Interviewer
It is a hell of a day for anybody to go through! How do you cope?
Prime Minister
Well, I think when you are presented with these things, you have no option but to cope and so you do, and that is a thing which women through the ages have had to do. You are presented with a situation, you cope.
It was a situation which I did not want. I tried to persuade Nigel LawsonNigel to stay. He had made up his mind and so, believing that I could persuade him to stay, I had somehow to get through Questions and a Statement and then come back immediately I had finished to try and persuade him to stay.
He had made up his mind. I was not able to persuade him, so then we had to move very quickly and fate operates in a very strange way. [end p1]
We are very sad that Nigel has gone. He had six extremely successful years at the Treasury. He has a very imaginative, fertile mind. What he did on reducing income tax and the things which he did on the structure of income tax and, for example, some of the things like the separate taxation of married women which comes in next April, will live on in his name for a very very long time and we are obviously deeply sorry he has gone.
Faced with that situation, the way in which it has worked out is this:
It has come about there were three people there: John Major, whose dream had always been to be Chancellor of the Exchequer, so he has got his dream. I had always thought the Nigel would stay on very much longer and that eventually John could succeed him. It came much sooner than I had expected, but I knew that that was John Major's dream and he now has got it and, of course, it is after years of experience in the Treasury. He is experienced and he has got his ambition, his dream.
Interviewer
But you? [end p2]
Prime Minister
Never mind about me!
Douglas Hurd has been a very successful Home Secretary. You know, that is a very difficult task. He has done enormous reforming legislation there, but he really and truly wanted to return to the Foreign Office and that was his dream. So that has worked out for him.
And then, David Waddington is a superb lawyer, has been a marvellous Chief Whip and was an excellent Minister of State at the Home Office and that was his dream.
So by something that no-one could possibly foresee … if ever people tell you you can prophesy or get a crystal ball out, life does not happen that way. The way life happens is to bring the unexpected as a shock, as a sorrow and at that moment you do not think of yourself at all, you think of what has to be done and, as I said, it has worked out very strangely. We are very sad to be without Nigel, but we have an excellent Chancellor of the Exchequer, an excellent Foreign Secretary, an excellent Home Secretary for each of whom it was their ambition.
Interviewer
Prime Minister, I have to ask you rude questions so that I get the answers in your words.
Prime Minister
Yes? [end p3]
Interviewer
You have been charged or some have said, that you are not prepared to work as a team, that you are too domineering. What is your answer to this?
Prime Minister
A leader must lead. A leader must lead firmly, must have firm convictions and see that those convictions are reflected in every single piece of policy. You cannot put someone in 10 Downing Street if they have no leadership qualities, if they have no convictions, if they have no convictions, if they rent a principle from anyone who has got one for sale.
Interviewer
So you will not change Margaret Thatcher?
Prime Minister
Certainly not! How can I? I am what I am.
I came here because I stood for certain things. I believe certain things. I have never faltered and I shall not and we have no difficulty in working as a team, none at all.
The way I work is that we do have very vigorous discussions, of course we do, because that is the way in which you translate your principles into practical policies. Some ways are blocked, some ways are open, and you have to think them all through and we have vigorous debates, of course we do. If someone comes up with a [end p4] point we have not thought of and it is material then of course we change the policy to take that into account, but it is always the policy founded on the convictions which we hold.
Interviewer
Do you think you are too hard on your men sometimes?
Prime Minister
No, I do not think so. I expect them to work hard - they do. You have to. It is a very absorbing job.
But you know, politics is more than a job. It is an enormous privilege. It is a great trust and it is a total fascination.
Interviewer
Were you fascinated with yesterday? You must have been fed up!
Prime Minister
No, I was not fascinated. I did not have any time to think of myself. What I had to do was to get through the day. I knew that I had not been in the House for three months. I came back. We had done a tour to Japan and called into Moscow, that was strenuous. We had a Party Conference in which one was totally absorbed and very successful and then we came back and we had over the week-end to unpack one lot of things, another lot of speeches, [end p5] everything ready, the briefings, the agendas, and reading everything but we had done a lot of work for it, working hard on the plane; and a Commonwealth Conference which I knew would not be easy.
We got back and I knew it would be difficult enough to get back on Wednesday morning, having flown for eighteen hours. We got back at four o'clock at London Airport, we got back here before five, unpacked. I then had to turn my mind to one or two engagements that day, prepare for a Cabinet yesterday morning, Questions yesterday afternoon and a Statement, so I did it.
Interviewer
How did you feel during Question Time?
Prime Minister
One had this thing hanging over one, but then I knew that the important thing was that I performed well and so I just had to put it out of my mind because my prime duty was to Question Time and to the Statement and I knew that I could do nothing further about it until the Statement and the Questions were over, which normally takes an hour, and then I had to return to that immediately.
So it is a question of saying: “I must put that thing out of my mind immediately because this is my immediate job and I must concentrate everything on that!” [end p6]
Interviewer
How does one do that?
Prime Minister
You only learn to do it by driving necessity and having had experience of driving necessity because do not forget - and this is where just a little bit of leadership does come in - my priority at that time is to answer the questions, to do the Statement; answer the questions in a way which does make it very clear that you are Prime Minister.
Interviewer
Being Prime Minister is a very lonely job. I know how much your husband means to you. Did you use him as a sounding board yesterday?
Prime Minister
No, I did not. I think Denis Thatcherhe was out for a good deal of the day. When I went up, he was not in. But we were pretty busy, if I might put it that way. We were pretty busy from the time I came down at about a quarter to nine until the time that I went up at about half-past nine to start the boxes.
Mr. Ingham
Twelve hours on the trot! [end p7]
Prime Minister
He was not in at that time; he came in later.
Interviewer
And you told him, obviously?
Prime Minister
He had heard about it and I told him about the day and then, yes, your family does mean a great deal. Do you know, by ten o'clock, both Mark Thatchermy son had rung up from the United States and Carol Thatchermy daughter. Isn't that marvellous? “How are you, Mum?”
Interviewer
And how was Mum at that stage? Did you feel emotional?
Prime Minister
By that time I knew that I had to get the appointments made. Politics and nature abhor a vacuum, so you have got to fill it pretty quickly and there were quite a lot of comings and going and consultations, so we finished it and we did it.
Nigel LawsonNigel had decided at five o'clock that I had to accept his resignation and we had seen everyone and done everything, completed the formalities, by a quarter to eight. [end p8]
Interviewer
When one is trying to persuade someone to stay on and that person is going, does it get very emotional, a friend?
Prime Minister
“Emotional” is not quite the word. “Intense” might be the word, because I very much wanted him to stay on and could not quite understand why he was going. That was the real thing.
In this kind of life you have to take a lot of knocks and the thing is you must not be knocked over by them and it seemed to me that he had had six such successful years and it had never occurred to me that he would want to go at this stage. I always know that one day he would wish to go because he obviously has other talents and abilities which he will wish to use in business. So it was intense in trying to persuade him because he is a very valuable person and we worked together for a long time.
Interviewer
You had a double blow yesterday.
Prime Minister
Yes, we had a double blow. [end p9]
Interviewer
How does one survive that and how do you shuffle your mind?
Prime Minister
Because once Nigel LawsonNigel had gone … Alan WaltersAlan is in America ...... Alan is one of the gentlest, most honest, kind people you could ever meet, he really is. If someone asks him a question, he will naturally give them the most honest answer and he is naturally helpful. All right, sometimes the press will ask him a question; it is his nature to give an answer, although all Alan did was to give them an article which was written over a year ago before he was back with me - he had no duty of confidentiality about that at all. Then he heard from the American television and, of course, he was very deeply upset and felt that he should step aside.
So yes, it was double blow but I understood how he felt. I know Alan. I know these qualities. I know when you that you have done a really good job, when you are the kind of person he is, how deeply wounding … you know, some of your colleagues take a knife to innocent people, plunge it in and twist it in the would. It is not the sort of journalism that you or I like but it happens, and it is terrible when that happens. I knew exactly how Alan felt and so we talked on the telephone and I could understand why he wanted to step aside, but I have to think about the future and that is what leadership is. [end p10]
Interviewer
Don't you sometimes feel like saying: “To hell with the lot of them!”?
Prime Minister
Oh yes, and you say that sometimes but you do not mean it. It is just a sort of little temporary explosion and then off you go again and get on with the job next in hand.
Interviewer
But it takes great strength to keep going on and especially when you turn on the TV and you hear: “Mrs. Thatcher is domineering; she will have to change her policy; it could be her great decade is over!” [end p11]
Prime Minister
Listen! Who are these people who change their policy with every passing wind and trim every sail? People who have never believed anything in their lives! And if you have never believed anything in your life, you ought never to aspire to ministerial office - never - you are not worth it!
You are only here because you want, in fact, to translate your convictions into reality.
We had a quick debate at the Commonwealth Conference on rich and poor nations and when it came to my turn I said: “Look! We were all poor. We all had to sweat a living - our ancestors - from the soil, a bleak agricultural life. We were all poor. We all started poor.”
Whether a country is now rich or poor does not depend upon its natural resources, but on the enterprise of its people.
It was my belief that these people were still enterprising and we had to release that. We did not discover that Britain was enterprising - it was all there. We had to release that and look now at the young people who are starting up on their own with enthusiasm, with energy, with adventure!
Everything I have done, the Labour Party have fought tooth and nail. They did not want people to own their houses, council tenants; they did not want to own shares - it might give them independence, it might give them self-reliance, it might give them a sense of responsibility and then they would not be so manipulatable, so malleable, so pliant to socialism. [end p12]
Socialism is for the rulers to dominate people. Everything I have done has been to release the powers of government, to give them back to people, to cut taxation; that means the cutting the amount over which government has power and more to people; to cut the amount of ownership by councils or Government, that is ownership to people. To get away from state industries. Politicians do not know how to run them - they should not have power over them - to let the industries go back to people who know how to run them. All of that - to cut controls, cut foreign exchange, cut prices and income control - is limiting the power of government and giving it back to people and if I have been dominating in giving more freedom back to people and checking the power of government, that is my fervent belief.
Government is not here to dominate people, it is here to serve them, and for that you have to release and devolve power to them and for that you have to override all of the facile, plausible half-truths and go straight for it. I believe that Government is there to serve the freedom of the people under a rule of law and therefore lower tax, take your industries out of the power of government, cut so many of your controls, have a reasonable framework of law which is fair to all - you cannot please everyone but you can be fair to them - and say: “This people is a people of talent and ability, dignity and responsibility!” and why I am in politics is because although there are some people who are evil and [end p13] selfish - and there always will be - the overwhelming majority of people are decent and honourable and generous and helpful and so if I release so many of the things away from Government back to the people, which is their right … human rights do not come from governments …
Interviewer
Prime Minister, one has to be terribly strong, though, when everyone is criticising you and some of your own people are criticising you.
Prime Minister
Of course!
Interviewer
Do you not ever look in the mirror and think: “God, am I wrong?
Prime Minister
On those fundamental things, never! Never!
Those fundamental things go to the root of the dignity of the human being and his destiny and his destiny and his dignity are not to be the pawn of the governments. [end p14]
Interviewer
Can you assure me that you will not resign and that we will win the next election?
Prime Minister
Well, I am not going to resign! I believe we shall win the next election because I believe what I believe is in tune with the deep feelings of people. They believe in self-reliance, they believe in getting on by hard work. They do want to own their home. Yes, they do want to have a bit of independence. Yes, they do, the overwhelming majority, want to leave something to their children. Yes, they do work for their families.
Interviewer
Fed up about the mortgage?
Prime Minister
Yes, they are fed up about the mortgage. I am fed up about the mortgage. I have fought more than anyone for home ownership and to keep mortgages with some tax relief. Fed up about the mortgages, but we got the thing going too fast and we have to slow it down and until we have got inflation down we shall not be able to get the mortgages down. [end p15]
The people worst affected are those who have recently purchased their houses because they purchased them at top price and, as you know, when you buy your home, whether you are buying your first one or moving into your second, larger, one, you always pay a bit more than you can afford. You do not quite know where you are going to get the money from but you always pay a bit more than you can afford and so they paid a bit more than they could afford. It is an asset that will stand them in good stead but it does not alter the fact that in the intervening years, when you have got the mortgage rate high, it really is tough because you paid more than you could afford and then you are faced with outgoings more than you can afford.
They are helped this October by the release of National Insurance - everyone pays £3 less a week on their National Insurance Contributions - so that is a little bit of help and do not forget that wages have gone up quite a lot too, so the double thing has helped a little bit.
But we just must not let it run away and we have to take the steps to get inflation down. It would have been better if things had not gone quite as fast. So I know that until we have that inflation down and the mortgage down then those people have a very tough time and I am very conscious of it. Not only mortgage owners; it is people who run small businesses. The larger [end p16] businesses have had very good profits and they can do their investment out of their profits. The small business starting is in much more difficult circumstances, the farmers as well.
I never cease to be amazed at the people who go on purchasing on credit cards with a colossal high rate of interest.
Interviewer
Paddy Ashdown called you this morning “arrogant” and I, as one who has known you so long and admire you so much, I think your fighting spirit is amazing and I would be wilting a bit after yesterday.
Prime Minister
No, I am not wilting in any way. The policy continues and a person is not arrogant who limits the power of government and returns it to the people.
Arrogant? Am I arrogant, Bernard InghamBernard?
Mr. Ingham
No! You want to get things done.
Prime Minister
I may be firm. [end p17]
Mr. Ingham
(Inaudible)
Prime Minister
Someone has got to go forward with momentum.
No, I am not arrogant. Sometimes I might be impatient.
Yes, I do give a clear lead and I should not be here if I did not.
Interviewer
You have an ...... image now. I was watching you at the Party Conference. I mean, you are so powerful now, you have changed so much.
Prime Minister
Have I?
Interviewer
Oh, I do not think you have changed underneath. I still find you a very nice person. Not many people know that and it is not easy for them!
But when you watch that woman - the great Margaret Thatcher - do you ever think: “I never realised I …! [end p18]
Prime Minister
I never watch myself. This is a thing I have never done. No-one is very happy watching themselves or listening to themselves and I have learned not to do it and when I am listening to the news and if anything comes on about me I have to walk out of the room. I go to turn it off and Denis ThatcherDenis says: “No! I want to see it!” and I always walk out of the room and go and do something next to hand, it may be work, it may be turning out the airing cupboard or doing washing up, but there you are, I never watch myself.
Interviewer
Denis watches you?
Prime Minister
Yes. I never watch myself and I will say to someone: “Look! If I am developing any mannerisms, please tell me!” I never watch myself on television.
Interviewer
So you are not, as you are accused, carried away by this image of the sort of lioness that you are?
Prime Minister
No. I never watch myself and Bernard InghamBernard never.
Mr. Ingham
...... extremely frustrating for those who want to see it! [end p19]
Prime Minister
I go to turn off the television and my family say: “No, no, Mum! We want to see it!” and so I just go out.
I do not know that woman, if you see what I mean. I only know her from the inside out. I do not know her just from the outside. I cannot - none of us can.
Interviewer
That is true.
Do you ever, at any stage - and this is not a trivial question or trying to trivialise you - but as a fellow woman you never feel like sitting down and crying and think: “God! I have done so much, I have tried so hard!” and then two people resign and life is murder and the press are outside saying everything and think this is too much?
Prime Minister
No. I think when one was younger, one might have done that, but you see, to get to both your position and mine, people forget there are a lot of rungs on the ladder to climb. You did not go from there to there. A lot of rungs on the ladder to climb and a lot of knocks on the way and the essence of life when you are climbing a ladder - whether it is in your job, in mine or sports or industry - is not how many knocks you get - you will get a lot and they will burt - but how far, when you get them, you pick yourself up and go on, and that is what you learn to do, whether you are a [end p20] batsman who has had a jolly difficult time or an industry (industrialist?) or someone who has been knocked by a hostile press or sometimes the politics are very cruel, you cannot go on unless you have a belief that takes you forward, so it is always a kind of recovery rate.
Look! The characteristics of women: you face disasters, you face difficulty, you turn immediately to do the practical thing now, that is good in three ways: first, there is always a job next in hand to do and so you get on and do it; secondly, you are always immediately thinking of other people - that too is very good; and third, it takes your mind off yourself. So you are doing things, you are thinking of other people and you have forgotten yourself. This is what happens to most when they have problems. It is not any different.
Interviewer
No. I suppose it is just the enormity of the problem.
Prime Minister
Yes, but do not forget most problems concern people and once you are faced with something which you can no longer influence - in other words, once you are faced with a resignation which you did not expect, which you did not want to come about and you still have a very good, amicable and working relationship with the person who has resigned - then you have a job that immediately arises and you have to do it. [end p21]
What you saying, really, is: “Do you sit down and mope in self-pity?” Self-pity is the most corrosive feeling. It does not do anyone any good, least of all yourself.
I had to get on. I do not like days like yesterday.
Interviewer
Do you sleep at night after a day like that?
Prime Minister
The previous night I did not because one's human clock was all wrong. We arrived back at four o'clock in the morning, came here, and I unpacked and there were three boxes here when I got back, so by about seven in the morning I was starting to work on boxes and there was no point in trying to go to sleep, I could not have gone to sleep, and I had a lot of work to do for the Thursday that was coming up and eventually went to bed after midnight because there were a lot of boxes and I did not sleep on the Wednesday night just before it happened because by the time I went to bed, twelve o'clock, it was eight o'clock in the morning where I had been, so my human clock was still at eight o'clock in the morning.
Interviewer
But this was not worrying about Nigel Lawson? [end p22]
Prime Minister
I had about one-and-a-half hour's sleep and then I was wide awake, so this is how I faced Thursday, and then I just had to keep going and eventually there were three boxes last night too, after all of this, and I worked until one o'clock and then I could not finish the last one because I was tired and then I did go to bed and I think I slept very deeply for about four hours and then I did get up and finish the other box early this morning.
I have had very little sleep in the last two days - about six hours sleep.
Interviewer
You have full confidence in your strength and in what you are doing is right, haven't you?
Prime Minister
Yes, because it stems from this deep conviction. This is why if anyone suggests I am an arrogant, authoritarian, I say: “Actually the reverse is true. I have limited the powers of government and enlarged the liberties of the people!”
Interviewer
But what they do say is that you have limited the power of those around you. [end p23]
Prime Minister
No, I have not! It is absolutely absurd, absolutely absurd!
I could not do twenty-one jobs. I can do one.
Mr. Ingham
And you are in the market for ideas from every one of them?
Prime Minister
I am in the market for ideas from every one of them. They come across with their ideas, because you know, you must see your ministers about their departments and so on.
We have never been short of ideas, Jean RookJean! No-one has ever accused us of being short of ideas. We are always looking to the future - always - that is our duty, our pleasure. We are always looking forward. We can fill the legislative programme for the next Parliament pretty well now.
Interviewer
Could you have shouted your head off at Nigel Lawson when he walked out?
Prime Minister
Oh no, oh no, that was not the-feeling at all! No! [end p24]
Interviewer
Somebody said this morning - I mean this in the loosest way - that it was like a love story at an end or let us put it as a great friendship at an end.
Prime Minister
But it is not at an end. Nigel LawsonNigel has behaved with supreme dignity and he has six years of fantastic achievement behind him, not only in giving us an economy with a higher standard of living and a higher standard of social services, but in the imagination of his tax reforms. His budget speeches will be looked back upon for years as a model of clarity, imagination and vision, so he has a fantastic record behind him. I wanted that record to continue, but there was no shouting. He had made up his mind and he has a wife and young family too.
Once I knew that there was nothing that I could do to change it - and I did after all have a go - there was no shouting and it is not the end of a friendship in any way and I still admire him and obviously admire what he has done and am very grateful for what he has done.
Interviewer
Do you ever have a regret that you perhaps did not have a go a bit earlier or see which way it was going for him in his mind? [end p25]
Prime Minister
No. I did not think that he would wish to go. He loved the Treasury, he loved the work. He worked very quickly. He was a journalist. He can draft very quickly and this is one reason why his budget speeches have had a clarity of expression and a minimum of jargon. Of course, when you start to talk about money supply, you do get some jargon, but he has the minimum of jargon, a very sharp mind and a very broad knowledge and I could not believe that he wanted to go after that immensely successful time.
No, there was no question of anger. There was a much deeper sense of loss and disbelief that he would not walk in the door again regularly, as he did once or twice a week, as well as seeing him practically every day on some meeting or other, and would not walk in for a twice-weekly or thrice-weekly discussion. It is very difficult to believe, but no, I did not feel the other way at all.
Interviewer
Now this is where I would have lost my confidence and sat down and thought: “I loved him! What did I do wrong?”
Prime Minister
I had not time to think of that. I had to think: “Nigel has decided to go, now he will have to tell his ministers - his wife he would already have discussed it with - and they will make out a statement to release; I must get my letter written to Nigel immediately so we can release it and I must get someone appointed immediately!” There was not time. One started quickly to draft. I knew exactly who I should ask. [end p26]
Interviewer
When you leave to open that foundry today … the press are a rotten lot ...... so many who once cheered you are going to be thinking! Ha, ha! She could be on the tilt!” How does it feel when you go out there?
Prime Minister
Well, you just cope. I have seen it so often before!
The appointments have been made; they are good ones. Each of the people is extremely good, experienced. They are all good team players. The policy continues.
Let us face it, the reason they have got stuck into personalities is because they have got no complaint about the policies. They have gone to the retreat of the small-minded.
Interviewer
Do you mind very much having a very hard press at the moment?
Prime Minister
I would like a better one! Who wouldn't? But if you put yourself in the front line, you cannot complain if you are short at and neither can people complain if you shoot back. That is what we do at Question Time or Answer Time.