Baroness Thatcher admitted to hospital

[marin man]

1 out of 10 on the trollometer.

You'll need to do better than that.

Sorry to offend anyone but it just depends on your personal circumstances,we had a small fishing fleet back then and done ok while thatcher was in "power",but a few years down the line when the poxy labour party bowed to european pressure and let foreign boats steel fish at a whim then we gradually lost our livelihood,which was a real nightmare after three hundred years of having a fishing business in our town and employing local peole too,so we got shafted under labour as most people who go to work do,if you are a lazy scrounger then you will do fine under labour and if you work,and pay tax crucially,you will prosper under the tories,in my field anyway

sorry for any offence as none is meant

 

[dbmtb]

Maybe I am ignorant coming from the south but was'nt the trouble all started by greedy unionists any way wanting to claw their way up the social ladder and forgetting their place...........

Yep. You're ignorant alright.

 

[old_coyote_pedaller]

You're pretty good at sweeping generalisation, anyway it was Ted the Grocer that took the UK into the EU after much pleading, so blame him for the UK having to adhere to the laws of the EU. Just a thought.

 

[marin man]

Sweeping generalisations are my forte alright,I have many more

 

[marin man]

Yep. You're ignorant alright.

Thanks for the confirmation of that

 

[JohnH]

Maybe I am ignorant coming from the south but was'nt the trouble all started by greedy unionists any way wanting to claw their way up the social ladder and forgetting their place...........

No marin man, the "trouble" started in the late 1960s when Japan could build a ship for less money than we were charging just for the requisite steel and when developing nations could produce coal for less than half what the British were charging.

The Labour government nationalised steel, coal and rail in 1945, referring to them as "the commanding heights of British industry". A hundred years earlier, that was an accurate description because only the British knew how to make steel, railways and iron ships. But by 1970, everyone knew how to make them. So we had no economic advantage there; in fact, we had been overtaken by the rest of the world. Instead of giving up on those 19th century industries, the unions bullied every government during the 1970s into flogging a dead horse.

Margaret Thatcher gets the blame for the shutting of steel factories, shipyards and coal mines. But the fact of the matter is that Britain couldn't compete in those industries anymore. Thatcher just happened to be the PM who wouldn't be bullied by the unions into keeping them alive with massive subsidies.

Even though the old industries were dying, there was a chance to replace them. In the 1960s, the UK did have fledgling companies developing computers, satellites and digital communication technology. But between Conservative cost-cutting and Labour interference they all went to the wall or were sold off to foreign competitors who profited from British ingenuity.

History was repeated in 2000 when BMW were selling Rover. Alchemy Partners were going to buy the company and let go of 75% of the workforce to create a much smaller, but sustainable, MG sports car company. The unions didn't like this and made Jon Moulton out to be some kind of cold, Thatcherite job-slasher. So Rover was handed to the Phoenix Consortium who promised that they wouldn't sack anyone. 5 years later, the company was insolvent and everyone lost their jobs (apart from the R&D dept. whose ingenuity is now in the employ of the Chinese).

 

[marin man]

Maybe I am ignorant coming from the south but was'nt the trouble all started by greedy unionists any way wanting to claw their way up the social ladder and forgetting their place...........

No marin man, the "trouble" started in the late 1960s when Japan could build a ship for less money than we were charging just for the requisite steel and when developing nations could produce coal for less than half what the British were charging.

The Labour government nationalised steel, coal and rail in 1945, referring to them as "the commanding heights of British industry". A hundred years earlier, that was an accurate description because only the British knew how to make steel, railways and iron ships. But by 1970, everyone knew how to make them. So we had no economic advantage there; in fact, we had been overtaken by the rest of the world. Instead of giving up on those 19th century industries, the unions bullied every government during the 1970s into flogging a dead horse.

Margaret Thatcher gets the blame for the shutting of steel factories, shipyards and coal mines. But the fact of the matter is that Britain couldn't compete in those industries anymore. Thatcher just happened to be the PM who wouldn't be bullied by the unions into keeping them alive with massive subsidies.

Even though the old industries were dying, there was a chance to replace them. In the 1960s, the UK did have fledgling companies developing computers, satellites and digital communication technology. But between Conservative cost-cutting and Labour interference they all went to the wall or were sold off to foreign competitors who profited from British ingenuity.

History was repeated in 2000 when BMW were selling Rover. Alchemy Partners were going to buy the company and let go of 75% of the workforce to create a much smaller, but sustainable, MG sports car company. The unions didn't like this and made Jon Moulton out to be some kind of cold, Thatcherite job-slasher. So Rover was handed to the Phoenix Consortium who promised that they wouldn't sack anyone. 5 years later, the company was insolvent and everyone lost their jobs (apart from the R&D dept. whose ingenuity is now in the employ of the Chinese).

what I just said in laymans terms,I worded it for the white van man among us

 

[dbmtb]

A posting I wouldn't disagree with in any way whatsoever.

My gripe is with the merciless and ham-handed fashion in which the whole process was carried out, which left the country in a state of unnecessary divide, and a very unfair distribution of the country's wealth.

 

[rosstheboss]

Between them, the Labour party and the unions have done far more to shaft this country than Maggie ever did, it does my head in listening to people bleat about the mines closing and industry going overseas - all of these things were/are market driven! Don't forget over the past few hundred years, we lorded it over many millions of people, industrializing countries and setting up infrastructure and funnily enough they ended up overtaking us! You can't single out people when it is globalization that causes these problems - that and people constantly wanting more money for what they do.

George Osbourne is going to get a load of grief for the same reason, people had it too good for too long, unfortunately he's the one lumbered with fixing the problem.

Just wait for the Labour loving unions to go mad in the coming weeks, they stayed silent under labour most of the time, when they were spending ridiculous sums on crap and wasting fortunes, funny that!!!

 

[dbmtb]

Between them, the Labour party and the unions have done far more to shaft this country than Maggie ever did,

Possibly. Or not.

But nobody's giving them heroic status now are they?