When she was in power she was adored by the armed forces, she treated them well (increased pay substantially) and gave them clear unambiguous missions.

…..and never once cut their budget and then committed them to a conflict which they didn’t have sufficientkit to properly prosecute…… hang on….. 😯

Funeral: Difficult to discuss without sounding churlish, but hey its never stopped me before…

Soooo, £10,000,000 in times of massive austerity. I think thats got potential for very wrong messages being sent.
Devisiveness: there is little doubt that the women polarises opinions, and there is frankly a huge potential for conflict on a frightening scale surrounding this funeral.
The family. As many have pointed out, she is an old lady and a mother, so is it right to set up a situation whereby there is absolutley no doubt that there will be some really hostile and negative behaviour around the event. I’m not sure I’d want booing and muck slinging at my mums funeral. (Mind you who knows what might motivate the criminal Mark and the idiot Carol?)

Overall for my money, I think it should be on a much lesser scale, and not public. for those reasons.

Well written and thoughtful.

at some unions would rather see a man out of work than in work

There is of course an alternative view of that.

What I was saying and still don’t see any reason not to believe is that the labour disputes of the 70s and 80s and the subsequent changes to the legislature were part of a journey with out which Sunderland Nissan would not be possible.

..and what I’m saying which you are clearly not going to listen to is that for good pragmatic reasons I disagree with you. Simplified right down my view is no bad crews, just bad captains. Thatchers view, and apparently yours, which to be honest I do find very weird is all good captains just bad crews.

I guess at the end of the day it comes down to whether you think a manager (and that word is being used in the largest context) can influence outcomes. Personally, I do.

Well, yeah – but I interpreted the question to be about factory-level management of labour rather than global management/design etc.

Not having a pop kona, just pointing out that bad mangement extends to producing shite product, which British Leyland were definately guilty of. Interstingly, programes such as Undercover Boss and their ilk are rarely incorrect in their outcomes if my experience is anything to go by. Generally there is an assumption that the prols are stupid, and that of they have a beef then its obviously bollocks. The reality is much nearer to the precise opposite.

Simple example: I got the hump once about the floors not being kept clear. Staff suggestion book, (that I’d spent some time nurturing, to get past the usual opening shots), came back with we haven’t got sufficent brooms. When I checked up on it sure enough, 4 to keep 60,000 sq feet clean. Not their fault, and especially not their fault that a culture had hitherto existed whereby they did not feel able to raise this as an issue.

BB- Question is the Sunderland Nissan plant an example of what could have been with better management or the result changing the employee/employer relations?

Depends whether you think its possible to control a business from the bottom up. Personally, I’ve run numerous organisations in my life, and I’ve never once found the balance of power legally or otherwise to be on the employees side. Thats in a senior management career spanning from the 1970’s to date. So I do think its largely down to better management frankly. In fact I’d go as far as to say that legislative issues around employee relations are what kicks in when its too late to have managed properly, so again the employee relations issue as you put it really is not relevant in my view.

Well, the radically superior product has to be a big factor too

…and would that be anything to do with management of the business by any chance?

It was tolerated

= Bad management, not a bad workforce, and thereby lies the fundamental problem in Thatchers ideaology. As previously stated you only have to look to the Nissan – Sunderland example to prove it.

The NUM asking for 43% is out of context without knowing their actual pay. If it was to provide the workers a living wage then so be it.

Out of interest I was managing a wholesale business at the time. It was quite normal to have surcharges on price lists of that sort of order, as inflation was running at such a level it wasn’t realistic to reprint them that fast. I don’t know for certain, but I suspect that figure might need to be viewed in that context.

Ransos rattrap – you should really do your own research properly:

The source given for that wikipedia info predates the BBC article detailing the release of the information regarding the flotilla. i.e. the secret info had not been released when the wikipedia infor was written

Interesting choice of photo by Gawker

Spawn of Satan: Office Party?

Would another UK leader have appeased and come to a face-saving (to a degree) arrangement?

I think another leader might not have engaged in negotiating over the islands future, and also giving a number of signals suggesting an inability or unwillingness to defend them. You know stuff like denuding our military capacity sufficiently to make the islands indefensible. That sort of stuff.

Now there is oil in Falklands she did us proud there too.

I know this is likely to come as a shock, but there was oil there in the 1980’s too. Obviously, it is clear that she only did what she did because the population of the Falklands apparently want to be British, and it had nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that ownership of this piece of real estate actually gives GB inc rights to part of Antartica and all the natural resources that may lie there.

The unions were out of control, led by communist party members who didnt have their members interests at heart but instead wanted to pick a fight with a right wing government.

Years ago I managed a business that was having some issues, and those problems were starting to manifest themselves through the formation of a union. I well remember a very gnarly and experienced ACAS official sitting in the boardroom and telling my half wit (bosses son) MD, “you’ll get a union if you deserve one”. Never a truer word said IMHO, and the truth of that adage extends to the various public utilities that Thatcher decimated.

The reality being that far from the workforce being at fault, years of piss poor management is what caused the problems. A good bit of that being due to lack of investment as successive governments robbed those organsiations of the investment they desperately needed and gave the proceeds away in tax cuts.

Evidence ?: Well try Nissan choosing to build their factory in Sunderland, that centre of right wing philosophy and home of workers with no history of union activity. Apparently the most productive car plant in Europe.

If she was so bad, how did she get voted in three times?

EasyP: a) she didn’t as such, a conservative government did, as was clearly shown when she was latterly deposed, and b) in our rather quirky electoral system a minority of the electorate voted for her.

Can’t see any reason whatsoever to a) complain about the thread thus far, or b) moderate it. In fact the anti Thatcherites, of which I an proud to be, have been very reasoned and moderate thus far, despite a fair level of trolling and provocation.

Another one who feels UK industry should have been subsidised….at what should it have stopped?….when the UK was bankrupt?….blame rampant unionism instead.

WTF are you talking about? Do you honestly think the Americans/Chinese/Indians/Germans/French ect etc etc are playing a straight hand in that context??

Presumably you don’t think the financial sector were being supported by her policies either?

In which case the next time you lose a tooth make sure to put it under your pillow.

Never mind manslaughter…. the fecker has been on Jeremy Kyle, a crime which in my view should lead to immediate neutering and the potential for the culprit to also be melted down and body fats used as a means of energy production. win : win

Seems to me that the assumption by airlines that everyone is the same size and shape is a bit daft. I’d quite like a bit more logic to be applied to the process with adjustable width seating and for that matter adjustable leg room too. I did a flight to Cape Town a while back and had this enormous Afrikaans guy sit next to me. Not in any way fat, but his hands were like twice the size of mine and I’d guess he wasn’t much short of 7 foot tall. Poor bugger spent the wolhe flight in real discomfort, because there simply wasn’t sufficient distance between seats for him to fit his legs in.

Maybe if Berm Bandit had to pay a full ticket price for a 2 year old child, then have the airline squeeze (quite literally) someone into the next seat & spill across half of your childs seat & be grumpy about the fact that your child bumped into them (in the seat you’ve paid for), then perhaps that would alter your opinion?

…….remember me? I’m the bloke who started this thread on the basis of generally being in favour of fattism in this context? 😯

how is being penalised for something out of your control fair

What like subsidising fat folks like I do now you mean?

Lesley Garrett…… my piss turned to steam just typing that 😯

Marx had a lot to say about a lot of things. Regretably, time seems to have proven not all of it was practical or necessarily correct.

If however this were a Marxist paradigm, the tongue in cheek accusations of trolling could be more seriosu for you. However, I am sticking with the democratic principle and if sufficient of our brethren come out in your favour, I will reconsider your fate. 😉

Or are you claiming that Switzerland isn’t a democracy Bandit.

Pretty sure I’ve neither said it was or that our model is the only one available. What I have implied however, is that both their system and ours have been arrived at by democratic process, and that democratic process is what will change it as and when there is sufficent demand for that to happen. However, as that has yet to happen, it is clear that the will is not there to bring change about…….or are you suggesting that your view should take precedence over the majority who either don’t care enough or actively don’t want to change?

(Currently sticking with Troll theory, albeit if there is sufficient reaction agaisnt that I am prepared to reconsider my position)

No, Bandit, you’re mistaking the parliamentary representative democracy that we have in the UK as the only form of democracy,

Troll then 🙄

rattrap – Member

Up until the last election we routinely have had a referendum on these issues, its called a general election and thus far it has maintained the status quo as you know it.

Really, can you tell me which significant political party in the past forty years has stood on an election commitment regards the reintroduction of the death penalty, departure from the EU, or cessation of foreign aid?

I thought we wanted democracy?

why cant we have democracy on these issues as well as the issues that suit the political elite?

Clearly there are one of two possibilities here;-

A) You’ve not understood the basic tenents of Democracy (if you’re not sure what that means google majority)
B) You are a Troll, and I claim my rights under Troglodytae Prima Nocte…tonight you’re mine sucker

Maglev from airport to town 50 rmb each way (like a £5er) takes 7 minutes, as opposed to a long time on the underground, besides doing 400km an hour is fun.

At the Longyang street station take the underground to Lujiazui, which will bring you our close to the Jinmao and Pearl Orient towers theres a dirty great shopping Mall there where you’ll find getting fed and watered easy.

After that try Yuyuan Garden, Xintiandi or East Nanjing Road. I can also highly recommend the Museum to while some time away.

I find the metro efficient clean and cheap for getting about, and best of all you are not having to try to tell taxi drivers etc where you want to go. There are numbers in cabs that you can ring for a translation service and assistance.

For planning use this highly effective interactive Metro Map http://www.exploreshanghai.com/metro/old/

Tell me, if you’re so keen on democracy, would you be happy to have a truly democratic society? lets take a couple of exmaples, would you be happy for a referendum on the following subjects:

i) EU membership
ii) The death penalty
iii) immigration
iv) Foreign Aid

Or are you happy to tolerate democracy only as long as those democratic decisions fit with your own belief system?

Up until the last election we routinely have had a referendum on these issues, its called a general election and thus far it has maintained the status quo as you know it. I have to say our system isn’t working well with an unelected government and that is a cause for considerable concern to me and I suspect many others.

You need a party called CORRECT The Coalition Of Radical Realistic Effective & Clear Thinkers

Drop the tribal prattle and go for the best of the best solutions to all things, including what overall direction to take. This is the opportunity missed by the Lib-Dims. I had great hopes after the expesnes debacle and last election. Clegg fluffed it.

FWIW the first part of the answer here is to work like, erm, very hard working people to clear the backlog of migrants who shouldn’t be here.

I guess you’ve not looked at the speech. Its about curbing benefits to EU migrants. Now correct me if I’m wrong, but they have two rights which make both your and his comments sound a bit daft. A) They have every right to be here, and B) they have benefit rights here, just as we do in their countries….

Migrants that “shouldn’t be here” i.e. illegal immigrants can’t claim without exposing their illegal status and putting themselves at risk, which I guess is probably why the director of the National Institute of Economic and Social Research, told the BBC that people “coming from outside the UK, and especially people coming from outside the European Union, are significantly less likely than British nationals, and people born here, to claim benefits”. As quoted above.

So WTF???? Is it a Cameron talking ball cocks shocker?

Been reading up on this…..and noticed this

Jonathan Portes, director of the National Institute of Economic and Social Research, told the BBC that people “coming from outside the UK, and especially people coming from outside the European Union, are significantly less likely than British nationals, and people born here, to claim benefits”.

He added that the issue of “people coming from outside the UK in order to sponge off our health service may be a problem, and we should certainly deal with abuse, but the figures tell us that they impose rather small costs on the health service”.

Which I kind of instinctively knew anyway, and given the comments above regarding what percentage of the benfits bill is actually claimed by people who are both employable AND not working, what the **** is he talking about???

I work in an industrial unit on a farm that is staffed by East European workers, (the farm, not the unit). I’ve been here for a long time, and know full well that prior to recruiting these folk the farmers business was stagnant and going nowhere, mainly due to an inability to attract staff. It is now vibrant and growing.

I really don’t get it…. these “economic” migrants are coming here to work, not to scrounge. You can argue about the rights and wrongs of that, but there just is no evidence to support this bullpoo that is being spouted about benefit scrounging.

It’ll be intersting to see the reaction when similar reciprocal restraints are applied to ex-pat brits who have for example chosen to retire to the Algarve or whereever.

Watched it live. BJ does a good act as the affable bumbling British eccentric. However, he was caught out completely, utterly and simply did not answer the questions that were posed to him. He was given ample opportunity to do so, but just couldn’t offer up answers of any credibility.

1) Fired by the Times for making upa quote (lying/cheating)
2) Lying to the Party leader over an affair (lying/cheating)
3) Providing priviliged information to a mate so he could get a journo beaten up. (criminal act)

Just what Eton and the great British public school system teaches one eh? suprised he didn’t send a Fag to take the beating for him.

Seemed incredibly ironic that the Winslow Boy was being covered shortly after.

Bearing in mind that I susbscribe to the theory that “everyone behaves rationally according to the world as they perceive it”, whats the rationale for the press to making a big issue out of Tibet for 6 – 8 weeks during the Olympics then? Like I say if it sells papers it will do that regardless, if it doesn’t why do it?

In answer to the OP.

A few years ago my wife was directed into a difficult parking space by a parking attendant. He basically waved her into the back of another car. They both inspected the damage, and she left her details. The damage to the other was barely visible to the naked eye and at most would have required a bit of a rub over with T Cut. So you might imagine my surprise when some time later I got a demand for several hundred pounds including the use of a hire car for a week.

What they were doing was trying to stiff me for previous damage, which I actually demonstrated would have been impossible for my wifes car to have caused. (The visible point of impact on my wifes car would have placed her bonnet about 18 inches inside the footprint of their vehicle before it could possibly have come into contactw with the place where their vehicle was damaged).

There was a lengthy dispute, with threats of violence made towards me and my wife, and which only ended when I involved the Police, and even then they tried to take me to county court.

Thats why people drive away. Sad but true.

Back to the OP

Big problem for me with all this release of “private info” is that it really only tells you what “they” want you to hear.

Firstly, it isn’t by their own admission, complete archive. At best it is merely selected items kept by Thatcher as personal mementos. Lets face it, I could write a letter to Ronald Reagan and not send it, so at the end of the day what does it actually prove if I then publish it 30 years later?

The other thing is why? Any chance it might have something to do with the book published yeterday by her sychophnatic former minister?

My point being wasn’t it interesting that our press managed to major so heavily on it in the run up and during the 2008 Olympics, dropping it straight after?

Putting aside all of the actual issues for one moment what does that sort of behaviour actually achieve? Does it sell more papers, does it make the intransigent more so, does it further the ends of the Tibetans themselves, is it governement sponsored for political ends? Whats it all about?

It just seems really weird to me, and looking back the intensity of the coverage for a month or two followed by nothing just doesn’t seem right. Surely if people were interested and bought papers because of it that interest doesn’t just wain overnight. Perhaps people never were really engaged with it and there was another motive.

It came up this am in a chat with a Chinese supplier, and got me thinking so thought I’d kick it around a bit with you lot.

So whats the Tory one then? Come in **** everything up, then run away and hide shouting “it was some big boys what done it and then they ran away”…….thougth that was the it was Fatcher waht dun it thread.

So I’m not losing my marbles then??

That’s bollocks – if you mean most people on benefits are unemployable

I stand open to correction on the precise percentages and vlaues, but isn’t it correct that all bar about 2 or 3 % of the benfits bill is made up of the Disabled, the Retired and people receiving Tax Credits (i.e. already employed but on low wages)? I think the total value of Job Seekers allowance out of a budget well in excess of £150 billion is about £5 billion, not insiginificant, but not the vast sink hole that they pretend it is.

Pitt the younger : What a bastard! 😡