Archive

MT's official files as Prime Minister, 1979-90

MT's official files as PM can be read on this site as they are released, in full and free to all - the confidential files originally stored at No.10, the core record of her premiership.

The files have been copied at the British National Archives (TNA) at Kew in London and can be downloaded precisely as they appear in the reading room.

We are doing something more to help people make sense of this mass of information. The files are subject-based, logically enough, but that system makes it difficult to reconstruct the flow of paper across the Prime Minister’s desk at any point in time, depriving us of a sense of context, of the political cross-winds, some of them overwhelming.

To combat this effect we are uploading a large selection of the most important documents from these files – thousands in total - to our powerful site database. You can search and sort by date, subject and other parameters, getting as close as anyone can now get to reconstructing the Prime Minister’s daily "Red Boxes", the rich diet of foreign and domestic policy papers submitted to her by the No.10 Private Office.

List and links to the PM’s files

Below are links to the downloadable files in numerical order. The subject terms are those used in the original filing system.

An average file has around 200 pages.

You can read here an account of how filing worked at No.10, and the system for archiving MT’s Prime Ministerial papers, both of which had their quirks.

Chancellor of the Exchequer’s Private Office files, 1979-1989

1979-89: Chancellor’s Private Office files [links to hundreds of digitised files from the Chancellorships of Sir Geoffrey Howe and Nigel Lawson]

Engagement Diaries

An alternative way through the material is to read MT’s engagement diaries, jumping day to day.

The engagement diaries link directly to relevant documents in the site database, so this is a good way to recover the perspective from the Red Box.

Showing items 76 - 100 of 3726

Per page:
File name File title Begins Ends Release date Any docs withheld? Classification Pages
PREM19/138 Algeria (Visit to UK by Foreign Minister Mohammed Benyahia, June 1980: meeting with Prime Minister) (Part 4) Begins: 1980 May 20 Ends: 1980 Jun 2 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 17
PREM19/139 Anguilla (Legislation for separation of Anguilla from St Kitts-Nevis) Begins: 1980 Mar 26 Ends: 1980 Oct 22 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 20
PREM19/140 Argentina (Visit to UK by Dr Martinez de Hoz, Minister of Economy, June 1980) Begins: 1980 Feb 26 Ends: 1980 Jun 11 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 16
PREM19/142 Bangladesh (Visit to UK by President Ziaur Rahman, June 1980: meeting with Prime Minister) Begins: 1980 Apr 10 Ends: 1980 Jul 25 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 78
PREM19/143 Canada (UK/Canadian relations: patriation of the Canadian constitution) (Part 1) Begins: 1979 May 23 Ends: 1980 Nov 6 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Any docs withheld? 1 Classification: Confidential Pages: 248
PREM19/146 Civil Service (Cabinet Office Whitley Council request for meeting, concerning pay, with Prime Minister) Begins: 1980 Mar 21 Ends: 1980 Dec 3 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 18
PREM19/151 Civil Service (Long-term management and manpower policy: efficiency of central government; Civil Service manpower; Sir Derek Rayner’s recommendations for reforms) (Part 5) Begins: 1980 Aug 5 Ends: 1980 Sep 30 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 167
PREM19/157 Cyprus (Prime Minister’s meeting with Alecos Michaelides, President of Cyprus House of Representatives, November 1980) Begins: 1980 Mar 12 Ends: 1980 Nov 26 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 37
PREM19/158 Defence (Defence equipment trade with USA; possible sale of improved Harriers - the AV-8B) Begins: 1979 Dec 14 Ends: 1980 Jul 31 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 42
PREM19/172 Economic policy (Strategy) (Part 5) Begins: 1980 Feb 1 Ends: 1980 Jun 30 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 219
PREM19/184 Economic policy (The Brandt Commission: report on international development issues; proposal for a North/South summit meeting) (Part 1) Begins: 1979 Oct 26 Ends: 1980 Nov 18 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 217
PREM19/190 Economic policy (Public Service pay negotiating machinery) Begins: 1980 Jan 4 Ends: 1980 Feb 13 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 14
PREM19/191 Economic policy (Proposal for a national investment trust to promote wider property ownership: report by Leo Pliatzky, July 1980) Begins: 1980 Jul 17 Ends: 1980 Dec 23 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 59
PREM19/196 Economic policy (Liability to tax of UK resident beneficiaries of overseas trusts: the Vestey case, November 1979) Begins: 1980 Oct 7 Ends: 1980 Nov 21 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 20
PREM19/197 Economic policy (Seminar with academic economists, 13 July 1980) Begins: 1980 May 9 Ends: 1980 Jul 15 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 34
PREM19/198 Education (Future of the Inner London Education Authority (ILEA)) (Part 1) Begins: 1979 Jul 4 Ends: 1980 Jun 20 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 131
PREM19/199 Education (Future of the Inner London Education Authority (ILEA)) (Part 2) Begins: 1980 Jun 20 Ends: 1980 Nov 28 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 36
PREM19/200 Education (Teachers’ pay) (Part 1) Begins: 1979 May 4 Ends: 1980 Jun 17 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 154
PREM19/201 Education (Committee of inquiry into the education of handicapped children and young people: responses to the Warnock Report, 1978) Begins: 1980 Feb 15 Ends: 1980 Jul 22 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 17
PREM19/202 Education (Non-teaching staff employed by local education authorities) Begins: 1980 Jan 30 Ends: 1980 Mar 10 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 16
PREM19/204 Energy (Energy Policy) (Part 4) Begins: 1980 Feb 20 Ends: 1980 May 7 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 207
PREM19/208 Energy (Coking coal: National Coal Board grant; British Steel Corporation imports) Begins: 1979 Jul 23 Ends: 1980 Sep 8 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 52
PREM19/210 Energy (European Community energy issues; research projects; oil import targets; coking coal scheme; projects in the hydrocarbons sector) Begins: 1979 May 11 Ends: 1980 Dec 12 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 131
PREM19/214 European Policy (Common Agricultural Policy (CAP)) (Part 2) Begins: 1979 Oct 29 Ends: 1980 Jan 31 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 185
PREM19/220 European Policy (European Council Meeting, Venice, 12-13 June 1980) (Part 4) Begins: 1980 Jan 14 Ends: 1980 Jun 19 Date of release: 2010 Dec 30 Classification: Confidential Pages: 181
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