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 876 - 900 of 3726

Items per page
File name File title Begins Ends Release date Any docs withheld? Classification Pages
PREM19/876 Posts and telecommunications (Future of the Post Office: telecommunications liberalisation and privatisation; British Telecom's financial position and prices; System X) (Part 4) 1982 Mar 22 1982 Jul 19 2012 Dec 28 Top Secret 159
PREM19/877 Posts and telecommunications (Future of the Post Office: telecommunications liberalisation and privatisation; Telecommunications Bill; System X) (Part 5) 1982 Jul 12 1982 Oct 21 2012 Dec 28 Secret 145
PREM19/878 Prime Minister (Communications with Jimmy Savile concerning tax deductions for charitable donations following his fund raising for Stoke Mandeville hospital) 1980 Feb 5 1982 Jan 8 2012 Dec 28 4 Secret 22
PREM19/879 Prime Minister (Meeting with delegation of Conservative Friends of Israel) 1980 May 1 1982 Jul 12 2012 Dec 28 Confidential 31
PREM19/880 Prime Minister (Meeting with George Foulkes MP to discuss closure of Falmers factory in Patna, Scotland) 1981 Feb 16 1982 Jul 30 2012 Dec 28 Confidential 94
PREM19/881 Prime Minister (Meetings with James Craigen MP to discuss closure of Bryant and May and Metal Box factories in Glasgow) 1981 Feb 27 1982 Dec 15 2012 Dec 28 Unclassified 49
PREM19/882 Prime Minister (Meeting with Sir Siegmund Warburg and Dr Winifried Guth; Anglo-German relations) 1981 Mar 10 1982 Mar 18 2012 Dec 28 Confidential 28
PREM19/883 Prime Minister (Meetings with Robert Kilroy-Silk MP to discuss closures of factories in his Ormskirk constituency) 1981 Mar 5 1982 Apr 8 2012 Dec 28 Unclassified 36
PREM19/884 Prime Minister (Meetings with Geoffrey Robinson MP to discuss redundancies in Jaguar factories in Coventry) 1981 Jun 1 1982 Jan 21 2012 Dec 28 Unclassified 28
PREM19/885 Prime Minister (Meeting with Allen Adams MP to discuss redundancies at J & P Coats (UK) Ltd mill at Paisley) 1981 Nov 24 1982 Jan 22 2012 Dec 28 Confidential 27
PREM19/886 Prime Minister (Meeting with Sir Ernest Harrison, Chairman of Racal Electronics Ltd) 1981 Oct 30 1982 Feb 10 2012 Dec 28 Unclassified 19
PREM19/887 Prime Minister (Meeting with Albert Booth MP to discuss closure of Derwest Jennings factory in Barrow-in-Furness) 1982 Feb 2 1982 Jul 20 2012 Dec 28 Unclassified 30
PREM19/888 Prime Minister (Meeting with Daniel Jones MP to discuss Lucas Aerospace redundancies in Burnley) 1982 Feb 4 1982 Mar 27 2012 Dec 28 Unclassified 27
PREM19/889 Prime Minister (Meeting with John Opel, President of International Business Machines (IBM), concerning investment in the UK) 1982 May 21 1982 Aug 9 2012 Dec 28 Unclassified 28
PREM19/890 Prime Minister (Meeting with Robert Adley MP to discuss Prime Minister's visit to Far East) 1982 Jul 15 1982 Sep 15 2012 Dec 28 Confidential 23
PREM19/891 Prime Minister (Meeting with Hong Kong Association members) 1982 Aug 20 1982 Sep 27 2012 Dec 28 Secret 28
PREM19/892 Prime Minister (Meeting with George Turnbull and Anthony Fraser, President and Chairman of Motor Manufacturers and Traders Association, on problems of the UK motor industry) 1982 Oct 15 1982 Dec 24 2012 Dec 28 Confidential 22
PREM19/893 Prime Minister (Disappearance and rescue of Mark Thatcher in Algeria during Paris to Dakar car rally) 1981 Dec 17 1982 Sep 13 2012 Dec 28 Confidential 104
PREM19/894 Prime Minister (Closure of British Aluminium Company's smelter at Invergordon; meeting with Lord Plowden; proposals for a restart; proposed new power contract) (Part 1) 1981 Dec 4 1982 Mar 19 2012 Dec 28 Confidential 193
PREM19/895 Prime Minister (Closure of British Aluminium Company's smelter at Invergordon: proposals for a restart; proposed new power contract; government assistance) (Part 2) 1982 Mar 22 1982 Jul 28 2012 Dec 28 Confidential 93
PREM19/896 Rhodesia (Sir Roy Welensky, former Prime Minister of the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland) 1979 Oct 31 1982 Oct 28 2012 Dec 28 1 Secret 61
PREM19/897 Royal family (Duchy of Cornwall Management Bill) 1981 Jun 22 1982 Jun 24 2014 Feb 14 Confidential 29
PREM19/898 Royal family (Prime Minister's Audiences with the Queen) (Part 1) 1979 May 8 1982 Feb 9 2013 Dec 6 147 Unclassified 105
PREM19/899 Royal family (Civil List) (Part 1) 1979 Jun 7 1982 Mar 23 Retained Unknown
PREM19/900 Saudi Arabia (Visit to UK by Shaikh Hisham Nazer, Saudi Minister of Planning: call on Prime Minister) 1982 Jan 8 1982 Mar 2 2012 Dec 28 Confidential 14
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