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Portrait of Margaret Thatcher

Prime Ministers · 20th century

Margaret Thatcher

1925–2013 · British

Conservative

In office: 1979–1990

Margaret Thatcher was Britain's first woman prime minister and the longest continuously serving prime minister of the 20th century. Winning three general elections, she fought the Falklands War, defeated the 1984–85 miners' strike, privatised major state industries and curbed trade union power, an approach known as Thatcherism. The unpopular poll tax and divisions over Europe led to a leadership challenge and her resignation in November 1990.

How to spot them

  • ▸The 'Iron Lady', a name coined by a Soviet army newspaper
  • ▸A grocer's daughter from Grantham who studied chemistry at Somerville College, Oxford
  • ▸'The lady's not for turning'
  • ▸Falklands War, miners' strike, poll tax, privatisation
  • ▸'Milk snatcher' as Education Secretary

In office

The Falklands War (1982)

Task force sent to recover the islands after the Argentine invasion; Argentina surrendered in June 1982

'The lady's not for turning' speech (1980)

Conservative conference speech rejecting a U-turn on economic policy, written with Ronald Millar

Defeat of the 1984–85 miners' strike (1984–1985)

Year-long NUM strike led by Arthur Scargill against pit closures

The Community Charge ('poll tax') (1989–1990)

Flat-rate local tax, introduced first in Scotland; sparked riots in London in March 1990

Right to Buy council houses (Housing Act 1980) (1980)

Gave council tenants the right to buy their homes at a discount

The Bruges speech (1988)

Warned against a European super-state exercising dominance from Brussels

The Brighton hotel bombing (1984)

IRA bomb at the Grand Hotel during the Conservative conference; she survived and gave her speech the next day

'There is no such thing as society' (1987)

Much-quoted remark from an interview with Woman's Own

Key ideas

  • Thatcherism: free markets, privatisation (British Telecom, British Gas's 'Tell Sid' campaign), control of the money supply, and reduced union power
  • Won the British EEC budget rebate at Fontainebleau in 1984
  • Signed the Anglo-Irish Agreement (1985) and the Single European Act (1986)
  • Her close alliance with Ronald Reagan and her judgement that Gorbachev was a man she could 'do business with'

Quick-fire facts

  • •Born Margaret Roberts in Grantham, Lincolnshire; her father Alfred ran a grocer's shop
  • •Worked as a research chemist and then qualified as a barrister
  • •MP for Finchley 1959–1992
  • •Won the general elections of 1979, 1983 and 1987
  • •Resigned in November 1990 after Geoffrey Howe's resignation speech and Michael Heseltine's leadership challenge
  • •Created Baroness Thatcher of Kesteven in 1992; Order of Merit 1990 and Lady of the Garter 1995
  • •Died at the Ritz Hotel, London, on 8 April 2013, and received a ceremonial funeral at St Paul's Cathedral

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Sources