Quote:
Originally Posted by SlowOne
And just in case anyone is left with any good feelings about Margaret Thatcher, she was also the one who ran down our manufacturing industry in order to break the Unions, who decided that was not a problem because we would become a service and finance economy, and then privatised the utility companies because she said we needed more competition to drive down gas electricity and water bills!! And it was Gordon Brown who decided to tax the dividends paid into our pension funds which has led to them being decimated and us having lower pensions!
You can wind us up all you like Rebelrc, but this is what happens when you live in a capitalist economy. There's a rational explanation for it all, providing you don't believe what you read in the papers. That's all folks!!
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I agree with most of your post and it is largely correct except the bit above, Thatcher didn't shut down decent, efficient manufacturing plants that produced quality products.
She closed down these plants because they were by making absolute crap and were losing a huge amount of money and costing the country a fortune.
The Callaghan government was completely beholdant to Trades Unions who throughout the 70's went on strike whenever they felt like it, affecting quality, production and profitability of these state owned (at the time) assets. If you're looking a guilty party for the demise of the UK Large scale industrials look no further than the Labour government and the Trades Unions of the 70's.
Also
Labour did it again recently with the tendering process for the contract to build 100's of trains - they set the criteria which was biased AGAINST Bombardier (a British firm) and then also made the decision legally binding, so when a German firm (Siemens) won, there was no way the new Conservative government could do anything about it.
Thanks Labour.