Thatcherism - This is England & Trainspotting Context
In the history of popular music, there probably has never been a politician more reviled in song, than Margaret Thatcher.
A controversial head of state, British music loved to hate the conservative leader, who helped shape the soundtrack to the late 70s, 1980s, and beyond.
Artists were singling out Thatcher before she entered Number Ten, as Linton Kwesi Johnson sang "Maggi Tatcha on di go wid a racist show," in the 1978 single It Dread Inna Inglan.
One year into office and ska revivalists The Beat were singing Stand Down Margaret.
Musical responses to Thatcher's politics came in many forms, during the early 1980s recession and the Falklands war, much of the anti-Thatcher lyrics focused on disillusioned Britain.
The Conservative government had to find substantial cuts to meet election pledges on tax. Removing free school milk for the over sevens became the most notorious saving introduced. Edward Short, then Labour education spokesman said scrapping milk was ‘the meanest and most unworthy thing’ he had seen in 20 years. It earned Thatcher the nickname, Milk Snatcher, which haunted her throughout her career. In 1985, she was refused an honorary degree from Oxford University because of her education cuts. After the war under Clement Attlee the 1946 Free Milk Act was passed providing 'one third of a pint to all children under the age of 18'. Previous research had linked poor nutrition, low income and underachievement.
Margaret Thatcher's governments weakened the powers of the unions in the 1980s, in particular by making it more difficult to strike legally, and some within the British trades union movement criticised Tony Blair's Labour government for not reversing some of Thatcher's changes
Margaret Thatcher, like her predecessor governments, closed coal mines because they were uneconomic tax guzzlers and the unions were preventing the opening up of new energy sources which could benefit the British people and the economy. In early 1984, the Conservative government of Margaret Thatcher announced plans to close 20 coal pits which led to the year-long miners' strike which ended in March 1985.In 1964, 545 mines where open, but Labour governments shut down 326 of them, more than half. When Thatcher took over, the pace of closures actually slowed, with only 6 closing in her first year as Prime Minister.
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