Thought Id start this one going because its rather dead on this board at the moment and I suppose all my usual muckers are either at the Stella tennis event watching Dim Tim (lose again) or at Henly Regatta eating cucumber sandwiches (they wish,...NOT).

Anyway please feel free to just talk to yourself blast away and let it go on any company or subject you wish. Just wish Id thought of this one before.

cheers GF.

I see from above that 'goldplunger' has become the king of cut and paste.

The EU rebate that Margaret Thatcher negotiated has netted us £75 billion so far.

There is speculation that Port Stanley in the Falklands will be renamed Port Margaret.

Would have saved a lot more if we hadn't joined in the first place Haystack and she only renegotiated the crap Heath signed when we joined.

Chris old mucker, have you seen this......... (doesnt do much for your and your freinds reputations) Good old Haystacks.

Margaret Thatcher accused of holding 'unabashedly racist' views

Australian foreign minister, Bob Carr, reveals former British PM warned him of challenge posed by immigration


Nicholas Watt, chief political correspondent

guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 9 April 2013 23.49 BST



Australia's foreign minister, Bob Carr, said that Margaret Thatcher pleaded with him to ensure Sydney did not 'end up like Fiji'. Photograph: Achmad Ibrahim/AP


Margaret Thatcher has been accused by the Australian foreign minister of having held "unabashedly racist" views after he revealed that the late former British prime minister had warned him of the challenge posed by immigration from Asia.

Bob Carr, who served as premier of New South Wales between 1995 and 2005, said that Thatcher pleaded with him to ensure Sydney did not "end up like Fiji" where citizens of Indian heritage formed a majority until a coup in 1987.

Carr, whose wife is of Malaysian origin, spoke of his surprise at Thatcher's remarks. The senator told the Lateline programme on ABC TV: "I recall one conversation I had with her in her retirement where she said something that was unabashedly racist, where she warned Australia – talking to me with Helena [his wife] standing not far away – against Asian immigration, saying that if we allowed too much of it we'd see the natives of the land, the European settlers, overtaken by migrants."

Carr expressed astonishment when Thatcher drew an analogy with Fiji, where the Indo-Fijian community formed a majority of the population in 1970 when it achieved independence from Britain. The community, descendants of labourers who travelled to the former British colony to work on sugar plantations in the late 19th century, has fallen to just over 38% in the last two decades after a 1987 coup. In 2000 Mahendra Chaudhry, the first Indo-Fijian prime minister, was taken hostage in another coup.

Carr said: "I was astonished. Helena fortunately was out of earshot. I remember one thing she [Thatcher] said as part of that conversation. She said: 'You will end up like Fiji. I like Sydney but you can't allow the [Asian] migrants … to take over otherwise you will end up like Fiji where the Indian migrants have taken over."

The foreign minister added: "I was so astonished I don't think I could think of an appropriate reply. I think we moved on to other subjects pretty quickly."

Carr, a Labour senator who was appointed foreign minister after the resignation of the former prime minister Kevin Rudd last year, made clear that he still respected Thatcher on the grounds that she challenged the centre-left to modernise.

He said: "She produced a realignment of politics. She forced my side of politics, the social democrat parties, to think more deeply about the role and function of the state, of the public sector. [She] forced Labour parties around the world to consider whether government could remotely pretend to be the answer to many of the problems it was assumed it could be. I also think she was right in joining Reagan and denouncing the old Soviet Union as an evil dictatorship."

Carr's remarks contrasted with warm praise for Thatcher from Julia Gillard, Australia's British-born and first woman prime minister. Speaking in Beijing, she said: "Her service as the first female prime minister of the United Kingdom was a history-making achievement. Her strength of conviction was recognised by her closest supporters and her strongest opponents."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2013/apr/09/margaret-thatcher-accused-racist-views?CMP=twt_gu

It is just Bob Carr, as usual, trying to make a political point. What she said has some merit. She was suggesting Australia limit immigration from countries that would change the culture of the country. That seems to be the same dialogue we are having now but too late.

I think you already posted that Guardian article in the early hours of this morning gf.

Yes I have but chris hasnt seen it yet. Just tell him Ive linked it onto twitter so IT WILL be half way round the world come friday.

Hope you had a better nights sleep DB, those nasty anti left wing non Maggie fans.

New house hunting job today then?.

GF - LOL left wing shite as per mate, is that the best you got? You are much better at picking stocks, give up making a pillock of yourself.

3m,

When Stalin and Hitler died, some rejoiced and cheered, some mourned.

While wandering around Europe in the 90s came across a German mourning the death of Hitler and lighting a candle to iconic photograph of Hitler.

Surprised me, but to each, their own.

-------------

I think, the proposed "state" funeral, is another Cameron and con party stunt to divert attention to from his appalling failures and current policies he is forcing through.

Also, he attempting by use public money for party political purposes, to sway the party diminishing faithful, who are rapidly recognising him as a fraud and a failure, to stick with his sinking ship.

He is costing for the public approximately £10million to burn her, but at the same time denying “welfare support” for others who are in more need.

Thatcher was over hyped by the Murdock and right wing press, who relied on little Englanders' naivety to keep her and them in “power”.

I suggest you look at the policies she introduced to her "reign", the "rich" who she pandered to and fragmentation and atomisation of society she produced in the UK..

She was the driving force of mean, deplorable policies which eventually stuck in the throats of her own cabinet, who "killed" her off, and which in private rejoiced in doing so.

---------------------

Hays,

Sometimes, in the past I thought your postings were interesting, although I disagreed with many of your stances, but your recent posting seem to show the zeal of the village idiot who shouts mindlessly on the village green at passing shadows.



GF.


Thank you for Postings 23252 and 23254.

One can seen the usual band of failures, feebly clinging to each other trying to support their delusions.

Of course there will be the usual denials from some, who prefer to scapegoat others for the results of their actions.

The tory party is still continuing with its attempts to con the public into believing that the “elitist looney right” with its few remaining few affiliates are fit to govern.

A state of denial.

======

I don't think Maggie was more of a racist than many others in that party, but just another deluded egocentric elitist.

-

Stan,

I hope the pub hasn't run dry.

Margreat
Maggie voted No1 Prime Minister as UK gives verdict

More than a quarter of all those surveyed hailed her as Britain’s most popular PM since World War Two.

An overwhelming 28 per cent of people interviewed opted for Maggie as “the greatest” out of 13 Prime Ministers we have had since 1945.

She even eclipsed legendary Sir Winston Churchill, who came second in the poll. Churchill, who as well as being Britain’s wartime leader was also PM from 1951-55, won 24 per cent of support.

Afternoon Fred, the right are imploding here this morning.

Young chris(poor simple lad) has just had a right go at haystacks re- to haystacks bringing up Thatcher as a racist.

Cant do with racists, they make me sick and are dinosaurs of this earth.

Shocked me to find Maggie was a racist aimed at India of all places aswel, a lovely country with lovely people. (suppose this included Pakistan aswel)

Shame on her shame on her I say, the Lady should have been for turning, YES YES YES.

Fred weve been in your abscence debating wether Maggie should have such a high profile funeral with all that cost £ 10 million plus spent on it.

Big majority here so far against it.

Poor people having to take cuts and Camoron spending money like water.

I say NO NO NO.

As can be seen above the majority are in favour of a state funeral with a only 32% against. It is just the left loonies that are against it.

"...Cant do with racists, they make me sick and are dinosaurs of this earth." Which, based on many of Tanker's posts, includes him....BIG TIME!

I say NO NO NO to spending any money on funeral.

Cameron is the ignorant, putting his own agenda ahead of people. He wants to be respected/remembered when his time come. This will backfire, I believe.

MPs who attend will lose votes next time.

Harry have you got the evidence for this?. This thread has been turned into a thread where you have to give evidence to back up what you say. The right wing loons have brought this in.

How the coalition is repeating Thatcher's biggest mistake: the poll tax


Like the poll tax, the decision to cut council tax support by 10 per cent will force the poorest households to pay the local charge regardless of their income.
By George Eaton Published 10 April 2013 12:22

One of the unambiguous conclusions from the polling carried out since Margaret Thatcher's death is that her biggest mistake was the poll tax. Forty four per cent of those polled by YouGov for today's Sun select it as her greatest failure (more than for any other policy), while a Guardian/ICM survey found that 70 per cent believed it didn't work, compared to just 14 per cent who said it did (again, the worst rating received by any of her policies).

All of which makes it even more surprising that the coalition has chosen to effectively reintroduce it. The decision to cut council tax support by 10 per cent will force many of the poorest households to pay the monthly charge for the first time, regardless of their income. A report by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation found that 1.9 million families who do not currently pay council tax will be billed an average of £140 a year, while an additional 150,000 low income families will pay an average of £300 more.

When the poll tax was introduced in 1989, the poor were at least assured that their benefits would rise with prices. But under George Osborne’s plan to uprate working-age benefits by 1 per cent for each of the next three years, rather than in line with inflation, their incomes will be squeezed to an unprecedented degree. Figures from the Institute for Fiscal Studies show that the average working family will lose £165 per year, while the average non-working family will lose £215. Confronted by these losses, which household will willingly pay hundreds of pounds in additional tax? Yet, for the sake of saving just £480m a year, the coalition intends to force councils to chase the poorest through the courts to recoup a charge they cannot afford to pay.

By devolving council tax support (Council Tax Benefit, which 5.9 million households receive, is currently administered by central government) and requiring local authorities to design their own schemes, ministers are hoping to avoid receiving the blame for the tax rises. Their luck may well hold. But more than any other austerity measure, "Poll Tax II" has the potential to cause a mass revolt.

http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2013/04/how-coalition-repeating-thatchers-biggest-mistake-poll-tax


.

But more than any other austerity measure, "Poll Tax II" has the potential to cause a mass revolt.