Margaret Thatcher

1925-2013. British politician. Member of the Conservative Party. First female British Prime Minister (1979-1990).

Biography

On 13 October 1925 Margaret Roberts was born in Grantham, the second daughter of Beatrice and Alfred Thatcher. Her father was a specialist grocer and became the Mayor of Grantham. After studying at Oxford University she became a research chemist. In 1950 she married a wealthy businessman, Denis Thatcher, and started studying law. After three years of marriage she gave birth to twins named Carol and Mark. Becomes a Member of Parliament (as member for Finchley) in 1959. Later on she lived with her family in London where she started working as a lawyer. She was elected the leader of the Conservative Party (then in opposition) in 1975. After the election victory of the Conservatives in 1979, she became the first female British Prime Minister and resigned after nearly ten years. On 8 April 2013 she died of a stroke in London.

Thatcher`s Terms as Prime Minister

Margaret Thatcher was determined to end Consensus politics (something she deemed 'socialism'). In her first year as Prime Minister the world`s oil prices increased and the value of the British pound depreciated. There were strikes, mass lay-offs and the closure of many factories so that Thatcher had to deal with high unemployment rates and poverty. Her reaction to the economic crisis that Britain was faced with, was the first Trade Union Bill with the United Kingdom that restricted picketing and defined tighter limits for the closed shops. Towards the end of her first term of office, she sent troops to fight in the Falklands War (against Argentina) in 1982. The successful offensive sparked a wave of patriotism that carried Thatcher to her election victory in 1983. During the early 1980s the government was establishing alternative power sources to its previous reliance on fuel. In 1984 the coal miners went on an eleven month strike. To Thatcher, a union strike was a threat of socialism and was necessary to end it forcefully. Thatcher`s policies succeeded in curtailing inflation but unemployment rose and the rich became richer while the poor became poorer. In 1990 when Thatcher resigned, John Major became Prime Minister. After her resignation she founded the Thatcher Foundation that aims political and economic freedom of Britain. In 1991 she got the Presidential Medal of Freedom and also joined the House of Lords with the title of "Baroness".

Thatcher`s Policy

During her years as Prime Minister she focused on conserving what she believed to be key principles of British society and politics and emphasised national identity and patriotism. Her policy sought to encourage traditional families by increasing their tax cuts. She looked upon the British population as a society that had to be guided and taught how to be responsible for themselves. That manner which she believed she could best achieve this goal, was to restrict state aid in every sector. Her policy based on lowering taxes (especially of higher incomes), spending, replacing what she called the 'dependency culture' with an 'enterprise culture' (others denounced this as replacing caring and solidarity by greed), privatising state-owned industries and utilities (e. g. British Rail, British Telecom, British Gas, British Airways), cutting welfare benefits, fighting against the influence of Trade Unions. She was sceptical of Britain`s integration into the European Union and took also an uncompromising position towards the Soviet Union, for which she was nicknamed "the Iron Lady". There was a privileged relationship between Thatcher and the US-President Reagan.

Bibliography

Gomoll, Kimberly. Margaret Thatcher. www.womeninworldhistory.com/imow-Thatcher.pdf (accessed 3 June 2017).

"Margaret Thatcher: Timeline". The Independent, 8 April 2013. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/margaret-thatchers-timeline-from-grantham-to-the-house-of-lords-via-arthur-scargill-and-the-8564555.html (accesssed 8 June 2017).

Thatcher, Margaret. The Downing Street Years. London: HarperCollins, 1993.