Opinions were honest, not foul abuse

I DO not think William Snowden (Yorkshire Post, August 4) should have allowed his unabashed adulation of Mrs Thatcher to call the honest opinions of correspondents who experienced her years in office as foul abuse.

Like those who think the MPs’ expenses abuse started in 2003 rather than the mid-1980s, he implies the nation’s difficulties started in the 1970s.

As a self-styled historian, if he wished to look at effects from 1979, he should also have examined causes for much earlier years.

The power failures he mentions in the ‘70s were not a result of Left-wing action, they were actually power cuts allied to a three-day working week and were advertised in advance.

Ted Heath took much of the blame for these, but what really initiated the problem was the dash for oil in the 1960s, converting power stations from our best national resources, coal, to oil and condemning the country to the vagaries of foreign owners.

When the cost increased fourfold almost overnight, it left the country struggling to keep the lights on, as well as placing additional burdens on the transport industry.

We are facing a similar situation today, where, although we are less reliant on oil for power, the continued inexorable increases in oil prices are imposing additional burdens, although at a slower rate.

From: Gordon Lawrence, Stumperlowe View, Sheffield.

I ASK myself what would our friends on the Left do if Margaret Thatcher had never existed? Life would be about as barren for them as Sunday in the Gobi Desert.

William Snowden in his letter (Yorkshire Post, August 4) expressed his contempt for the stream of venomous attacks on the former Prime Minister. But, in no way, can the Yorkshire Post be accused of being biased by publishing these attacks.

In my view, the newspaper has always reflected a full spectrum of opinion and I believe William Snowden’s letter does not, in anyway, suggest otherwise, as another letter writer infers.

But to return to the Thatcher bashers: some are now blaming her for allegedly introducing Rupert Murdoch to Britain and, of course, they accuse her of creating the expenses system that dishonest MPs exploited in order to line their ample pockets. It’s like blaming the Royal Mint for the existence of forged bank notes.

Another correspondent even made sardonic comments about the Iron Lady turning to rust. I didn’t think he’d recognise rust since iron was never used in the Stone Age.

Margaret Thatcher, it seems, will never be forgiven for delivering an anarchic Britain from a rampaging trade union movement. The idea, fossilised in the minds of the Left, that manufacturing industry was sacrificed on the altar of Thatcherism is mostly delusion. Certainly, a lot of decrepit industry went to the wall.

Much of our manufacturing, at the time, took on the nature of a dinosaur with advanced rickets; competition, especially from the East, was growing; our labour practices were destructive; our machinery was out of date.

Both Labour and Tory administrations had previously wilted in their battles to wrestle with these so-called “insuperable” problems. The unions were too strong and the vested interests enshrined in the moribund Left-liberal status quo of the post-war years were an insidious brake on progress.

In spite of the deadlock, Thatcher’s tenacity, self-belief, willpower and vision succeeded in turning Britain’s economy round.

The flack was horrendous, and it still prevails, but in accusing her of being the origin of so many contemporary problems, her critics desperately scrape at an empty barrel.

Their endeavours would gain more relevance if they examined the appalling inheritance left by recent governments.

From: T Askew, Kendal Drive, Bolton-upon-Dearne, Rotherham.

Bill Carmichael’s column (Yorkshire Post, August 12) was a little contradictory.

He says our present problems are not down to Thatcher’s policies of the 1980s. Then he says later in the piece that the problems started 30 years ago with the benefits system.

Just remind us Bill, who was in government 30 years ago?

Behaving in church

From: Stephanie Kemp, Boston Spa, Wetherby.

The Rev Matt Woodcock (Yorkshire Post, August 9), blames the decline of the established church on the views given by the Rev McNicholas (Yorkshire Post, August 4).

It’s a strange scenario, as the views of the Rev Matt Woodcock could also be seen by some as the reason for the decline of the established church.

As someone who has helped in a church on some occasions, both weddings and baptisms, I do feel a degree of empathy for what the Rev McNicholas is saying.

This is because the church bit of these occasions is in the middle of a party atmosphere. Yes, these are both joyful occasions and the church does need to give out a happy joyful message. However, if the church ignores behaviour which is inappropriate, then what message does the church send out? The church must not fear to stand up for what it stands for.

Some people can tolerate badly behaved children in church, others can’t. A variety of people make up a congregation.