Speeches, etc.

Margaret Thatcher

Speech to Christchurch Conservatives

Document type: Speeches, interviews, etc.
Venue: Christchurch, Hampshire
Source: Christchurch Times, 14 December 1974
Editorial comments: 1245.
Importance ranking: Major
Word count: 954
Themes: Conservatism, Industry, Monetary policy, Privatized & state industries, Public spending & borrowing, Labour Party & socialism

Mrs Thatcher's grim warning

The Tories of Christchurch and Lymington were out in force at the King's Arms Hotel, Christchurch, last Thursday, for the visit by Shadow Chancellor Mrs. Margaret Thatcher.

The Rt. Hon. Mrs. Thatcher is one of the two chief contenders for the leadership of the Conservative Party. And after her direct and impressive speech at the inaugural lunch of the Christchurch and Lymington Conservative Association Ladies' Luncheon Club, most of her audience were a lot happier with the thought of a woman as Prime Minister.

Mrs. Thatcher was introduced by local MP Mr. Robert Adley, who said that he would not list her past successes, because he felt that Christchurch was seeing Mrs. Thatcher at the beginning of the heights of her political career.

Management

Mrs. Thatcher took a piercing look into the economic purse of the country.

Mrs. Thatcher took a piercing look into the economic purse of the country.

“Our success depends on how we manage our money affairs,” she said, and she warned that a free society could not survive for long with the rate of inflation Britain is facing now.

She said that the country must face the fact that a Labour Government will borrow money to finance its expenditure.

The last Conservative government had largely paid back the previous Labour borrowing, but the present Government was committed to borrow £6,000 million—compared with £800 million 10 years ago.

She warned that freedom of speech and freedom of belief are irrelevant if there is nothing to say and nothing to believe in. And once again she stressed the need for careful and prudent management.

“You will never get a prosperous society unless you have people in power who manage well. Every prudent housewife plans the future, and it is similarly the job of the politician in economics to try to foresee and plan the future.

“And if you have a plan it does enable you to meet any unknown and unforeseen thing that may arise,” she continued. “Money is a man-given, not a God-given thing,” she said.

She recalled the recently published economic report, which prophesies an inflation rate of 20–25 per cent next year, and mentioned a recent speech by Lord Stokes in the House of Lords.

Inflation

If inflation continues at the present rate it will mean that if someone starts work at £1,800 per year, by the time he is 30 he will earn £16,000, and by age 40 will earn £100,000.

“So it cannot and must not go on,” she said.

Mrs. Thatcher touched on a subject dear to the hearts of many of her audience—the depreciation in the value of savings. “Long before you reach these salaries, savings will have lost their value completely,” she said.

Inflation is at the expense of those who have built up savings and pensions, she continued, and reminded the diners of the value of pre-and post-war bonds today.

“If you had invested in these, you would have lost out two ways,” she said explaining this was because they are worth about one-fifth of their original value, and the money you get by cashing them in buys considerably less than the same amount of money when they were bought.

“If you go on allowing inflation there will be no point in trying to persuade people to save unless also the savings can be kept abreast of inflation. Otherwise it becomes a sort of cheat on society,” said the Shadow Chancellor.

Mrs. Thatcher also warned people not to be afraid of the word profit. Industry can only look after its people and provisions if it is profitable.

Free Society

“ Marks and Spencer has done more for democracy and a free society than any amount of State control has ever done.” She said that the concept of State ownership was the more State ownership, the more power in the hands of the people.

But she refuted this concept, saying that we might own the railways, the Coal Board etc., but we cannot go to our neighbour and say: “Would you like to buy my share in the Coal Board” .

“Political liberty cannot long survive if economic liberty goes to the wall,” she said. “If prices go up faster than in other countries we cannot sell our exports, therefore we cannot pay for the imports we need.”

“The government must be judged not on what it says but on what it does,” she said. And the Government must be candid.”

President of the Luncheon Club, Mrs. C. Birney, thanked Mrs. Thatcher, saying: “Listening to you makes all that stuff you read in the papers intelligible.”

In spite of Mrs. Thatcher's speech, the surprise of the day came from Christchurch's vicar,Canon Leslie Yorke, proposing the vote of thanks to Mrs. Thatcher.

“I do not like being dragged from cradle to grave, going in directions in which I don't like to go,” he said, after thanking Mrs. Thatcher for her “Realistic, [end p1] prophetic and significant talk.”

“I like to make free decisions concerning myself and my family. If we want our way of life to continue we must come out and be seen—because freedom is the philosophy of the Conservative party.

“It isn't true to say that the Church of England is the Tory party of prayer. We have Lefties and Radicals in our ranks,” said Canon Yorke, “And we are restless to reform.”

But he said that it was no longer true to say that the middle classes were grinding the working class underfoot. “It is more true to say that many malicious and greedy working class people are doing the grinding,” he said. “Our way of life will not be preserved unless we fight for it.”

Canon Yorke said to Mrs. Thatcher: “I wish all England could have heard what you said today, and having heard it, England would listen.”