Maggie Twatcher

[Hartshot]

RIP Maggie, God bless you. If possible can you come back and possess Cameron



And before you start, I worked for British Rail and had mates working for Rover Longbridge. They all deserved what was coming to them, idle gits. You wouldn't believe what we got away with at BR, I actually left because of boredom and nothing to do, it took 5 years though Shame for the very few innocents that were involved but you always get casualties in any trouble.

Hartshot, I wasn't there at the pits but you can bet your bottom dollar quite a few brought it down. Your Dad may have been an innocent and you certainly were but common sense says if men work 8 hours and don't make a profit then something has to be done.
Why should Joe Bloggs work 8 hrs in a factory as a welder have to sponsor Fred Smith who works 8 hrs in a pit as a miner ? The rules are quite simple, make a profit or go.

All I know is my Dad had his fib&tib shattered by a roof fall,I remember the phone call "had a bit of a bump son" he told me. He still has Vibration white finger, broke his fingers countless times and his hand, Has neck problems stemming from the cold and wet of the pits where he worked. He has blue scars where there should be none, he was a team captain at the face where it was toughest and worked his guts out for 18 years down there.
The Problem was not Dad or his close work mates, it was the reality of a reduced demand for coal that led the way in that industry.
I have worked at Longbridge as an Inspector for British Steel, both of these (as you say) are guilty as charged. As I said, it needed to happen, things needed to be more efficient.
BUT.
When it hits you so personally, when there's nothing in the cupboards or fridge and your Mam is crying, it really hits home.
It takes a long time to forget that and she represents those memories for me. She represented everything that was wrong at that time. Bye Bye Maggie, Bye Bye.
Simples.

Religion is next lads, who's up for some

PS.
Thanks Ian (Sika Stag), I just had to get it off my chest mate

[rodp]

RIP Maggie, God bless you. If possible can you come back and possess Cameron



And before you start, I worked for British Rail and had mates working for Rover Longbridge. They all deserved what was coming to them, idle gits. You wouldn't believe what we got away with at BR, I actually left because of boredom and nothing to do, it took 5 years though Shame for the very few innocents that were involved but you always get casualties in any trouble.

Hartshot, I wasn't there at the pits but you can bet your bottom dollar quite a few brought it down. Your Dad may have been an innocent and you certainly were but common sense says if men work 8 hours and don't make a profit then something has to be done.
Why should Joe Bloggs work 8 hrs in a factory as a welder have to sponsor Fred Smith who works 8 hrs in a pit as a miner ? The rules are quite simple, make a profit or go.

All I know is my Dad had his fib&tib shattered by a roof fall,I remember the phone call "had a bit of a bump son" he told me. He still has Vibration white finger, broke his fingers countless times and his hand, Has neck problems stemming from the cold and wet of the pits where he worked. He has blue scars where there should be none, he was a team captain at the face where it was toughest and worked his guts out for 18 years down there.
The Problem was not Dad or his close work mates, it was the reality of a reduced demand for coal that led the way in that industry.
I have worked at Longbridge as an Inspector for British Steel, both of these (as you say) are guilty as charged. As I said, it needed to happen, things needed to be more efficient.
BUT.
When it hits you so personally, when there's nothing in the cupboards or fridge and your Mam is crying, it really hits home.
It takes a long time to forget that and she represents those memories for me. She represented everything that was wrong at that time. Bye Bye Maggie, Bye Bye.
Simples.

Religion is next lads, who's up for some

PS.
Thanks Ian (Sika Stag), I just had to get it off my chest mate

I do honestly feel for you buddy, I really do. It had to be done though, where would we be now if it had gone on. We would certainly have the commy unions in charge and they would be bleeding profitable private enterprise dry subsidising these money swallowing white elephants.
As you said yourself, it was lack of demand that caused the pits to go. How would you feel if I said "look, my business isn't doing to well so you HAVE to subsidise me". You would tell me to go and spin on it and find something profitable to do, and you would be right to do so

As for British steel Down at Round Oak (it was just up the road from me) when my old Dad had a fleet of tippers trucks used to go in the tipping shed with scrap, wait a few minutes and drive out (without tipping). They would then go out the bottom gates on to Level st and up onto the Dudley rd. They would wait there an hour and drive back in the top gates, over the bridge and in the tipping shed. Repeat italics over and over again all day. And folk wonder why steel from Britain wasn't competitive Now, I can honestly say my old Dad wouldn't do this, I did plead with him time and time again but he said no chance son, not worth the risk. Looking back with a much older head on my shoulders he was right, some things just shouldn't be done. Good old Dad.

[chas]

As for British steel Down at Round Oak (it was just up the road from me) when my old Dad had a fleet of tippers trucks used to go in the tipping shed with scrap, wait a few minutes and drive out (without tipping). They would then go out the bottom gates on to Level st and up onto the Dudley rd. They would wait there an hour and drive back in the top gates, over the bridge and in the tipping shed. Repeat italics over and over again all day. And folk wonder why steel from Britain wasn't competitive Now, I can honestly say my old Dad wouldn't do this, I did plead with him time and time again but he said no chance son, not worth the risk. Looking back with a much older head on my shoulders he was right, some things just shouldn't be done. Good old Dad.[/quote]


There was a similar thing went on in the mines with trucks running about everywhere.
One place (remaining nameless) I used to go into had trucks taking freshly lifted coal from near the shaft itself and moving it to the stocking ground.
Each wagon had a vehicle ID card in the windscreen and loads were logged over a weighbridge based on this number, some bright spark had the idea of running two virtually identical wagons with duplicate ID cards.
The real wagon would park up on the stocking ground and his mate would load up with coal and drive out of a back gate
Hundreds of thousands of pounds were apparently involved and although the con was discovered albeit much to late, no further action was taken.
Alright for some.

[some bloke]

Whether you loved her or loathed her you have to admit she had bigger bollocks than anybody that has come to power since , maybe they can send a piece of her backbone to each of the soppy twats that are systematically ruining this what was once a great country , can you imagine what the end result would be if the falkands kicked off again now i also think "human rights" laws , immigration and being dictated to by a bunch of overpaid unelected tossers in brussels may be different today had she still been in power

That about sums my thoughts up too but I couldn't have worded it that well.

I once got escorted off a building site for refusing to join a trade union. Whilts I would agree a lot of good has been done for the working man, I truly believe trade unions were the main reason for Britain losing it's manufacturing base. In a nutshell - we became too expensive to employ in my opinion. Labour never wanted businessmen to reap a reward worth investing in. Europe's meddling has also contributed to our downfall but all MP's want to do about it is line their retirement pockets. I deliberately left "GT" out because there's now't great about Britain's place at the world table any more.

[Mister Gain]

I was saddened to learn of the death of Maggie Thatcher... saddened that it didn't happen 40 years ago.

[Hartshot]

I was saddened to learn of the death of Maggie Thatcher... saddened that it didn't happen 40 years ago.

Your picture still cracks me up Mr Gain
How have you got on at the orchard ???

[Mister Gain]

Spent 7 hours there today and only had one shot... which missed.. had 3 rabbits venturing away from their warrens and all of a sudden shot down their holes.. farmer was driving round with his f****ing demented dog.. downwind. The bunnies heard it but not me. I would like to shoot the dog . Prone position for 5 hours, I ache like a bast**rd. No fun getting old.. Left shoulder feels like the wife has been flogging me with the number 5 bull whip

[squid]

At the risk of being controversial..................I hope it's very warm down there !

Oooof, touch paper lit and away we go !

I find it interesting you think it likely that (many) others will disagree with you..

I agree with you in that she didn't consider the broader social implications of her actions, she could have done a MUCH better job in looking after the people in those industrial areas that had become uncompetitive. But a country can only go on subsidizing loss making industries (coal etc) for so long, when there is no improvement in sight for them. At that time much of our industry had brought itself to the point of collapse through bad management and over unionization so that massive job losses were, to a large extent, inevitable.

As well as beating the Argies she stopped Arthur Scargill (et al) from turning the UK into a satellite state of the Soviet Union.

If she is down below, she'll soon have the place turned around and making a profit

Let me start by saying that despite what may come across next, I am not an overtly political person. More often than not I could not give a monkeys nuts who is in power, to me they are now one and the same egomaniacal bunch of baying wolves, all out for their own gratification and in the process to line their deep greedy pockets - Miow !
This is my view of the Rusty old Gal, and why :

I was in my early-mid teens when her regime directly effected me, Dad was a South Wales coal miner. Now then, while I freely admit that industry in general needed a kick up the posterior, the way it was instigated and administered was purely class oriented. The middle class urbanites trying to dictate what the rest of the country should do and think.....sounds familiar to everybody with a firearm, doesn't it !
As a schoolboy I was in lined up to work on the Super Ted cartoon at S4C, or Buttyvision as I call it . because I could draw a bit. It was to be linked with a Uni course as a sort of apprenticeship, Dad went on strike at around the same time. Trouble was, the S4C thing was very poorly paid and the family needed the money. I had to go to work crazy hours at a bakery in order to earn enough cash to sustain the family, I had a fiver a week to spend on myself after giving the rest to Mam. Every day I would go out hunting rabbit, squirrel and pigeon to feed the family, while dad did odd jobs on the sly to get by.
So a year passed by, I'd had to leave school before taking my A levels and the S4C thing had been given to somebody else, I was still at the bakery and Dad went back to work. My golden chance had passed me by because my family took priority.
I never did go to Uni as a youth, only doing a course some years later after the kids had grown up a bit.
That year was hard, very hard. Do I resent the need to shake things up a bit in industry, NO.
Do I resent it affecting me personally to such a degree, YES.
I'm sure too that it had a greater effect on many more than me !
That's why I will not be wearing a black arm band next week.

H

Personaly, I would never rule out subsidising a loss making industry, if the cost of the redundant work force, and the associated socio-economic, implications, was greater than the cost of subsidy. I fear that not enough account is taken of the implications of shutting up such apparently, uneconomic industries.

However, it does seem to me that the trade unions had far too much power, and were not prepared to compromise in a reasoned manner. I suspect that the scale of the economic losses meant that something had to change. With that in mind, I wonder what you would have done, if you'd been PM at the time?

I'm not having a go but none constructive, criticism, isn't much use. Though I understand why it might make you feel better.

Incidentally, I always thought the poll tax seemed a good idea but I don't recall anyone mentioning, wether there was any, great, disparity, between the ammount of funds raised by poll tax v rates. There was presumably some good (or bad) reason for Mrs T risking so much.

What I will say, is that the woman had balls, and that's more that can be said for the current parliamentary incumbents.

[Hartshot]

As I said previously (and no offence taken by the way, it's all a bit of fun now anyhoo) things did need to change. Trade unions needed reeling in. The coal industry was on it's last legs, which in my view was a major factor in the disputes because coal reserves were rapidly dwindling and demand followed the same trend.
Look at the steel industry as an example, the Germans, Dutch, Italians, Russians, Indians, Chinese, and several other governments still subsidise steel firms with a coin or two in their boot between shifts , they are all still going, ours........well.......... not so good !
I, like a lot of others here experienced frst hand the demise of the trade unions, for better and for worse ! We are at a stage now where employers have so much power (myself included) it's shameful. Workers have lost their rights to such an extent that employers can do virtually anything and get away with it. I don't take the piss out of the lads who work under me, that can't be said for a huge percentage of employers out there.
It's purely personal for me regarding Maggie. She crossed my family, I don't forget..........
Now, every Magpie I get is my own little retrobution, a symbolic gesture and a wry smile to myself for the old crow !
I do agree she had more balls than most. But. If you look at the fallout and subsequent wider issues stemming from her influence it doesn't read well ! We now have the widest gap in Europe between the affluent and less well off. Worrying !
Was there a contingency plan for the areas most affected, for the industries most affected, for the people most affected....you decide !
The results stand for themselves today. Britain was once a major manufacturing base, worldwide. Now, it's all but gone, there's nothing left because they were dealt a heavy hand which decimated their future, not shaped it. She had balls but did she let her knob rule her brain. Anybody can break something, it's fixing it afterwards, that's the real challenge, the real skill ! Did she succeed in that endeavour ?
All that's left are call centres and kebab shops.
That was a Party Political Broadcast on behalf of the 'No Tears for Maggie' party.

Religion, c'mon let's get cracking on that hot spud next

[phoenix]

Hartshot,
Religion? - easy!! - it's not true - none of them are true, there is no sky fairy or whatever you want to call your personal deity.
Believers who say "God works in mysterious ways" when they don't understand something in the natural world are simply displaying their intellectual laziness.
As you may have guessed I'm a fully paid up atheist.
Best laugh lately was on Fox news (F**cks News more like) when a presenter challenged an atheist they were interviewing by saying that many people took comfort from their religous beliefs. The guys' response: "Junkies take comfort from heroin but that doesn't make it right!!"

Standing by for incoming!!

Cheers

Bruce