polices, her Poll tax is a shining example of the failure of Thatcher’s policy. She introduced the tax in Scotland first, in 1989, to the dismay of the Scots, then through the UK later in 1990. A single rate tax crippled the poor and benefitted the rich. The outcry in the UK was massive and caused rioting, culminating in a large-scale London riot with some 200,000 rioters. It was the Poll Tax mixed with her direct opposition to Trade Unions and her ceaseless support for business and, also, a financial sector that went almost entirely unbound after her reforms that killed industry in the UK, and permanently crippled Northern England. Thatcher crushed the Unions ability to work in a Democratic fashion and they were left, as she had planned, without a say. From 1980 to 2012 Union members declined from 13 Million to below 6 Million. She abandoned the Miners, even denouncing them, saying “We had to fight the enemy without in the Falklands. We always have to be aware of the enemy within, which is much more difficult to fight and more dangerous to liberty. ” The 1984 Miners strike ended in disaster, crippling the Union forever and privatising the industry in 1994 under UK Coal. Pit closures were and still are commonplace after 1990. Miners were forced into debt, entire towns dried up, and the sense of unity among communities was shattered. David Hopper, the general secretary of the Durham Miners Association, said in 2013, “There's no sympathy from me for what she did to our community. She destroyed our community, our villages and our people…Our children have got no jobs and the community is full of problems. There's no work and no money and it's very sad the legacy she has left behind. ” So there you have it. A Marge Thatcher who: Caused nationwide riots with the Poll tax Destroyed the Manufacturing industry and crippled Northern England Created a housing bubble with her Right to Buy scheme Destroyed the housing market with Right to Buy Destroyed Unions that ranged from over a hundred years old partly to fix inflation Widened gaps between rich and poor Let Banks and Finical Corporations and Companies have unbounded freedom, creating a speculative economy that was primed for failure Privatised many important services- further decimating North England Set up a system doomed to fail after her resignation Links . http://squarepenguin.co.uk... . http://www.theguardian.com... . http://www.npr.org... . http://www.aljazeera.com... . http://www.independent.co.uk... . http://www.dailymail.co.uk... . http://news.bbc.co.uk...