EALING'S Conservative MP Angie Bray has called Margaret Thatcher "our greatest peacetime Prime Minister" following the Iron Lady's death today (Monday).
Mrs Thatcher, who was 87, died of a massive stroke, it was announced this morning. She was Britain's first woman prime minister and served in 10 Downing Street from May 1979 to November 1990, winning three general elections along the way.
Ealing Central & Acton MP, Angie Bray, called the former PM "a giant in British politics" and added: "She will, I am sure, be remembered as our greatest peacetime Prime Minister to date. She was also our first female Prime Minister which, at the time when she first entered Number 10 Downing Street, was a remarkable achievement in itself. We shouldn’t forget, either, that she didn’t come from a gilded background – her family ran a small grocery shop in Grantham.
“She inherited a country going backwards following a succession of leaders who had talked of managing its decline. But suddenly with Margaret Thatcher, the country had a Prime Minister who talked up Britain's prospects and indeed she left office with our economy flourishing and Great Britain's reputation restored. No longer the sick man of Europe as we had become known."
Angie continued: “Her influence on Foreign Affairs was considerable as well. She defied many experts and sent a task force half way round the world to defend a part of Britain, the Falkland Islands, against the forces of tyranny - and won despite the odds. She won a famous rebate in talks in Brussels to reduce the cost of our membership of the EU - again against expectations. And perhaps most important of all, her courageous alliance with President Reagan helped to bring down the Iron Curtain finally, bringing freedom to many Eastern European countries who had been trampled underfoot by the communist regime in the Soviet Union. She was one of the first leaders in the West to recognise and support the rise of the new Russian President, Mikhail Gorbachev, who delivered the key changes to dismantle the Soviet Union.
“Her example has inspired many younger Conservative politicians, alot of them women who have seen how she blazed a trail for women to get themselves elected to Parliament. We have all noted in her an ability to fight for what she believed in, to stand up for those people who work hard for themselves and their families and to champion the cause of freedom. She never flinched from her goal even when pragmatism (which was another of her qualities) meant a more roundabout route to get there.
“For me the words which sum her up are courage, determination and grit. Who can forget her remarkable performance on stage just hours after the IRA had tried to blow her up in her hotel in Brighton during the party conference, killing a number of her close friends in the process? “I honestly doubt that we will see her like again in our lifetime.”
Labour MP for Ealing North, Steve Pound, told the Gazette: "Margaret Thatcher changed politics in this country forever, not necessarily for the better, but her place in the history books is assured. My sympathies to her children and grandchildren."
