Spugsy

'In January 1982, the inflation rate had dropped back to 8.6% from earlier highs of 18%, and interest rates were then allowed to fall. Unemployment continued to rise, reaching an official figure of 3.6 million — although the criteria for defining who was unemployed were amended allowing some to estimate that unemployment in fact hit 5 million.'

Aye and Ince will still say she did a good job.

admon

it was a bit different then, huge unionised business that was unprofitable and unsustainable. Some hard falls had to be taken.

Other countries such as France now face exactly the same problems we had back then, on top of all the other shit happening..

nottmbantam

It was fascinating battle really, Thatcher and her hit man Norman Tebbit were gunning for the Unions,and in effect, broke the backbone of the Union movement in the UK by beating the miners,who were considered to be one of,if not the, strongest unions.

After that, no real union has had the power to challenge government. Yes, here have been a few one / two day strikes, but really, they were meaningless. And the master stroke was of course to go to war with Argentina and rebuild the country's morale and pride. As much as I hated her, Thatcher certainly knew what she was doing.

Edited to rectify:

Bit hazy on the exact dates, so looked on Wikipedia.

Falklands Crisis 1982 ( not referred to as a war, as apparently neither country declared war ). At the same time unemployment was hitting 3M.

Thatcher re-elected in General Election of 1983.

Miners Strike 1984-85.