Margaret Thatcher, Leader of the Conservative Party - Essay Example

Margaret Thatcher: How She became Leader of the Conservative Party Introduction Margaret Hilda Thatcher was born on 13th October 1925. She became the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990. In the same time she was elected as the leader of the Conservative Party four years before she became the prime minister of the United Kingdom. Margaret Thatcher became the longest serving British Prime Minister and she also stands as the only woman to have held the office as the top most premier in the Conservative Party. Thatcher’s life in politics was a long journey that started with her being elected as a member of parliament in in 1959. She was representing Finchley Region in England. Later in 1970, she was appointed the secretary for Education and Technology. In a conservative party election that was held in 1975, Thatcher was able to defeat Edward Health as the leader of the Conservative party and by that she emerged the leader of opposition and the first woman to be a leader of a major political party in the UK. This paper will look at the strategies that Margaret Thatcher used to become the leader of the Conservative Party and how she remained its leader for such a long time. Thatcher Politics As mentioned earlier in the introduction, Margaret Thatcher became the first lady to hold a major party leadership in the United Kingdom. Her way of leadership made her to be branded the Iron Lady due to the mode she used in administration and maintaining her relevance in leadership. Battling it with men and especially defeating Edward Health in the Conservative Party elections in 1975 worked as a milestone in her bid to become the first female Prime Minister in the United Kingdom. Thatcher’s put down a number of policies that she was fighting for and which she deemed best for the whole nation. Her policies cost the country in some way but also empowered the people to work more and deliver much without waiting for the government to do a lot for them (Evans, 2013). Thatcher made it clear that the government could only do what it was capable of doing and the people would be left with the mandate to do the rest for themselves. One of the policies that she set was the ownership of houses that made the citizens able to own houses for the first time in the history of the nation. This earned her both fame and resistance from the people who thought that her way of leadership was truly deficient. In becoming the leader of the conservative party, Thatcher had capitalised in the loss of power of the party leader Edward Health who had become unpopular and consequently lost the seat to her in the party elections that were held in 1975. In the period that Thatcher rose as a new leadership phenomenon in the United Kingdom in the 1970s, the country was suffering from serious high inflation rates and so it was a bit easy for her to come up with policies that were seen as the best to address the issue. James Callaghan James Callaghan was the British Prime Minister who was succeeded by Margaret Thatcher. During his last years as the Prime Minister, he witnessed a series of strikes during the last winter in office which were branded the Winter of Discontent (Evans, 2013). This was marked by a spread of strikes in the public sector trade unions with the players in this sector demanding for pay rises. James Callaghan was heading the labour party and his term in office had seen the inflation rates rise high and unemployment hit 10% which was also alarming. The Labour Party had introduced Pay Caps against the trade unions a move that was aimed at settling the trade union’s congress. The Trade Union Congress had been aggressive in demanding for a long lasting solution to the nation’s rising inflation rates and with James Callaghan and his Labour Party not coming up with any solution, the trade unions took it to the streets with the series of strikes that marked the winter in that year. In a move to control inflation, the government had tried to make a forced departure from the social contract that it had made with the Workers Unions and imposed a number of rules on the public sector. In its bid the government had said that the pay for those in the public sector would be kept below 5% so that the rising rates of inflation would be controlled. This was also meant to be a good example to the private sector which was being urged to follow the same trend with its workers. However due to the resistance that this policy faced the Labour Party was the overall losers both in terms of popularity and in solving the whole issue (Evans, 2013). As his term came to an end James Callaghan knew that he could not successfully maintain the leadership of the nation and this gave Margaret Thatcher an added advantage since she seemed to have a better strategy to solve the problem of inflation in the nation without imposing rules that would further harm the normal citizen such as the ones that had been introduced by the Labour Party under James Callaghan. How Thatcher Came to Lead the Conservative Party The Conservative Party lost the elections to the Labour party in 1974 and this sent James Callaghan to power as the Prime Minister. Due to this loss, Margaret Thatcher decided to challenge Edward Health in the leadership of the party. To everyone’s surprise in the election that was held in 1975, Thatcher emerged the winner. However, she had to wait for the current tenure of Prime Minister James Callaghan to end in 1979 so that she could try her luck in the forthcoming elections. In the meantime she had the mandate to strengthen the Conservative Party in preparation to the 1979 elections (Campbell, 2003). The Labour Party was not able to deliver in its mandate and this led to the rising inflation rates in the United Kingdom by 1979. On top of this the unemployment rate hit 10% which made the citizens really agitated with the current government (Evans, 2013). To add to its misery it tried to impose a policy where the people working in the public sector would not be paid more than 5% to try and settle the inflation crisis that had hit the nation. This was the core reason behind the 1978/1979 winter of discontent that was marked by a string of strikes that shook the whole public sector at the time. All this worked positively for Margaret Thatcher who introduced her simple policy where the people would be empowered to work and deliver more rather than waiting for the government to do a lot for them. Thatcher’s Policies Margaret thatcher came up to power with a number of policies for the country that made her more relevant and that maintained and regained the people’s trust on the government. This made her stay in power for quite a long period than what many could have expected. Audit-Revolutionary Policy Immediately she got to power, Margaret Thatcher wanted to empower the people and ensure that they relied less on the government unlike what had been the norm in the previous government which had seen inflation rising high and unemployment becoming the order of the nation (Evans, 2013). In her first bid, she gave the people the right to buy and own council houses. This would make them house owners for the first time in the history of the nation. This was part of her initial speech in 1979 when she resumed the office. To make the people buy the houses, large discounts were awarded and up to 100% mortgage plans were provided for in the deal. In this plan and during her premiership, more than 1.5 million council houses were sold off. This generated a total of about twenty billion pounds to the treasury (Campbell, 2003). On top of this owner occupation grew from 55% of the population in 1980 to 67% in 1990. This was a great achievement for the government and it helped in getting money to curb the rising rates of inflation which had become a real menace at the time. Privatisation The other policy that boosted Thatcher’s administration was privatisation. She introduced a move where public industries were to be moved into the private sector. This way, she wanted to revive their fortunes as they were already struggling to exist. This was also meant to spread wealth and ownership of the industries like never before. The move to privatise many industries in the public sector was a major success to Thatcherism. The industries that were privatised include the British Telecom, British Airways, British Gas, and British Steel among others (Evans, 2013). During that time, i.e. 15 years of her tenure, over 100 billion dollars of assets worth of state dollars were sold off. This generated much cash and it was key in kicking off the economy in a country that was marred by unemployment. Trade Union Reform The trade Union Reform outlawed secondary picketing. This was important to eliminate a case like the one that was witnessed in 1979 during the tenure of James Callaghan (Campbell, 2003). There were numerous strikes which followed the policy aimed at reducing the payment of the public workers to as little as 5%. Thatcher knew she had to avoid a similar scenario if she had to safe guard her premiership. Economic Matters The main reason why the Labour Party under James Callaghan was unable to clinch the seat back in 1979 was the economic crisis that had faced the United Kingdom and they had no strategy that would solve that. Thatcher therefore came up with better strategies to avoid a similar scenario (Evans, 2013). Thatcher’s Achievements Apart from implementing the policies highlighted above, Thatcher was able to reduce income tax from eighty three per cent to 40 percent for the top rate tax payers. Basic income tax rate dropped from 33% to 25%. This and other Thatcher’s achievements were key to her remain in power and why she was an all-time successful Prime Minister. Conclusion Margaret Hilda Thatcher’s rise to power and leadership of the Conservative Party was based on her policies and taking advantage of the flaws made by Edward Health as the leader of the Conservative Party. When the labour party lost the elections in 1974, Thatcher took it as an opportunity to seize power and using her well laid strategies she was able to take it in the 1975 party elections. The years that followed up to 1979 were marred by inflation and unemployment crisis that gave her an upper hand as she came up with policies that were meant to address the problem. The way she tackled the problems ensured that she remained in power and made her period as the Prime Minister one of the most successful. Cited Work Campbell, John. (2003). Margaret Thatcher: The Iron Lady. Volume Two. London: Random House Group. Evans, J. Eric. (2013). Thatcher and Thatcherism, Third Edition, London: Routledge Press. Read More