Radio Interview for BBC Radio London (phone-in)

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Now, if you believe our newspapers, there is going to be a general election this year. We have already heard from David Owen and David Steel on this programme that the SDP Alliance is ready for an election and the Labour Party give every indication that they expect an election this year too.

Well, there is only one person who knows the answer to all that speculation and that is our Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher. She is with me on the Robbie Vincent Telephone Programme and you can call on a temporary phone number for the next hour, and that is 486&en;7744.

First, Mrs. Thatcher, I know politics are full of making sure you play your trump card at the right time, but to give the other parties a real chance, could you tell me when the election is going to be?

P.M.

No, I cannot, because I do not know.

You say you play your trump card at the right time, but you do not know when you are going to play it until the opportunity comes, so all I can say is that there will be one by June 1988. [end p1]

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Do you watch the speculation personally with great interest, because we get a variety of stories each day, each week. They invariably say Mrs. Thatcher has decided this, the Cabinet have decided that.

Well, if you sit at Cabinet, you obviously know you have not made that sort of decision. Do you get irritated by that, or do you quite enjoy the speculation?

P.M.

I would rather it did not happen, because it makes life difficult. If every day, you know, there is some speculation, then it means that people who have to plan work ahead think: &oq;Oh well! We had better not plan that far ahead!’ and frankly, it does make things difficult for many many businesses.

But we will make up our mind when the time comes and we do not quite know when that will be.

I just have a great belief that people in this country do not expect us to dash into elections at the first opportunity. They say: &oq;Look! We elected you to be Government for quite a period of years. There will be ups and downs in that time!’ But we do not like too many elections in this country, particularly when you have got a good majority, so, well, they have got to write something in the newspapers every day.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

You have been voted the most popular Brit in America and I have just come back from the States and I noticed the higher [end p2] profile you have there. It must please you, but do you ever feel hurt by the personal attacks that are made on you from time to time here in the UK because of Government decisions?

P.M.

Yes. You would not be human if you did not. They are not only personal; sometimes they are vicious.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Very vicious!

P.M.

Very vicious. If you do something good, then they say you have done it for an ulterior motive, but then I look at some of the people who make the attacks and they make the attacks to try to hurt one, to try to stop you from making the decisions that you think you ought to make, and then you think intellectually: &oq;Well, I am not going to let them get me down!’

Fortunately, there is so much to do in the course of my day that you have got to turn your mind to something else, but I do confess that if I see a very vicious headline, well I really will not read the newsprint underneath because I feel that it might take one's mind off the thing that I am doing.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

How do you keep up your pace of work? I mean, you are with me for an hour today and you doubt will fit in an awful lot of other things. Are you a workaholic? Do you thrive on hard work? [end p3]

P.M.

I am a workaholic, yes. I thrive on hard work. I have had years of training, but I have just been listening outside to your last programme, including the man who did not want you to say anything to me and I wonder how you keep it up for two-and-a-half hours! So don't you think it is what we are trained to do?

I could not do a taxi-driver's job.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

I could not drive a bus!

P.M.

You could not drive a bus or one of those enormous lorries! I could not do a nurse's job in hospital. So each of us has a certain amount of talent or ability and we choose the thing we want to do, and we are jolly lucky if we are doing something which we really love doing.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

You must have been quite interested in the gentleman who said: &oq;Please do not put questions to Mrs. Thatcher on my behalf!’ but he was really touching on two things wasn't he: the criticism which is often read about you that you do not care about the unemployed - that is number one - and he also touched on this gap that he sees between the North and the South and that we are fairly wealthy and fairly cossetted down here in comparison to the North.

Now, first of all, I know you have been asked this before. What is your reply to people who say Mrs. Thatcher does not care about the unemployed? [end p4]

P.M.

Well, it is totally and utterly false. Who could not care about the unemployed or understand their problems?

It is more than not having a job. It is losing your respect in front of your family; if you want a job and cannot get one and you have not the dignity of saying that you are the breadwinner and you look after your family.

Yes, we do try to look after them and I noticed what you said earlier - however difficult things are, they are nothing like the Thirties, when there was a very heavy means test, and nothing like the benefits that there are now now.

Yes, we do try to look after them, but they lose a part of their own respect and dignity if they cannot get a job.

What are we trying to do? We are trying to get everyone in who has been unemployed for a year and we are trying to either get them a job or get them a training which will make it easier for them to get a job, but above all we are trying to say to them: &oq;Look! We do care about what is happening!’ and if you look, whether it is in the North or South, at the people who are out of work, you will find that something like 50&pcnt; or 60&pcnt; of them get another job within a comparatively short period - well, say, five or six months - and it is the others we are really trying to help with training or on a Community Programme - to get them back some of that dignity and self-respect.

North and South! Look! We often get this and, you know, some people in the South think that the North is a terrible place full of dark, satanic mills. I was in Manchester the other day doing a speech to the Chamber of Commerce and some of them [end p5] grumbled and some of them did not, and I was just able to point out this: &oq;Look! In Manchester, you have got the biggest university campus and facilities in Europe! You have got three teaching hospitals. That is the biggest teaching hospital facility for a very very large area, not only in this country, but also in Europe. You have got a marvellous road system. You used to have a marvellous school called the Manchester Grammar School. It was open to anyone, whatever their background. Unfortunately, there were people who did not believe in that kind of school and it has had to go independent!’ They have got a marvellous Manchester Airport; money has been poured into it.

All of these things have been done and the jams I went through in order to get to the dinner were quite considerable.

There are areas in the North which are very prosperous and there are areas - centre cities - which are very very difficult indeed and very difficult to persuade people to go to set up business, because in the end you become prosperous by making things that you can sell to other people, and you cannot dictate to the rest of the world what they shall buy from us. You can only say: &oq;Look! Please! We are making this better than anyone else!’

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

I do understand from your answer that you do not accept there is this wide gap between the North and the South.

P.M.

There has always been some sort of gap in income and in prices and indeed, again, I heard you talking about one of the [end p6] great things. If you look at some of the houses in the North, many of them are absolutely splendid, and you can buy them for a fraction of what it would cost you in the South-East. So you can, income-for-income, live better in the North on housing and on travelling costs, because you often do not have as far to travel, and that is a good thing, and in a way it is now persuading some firms to go up there and start up, and that, I hope, will bring more jobs to certain areas of the North.

But we have done, I think, as much as we possibly can.

Look! I was thrilled when Nissan went to Sunderland. I went to Sunderland early as Prime Minister and I had been there before when I was Education Minister, and I was absolutely thrilled. It has brought a new hope to them. It has brought a new style of management.

When I went round there, the people working on the cars as they were going past on the conveyor belt said: &oq;Mrs. Thatcher, we are all given responsibility here, every one of us!’ and it was just a new style of management which is being practised by all our best companies here. But I hope that those who do not practise it now soon will.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

O.K. A couple of other short questions before I unleash London and the South East on the telephone to you. That is something I discussed with both David Owen and David Steel. I know it is hypothetical and you might not answer it, but if there was a hung Parliament, would you be prepared to be part of a coalition? [end p7]

P.M.

I would rather wait and see what happens. I do not believe we shall get a hung Parliament and I think those who want a hung Parliament tend to persuade you to put that view.

I tell you what I do not like about it. We go into our election campaigning, as we do our administration, pretty vigorously, pretty candidly, saying: &oq;This is what we believe. This is why we believe it. This is why it is going to be best for our country!’ Because a country is not made by speeches. It is made by the people who do things. It is made by its vitality, and what I hate about a hung Parliament or about these coalitions is that the first thing you have to do is to part from everything on which you got perhaps the biggest number of seats in an election and compromise it, and there is something that is not quite as honest as I would like it about that. It may be that it has to be done. Sometimes it has been done in the past, but in this country coalitions break up pretty quickly and one of the reasons is that they frequently tend to duck the difficult decisions.

Now, if you got a good majority, you do not duck the difficult decisions, but there were parties sometimes which had a majority which did duck them in the past and left us with a big overhang and we have tackled it. And I would rather go straight-forward honest: &oq;This is what I believe! This is why I believe it! The choice is yours!’

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Good government, of course, is often said to need a good Opposition. Do you think your Opposition is good enough? [end p8]

P.M.

I find that it tends to be, when I am answering questions, very very noisy, very very abusive and I have got used to it, but I do remember what one was taught in one's younger day: people resort to personal abuses because they have lost the argument, and Parliament ought to be about the argument, because there is a lot that is tremendously important to talk about.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Can I ask you this question in a non-political way before we go to the phones, which is: if you had a magic wand and you did not have to go through Parliament, what would you actually like to happen? I will give you one wish and you can wave your wand out of 10 Downing Street. What would you personally like to see happen?

P.M.

I would like personally to see everyone recognise that democracy is about individual people and it requires a personal response. Not always “What is the Government going to do?” but “What do I have to do?” because in democracy each person has a vote. It is not a block vote. Each person has personal responsibility for themselves, but then, you can only live that personal responsibility in relation to other people.

And I would like somehow to see more people realise that democracy is not about “What is the Government going to do about this?” It is about “What can I do as well?” And it is a great partnership between Government having to be very active on things which only Government can do - and we have been pretty active on [end p9] those things - and then saying: &oq;Now look! Life is about freedom under a rule of law and quite a lot depends on you too!’

It was always very interesting to me that it was one of the youngest of the United States Presidents, Kennedy, who said: &oq;Say not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country!’ and it is a combination; it is a partnership.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Individual responsibility you are talking about?

P.M.

That is right! That is right!

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

It is seventeen minutes to two, the Robbie Vincent Telephone Programme. I have given the Prime Minister a temporary phone number for you to call - 486 7744 - with your questions. Anybody caught making a speech will be banished!

Announcer

Over the next sixty minutes, it is your chance to question Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Call now on 01&en;486&en;7744.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

And first on the line is Mary, calling from Muswell Hill. Go ahead to the Prime Minister, Mary! [end p10]

Mary

Good afternoon, Prime Minister.

P.M.

Mary. How are you? Good afternoon.

Mary.

Good afternoon, Prime Minister.

P.M.

Good afternoon, Mary.

Mary

What I would like to say is regards to unemployment. I am in my fifties now and I remember quite, you know, a few years back, where when people became unemployed they offered three jobs to them and if they did not take after the third time, then that was it. But today, we know there is unemployment, but I think the system is very wrong and I can see it happening on the doorstep. There are people who are unemployed but who can jolly well get a job and will not take it. You hear people saying: &oq;I am better off without having a job!’ but I think something ought to be done to make those people take something.

P.M.

Well, as you heard me say earlier, we are getting in, one by one, each of the people who have been long-term unemployed, been unemployed by six months, and we are very much aware of this. You [end p11] have to be available for work in order to get the benefit and sometimes it seems as if some people put themselves down for a category of work which either they cannot get and all right, there are some people who perhaps do not take the jobs that are available and we hear employers saying: &oq;Please! We cannot get people! In the middle of unemployment we cannot get people!’ and this is why we are going to person-by-person interview, to help them back into getting a job or to help them take the training.

The whole of our Social Security system is to help the people who are genuinely unfortunate and genuinely cannot get work, and that is the way we are going to try to operate it, but we have to be jolly certain that they want a job and cannot get it.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Can I just clarify that with you, Prime Minister.

Mary is suggesting that if perhaps you turn down a number of jobs you then have your benefits taken away, but what you are saying is that you are doing a similar thing but in what you regard as a more humane way?

P.M.

It is the interpretation of &oq;available for work’. I mean, can you go on turning down jobs or making jolly certain you do not get them and still take benefit?

Now, what we do if that happens is take them in for re-training or we will take them into a job club, because as I said, [end p12] the great Welfare State is to help people who are genuinely unfortunate or who have come across hard times. It is not to be manipulated, and those people who do attempt to manipulate it really are taking money away from people who are more deserving, and so we are tackling it in a different way, saying: &oq;All right! If you have not been able to get a job, now there is a Community Programme job - quite a lot of jobs on those - will will you go on one of those?’ And if there is a question of any kind of fraud - which mostly there is not - then we have to deal with it in that way, but that is only a small minority.

Certainly, there are people … I think if you are a man and wife and two children, you have to be earning something like £150 a week before you are actually better off working than you were unemployed, but do not shrink from taking a much lower-paid job, because your income is topped up by Family Income Supplement, by Housing Benefit or by a new scheme we are going to have called Income Support, and we are doing all this because we believe passionately it is far better for a person to have the dignity of work, even though it is in a lower-paid job, and get that income topped up, so you go home at the end of the week and you have got your own wage packet - to have that income topped up - than to say: &oq;Oh I am not going to work because I can get more out-of-work!’ We are trying to get rid of that and we are trying to get rid of it for the best of all possible reasons: better to have a lower-paid job topped up by Family Income Supplement, by Housing Benefit, by help with certain other things than not to have a job at all.

So we are tackling it in the most human way by the biggest programme of personal interviews that we have ever had. [end p13]

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Because that could well be a specific question to you, and I think it is a common criticism: is it not a nonsense that you get £150 a week? You have to earn more than that before you go back to work, so you are saying that one of the things you definitely hope to be able to do away with is the situation where a husband and wife with two children are better off taking benefits of £150 a week, and it is something you hope in the future will not exist any longer? Because this is a common criticism on this programme: is it not a nonsense?

P.M.

That is why we are taking people … it is not the only reason why … if people have been unemployed for a long time we want to help them to get jobs and we are doing it by a number of ways, and we are doing it in a very positive, constructive way, because they do not live off the State. It is their neighbours who are paying the money which is then paid out and we are trying to help them get back self-respect and trying to get them to help get back a new spirit.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Let us move on to a different question. Marion, from West Wickham. Marion, go ahead with your question to the Prime Minister!

Marion

Yes, good afternoon, Prime Minister. What measures will the Government take to put the innovative heart back into British industry and return of confidence and investment in new ideas? I [end p14] ask this because I am a designer with lots of ideas and I have just managed to get a small doll onto the market which reflects London and is aimed at tourists and after being turned down by British companies I had to look to Hong Kong for the manufacture, and this upset me bitterly because I felt it could perhaps have given some work to some of the unemployed.

At the moment, managers of industry seem to be reluctant to risk investment in new ideas.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Were Hong Kong interested in your idea, Marion?

Marion

Yes, it is actually in the shops and it has been made in Hong Kong, which hurts me enormously because it is aimed at the tourist markets and it is a product which reflects London.

P.M.

Well now, that is very sad! I understand how you feel about it and in a way, I feel the same way, because Hong Kong has never had a fraction of the subsidies or Government help that we have here and they have become much more a self-help society and they say: &oq;Look! If there is a good idea, we will take it up!’

But you should be able to get help here. I was at the London Enterprise Agency just a few weeks ago and it exists to help just people like you, and there were a lot of people there who had started up business on their own. There are a group of industrialists and bankers who set out to help people like you; how [end p15] to get premises, what to do, what not to do and how to set up in the first place, and I went there and I was actually giving an award to someone who had an idea - do not have Interflora, have interteddy - you know, you can wire a teddy or anything else all over the world. They had found help there, and if you cannot do it any other way and you have been unemployed, we give what is called an Enterprise Allowance, which is £40 a week, so that you can help start up on your own and with the help of banks perhaps you can get someone to back you. That is the London Enterprise Agency, and if you write to my office, we will let you have the name and address and you might be able to get help there.

Marion

I do understand that. There is just one other question. Perhaps you could explain to me, because I do not fully understand how when in the US the salaries are much higher, can we afford to pay the shipping costs to have their products imported here? There are so many sorts of kitchen utensils, for example, that are appearing on the market now. How is it cheaper for us to import these goods rather than to make them ourselves? Of course, I understand in Hong Kong people say the rates of pay are very low, but in Germany and the United States they are not low. Their salaries are higher, so how is it still cheaper to import?

P.M.

I can tell you exactly. What you want is a high-wage low-cost society, and the acid test is how much each person produces, and you find countries like the United States and Germany have [end p16] higher wages than we do but per person they produce much more than we do, so the cost of each thing can be lower.

Years of restrictive practices and overmanning have made us not as good as they are, but we are catching up. Our productivity is going up quite fast.

I think some of the biggest differences appear in our car industry but, again, we are catching up fast.

There have been studies with the identical machinery and investment between Britain and Germany, and Germany, with identical machinery and investment, was producing more cars per person than we were. But again, we are going better, but we have got a backlog of old habits to get rid of.

But it is a high-wage low-cost cost society. You get high wages but have very big output. Then that, of course, enables you to pay transport cost.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Marion, before you go, can I just ask you one question? On your initial question of having to go to Hong Kong for funding for your idea, why were you not aware of the Enterprise Boards or have you already tried them?

Marion

I was not prepared at that time. I was just starting out.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Well that is what Enterprise Boards are for. [end p17]

Marion

I was not really looking though to set up my own business. At the time, it was one solitary idea. Do you see what I mean?

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Right. So you wanted individual backing for one idea, rather than starting your own business?

Marion

That is right, because I mean, that was my first attempt at it. Now, I have several ideas.

P.M.

Good! So you might go for help there?

Marion

I will. I will try that.

P.M.

I hope so. I am having a design conference at No. 10 very soon, because design is one of the most important things. Unless people like the look of something, they will not even go to consider buying it and design is one of the most important things, whether you are doing things in engineering or in household goods or in toys, in telephones or anything, and I am very conscious of its importance. [end p18]

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Thank you! Norman in Ilford has a question for you, Prime Minister. Norman, go ahead!

Norman

Good afternoon, Mrs. Thatcher.

P.M.

Hello! Good afternoon!

Norman

Good afternoon. Last September, I got a letter from my doctor to take or send to my hospital. I got a return letter to say that my appointment would be in April of this year.

Can you tell me why it is that I have to wait nearly six months?

P.M.

I am very sorry that you have to wait six months. I know that it is little consolation to you, but on the whole - over the country as a whole - the waiting lists are going down, because the Health Service is doing more operations, particularly on cataracts and things like that, and on hip operations, but there is still a waiting list.

The amount of money spent has gone up much greater than inflation. The number of hospitals has gone up. The number of nurses has gone up. The number of doctors has gone up. And many hospitals and many regional areas and districts are now doing their [end p19] utmost to see how they can get the waiting lists down, and that is our top priority.

Norman

Thank you.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Something I said earlier on, Prime Minister; which was that it does not matter what the facts are, it is what people believe. And there is no doubt that people believe the National Health Service is not as good as it used to be and they do not believe the Government when it says it is spending more money on the Health Service. Have you any idea why that should be?

P.M.

No, I have not any idea why it should be and I think what you are really saying is we have got to get the facts across because the facts do matter.

When I came into No. 10 Downing Street that day in 1979, something like £7½ billion a year was being spent on the Health Service. Today, it is not double that, which would be £15 billion - it is rather more than that: it is £18.3&slash;4 billion.

Put another way, it is not Government that spends it. It is the tax-payer. We have tried to compare the figures. Now, this year, the average family in Britain will spend £26 a week on financing the National Health Service. It used to be under £12 a week. So it is not Government that finds the money; it is the people; and with the extra money, we have built extra hospitals; [end p20] we have got more nurses; they are better paid; there are more doctors; they are better paid.

No government can run each and every hospital. It has to leave that to the hospital and to the regional boards, and we are trying to persuade them now to have a look at the distribution of waiting lists because you will find one hospital will have a long waiting list and another hospital has no waiting list, and it ought not to be beyond the wit of man to say: &oq;Well now look! We have got a waiting list, but there is a hospital there - it may be twenty miles away, it may be a big London teaching hospital - they have not a waiting list. Would you mind going there?’ Because some people would not mind, and our job and theirs is to try to get the waiting lists down, because that gets the pain down.

But more money, more hospitals, more nurses, more doctors. Those are facts and I can only ask you to look at them and believe them.

But I think there are two different viewpoints: one if you just ask people their perceptions; two, if you ask people who had experience of being in hospital, of being in a doctor's surgery: &oq;Were you satisfied?’ and the figure is very interesting. Nine out of ten say yes, and I have been round seven hospitals this last year and they were not only satisfied - they were immensely grateful to the doctors, the nurses and all who ran the hospital - so I think there are two different perceptions - one, what I call from some of the propaganda which is not always accurate; and the other from people who have been in.

All of this will not help our friend who rang a moment ago who is waiting and he [may?] say: &oq;But look! You told me that more [end p21] patients are treated, but I am not one of them and please, I want to be one of them!’ and I want him to be one of them.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Let us use Norman as as brief an example as we can up to the News. With Norman, for instance, he lives in Ilford on the East side of London. You are saying that, for argument's sake, let us pick an area, Welwyn Garden City for instance … say there is no waiting list for the sort of operation he wants, you look for more cooperation do you between the regional health authorities to say: &oq;Look! We can actually treat Norman in February or January!’?

P.M.

Well yes, and we shall have to do what sometimes we do in schools. All right, if there has to be a payment from one regional health authority or district to another to get them treated, so be it. The important thing is to get the waiting lists down as far and as fast as we can. And now, each of the regions and districts are looking to see if they can do something in this way.

I went round the Elizabeth Garrett Anderson Hospital a few months ago. It is a hospital specially for women. They had at that time virtually no waiting lists and that pleased me enormously.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Prime Minister, the News waits for none of us. It is two o'clock. The Robbie Vincent Telephone Programme. Radio London, 1458, Stereo FM 94.9. (NEWS) [end p22]

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

And the Prime Minister has a temporary phone number, 486 7744, and we go to Tessa, who is in Fulham with a question. Go ahead, Tessa, with your question!

Tessa

Hello!

P.M.

Hello, Tessa!

Tessa

Hello! I do not know much about politics. The only views I really hear is what is on the television and what my parents say, but one point they bring up is when they used to go to school, at the age of sixteen to eighteen they used to have to do two years service and they have always said that that was so good because you learn a skill; once you leave, you have a job to go to or you at least have the potential for a job.

Why was it ever abolished and have you ever thought of bringing it back?

P.M.

This was called “conscription”, that everyone had to be called up for Her Majesty's Armed Forces to do a period of service - a year, eighteen months, did it ever get to two years? Usually, it started at eighteen not at sixteen, and it still happens in many places on the Continent. People still have to do it. [end p23]

We run our Armed Forces in a different way. We have totally voluntary Armed Forces and they are highly professional, and one of the problems we used to have was that if you were going on to university and certain courses, you could opt out of it, and another problem is that I think that we would have to have a very much bigger Armed Forces if we were ever to bring it back, so that a large number of them could train those who were on conscription.

But it would mean a completely different Armed Services and I think many many people would object to it although there are others who say that, you know, it gives you a chance of belonging to something and having a sense of discipline and a sense of service to country. But I think we would probably get more problems in bringing it back compulsorily.

There is another way of doing it: of having a kind of selective one - that you do it by chance - that a certain number of people should have to be called up. But we do not run our Armed Forces in that way.

Tessa

But mainly, the problem of people being on the dole is surely to the fact that they have not got the skills or the qualifications for what, you know, the jobs there are?

P.M.

Well that is why we went about it a different way. As you know, we have got the Youth Training Scheme and that now does last for up to two years and it is not only to get people into going to work regularly; it is to get them those skills and it is to help [end p24] them to understand what business is all about and to get them into the habit of going regularly and arsquouiring the skills which they need to get a job.

Tessa

Right! OK! Thanks very much!

P.M.

Thank you, dear. Thank you for phoning!

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

OK Tessa. Thank you for your call from Fulham. We go to Theodore in Paddington. Good afternoon, Theodore.

Theodore

Good afternoon, Robbie. Good afternoon, Prime Minister.

P.M.

Hello. Good afternoon, Theodore.

Theodore

Yes. It has to do with equal opportunity as related to your Party.

Basically, my question is: there are some people who have resided in this country from the West Indies and from other parts of the world for years and still feel alienated because they think that nothing is being done for them to make them part of this country. [end p25]

What can you say or do to reassure established persons of belonging, which will lead to positive and active participation in development process? Because only as a result of the riots there has been a sort of feedback that we get from many young people who reside here that they are not part of it - and they were born here apparently?

P.M.

I almost do not know what to say to you, because there is a very active Race Relations Act, which prevents discrimination. There are many many people from the West Indies and other places in the riot areas who are the first to wish law and order to be upheld, because they are the first to suffer if it is not.

As you know, in this country everything I believe means that you do not look at people according to their background or who their parents were. You take whatever talents and abilities they have got and you try to give them the best education you can, to enable them to develop those talents and abilities, and I would have thought that in this country, with people who came to live here from overseas, they came; as soon as they did they had all our civil rights, they have access to all our social services, they have access to our education system. Indeed, if anything, we have something which is what is known as &oq;positive discrimination’, so that in those areas you try to give extra grants so that people who started perhaps with fewer advantages than the rest of us should be given a chance to catch up, and I do not know of any country in the world that has enabled people coming to their country to have a better chance and better facilities than they do here. [end p26]

Theodore

One of the establishments or organisations in this country that they look to for some sort of security is the political parties and they have been aligned to the Labour Party and there are a lot of people now who &dubellip; that they have because they think that nothing has been done in the sense of representation.

Do you think that your Party has done that or the Government has one way or the other looked into that seriously or think that they have lacked in that aspect of it, because there are people who are scared to say that they are Conservative as if it is a crime.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Theodore, can I get you to clarify that question? Are you saying that if you are black you would feel better represented if we had more black politicians? Is that what you are saying?

Theodore

No, I am not saying that. I do not think people are worried as to where their representation comes from. The point is they want to be represented, but there is a stigma here that a Party it represents only blacks so a sort of a bandwagon following that party and if one says: &oq;Look, I am Conservative and you are black!’ and people look &dubellip;

P.M.

It is not true and I never want us to distinguish people by the colour of their skins. When I have all our Conservative candidates round to talk to them, some are black. Yes, there are [end p27] people who are black and, of course, there are people Indian amongst them. They were not chosen for that reason. They were chosen because those people in that area representing the Conservative cause thought that was the best person, but it was not the colour of his skin.

Look! I had hoped that everyone here agreed that all citizens here, whatever their colour, whatever their background, have the same rights and the same responsibilities as any and every other citizen, and I think it would be a very retrograde step to distinguish people on the basis of colour or background. It would be contrary to everything I believe in.

What I want to see is a society based on the merit and talent and abilities of its people, and not on their colour or their background.

Theodore

Prime Minister, thank you very much!

P.M.

Thank you very much!

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Thank you for your call. Nicole's calling from Merston, Prime Minister. Nicole is eleven. What did you want to ask, Nicole? [end p28]

P.M.

Nick, how nice of you to telephone!

Nicole

Thank you. In the next election, if Neil Kinnock was elected, how would you feel?

P.M.

Awful! Awful, because I just do not believe in the things which Neil Kinnockhe believes in. I believe in a very different kind of society and I really would feel awful, because I would think that they were taking us closer and closer to a kind of East European system, which I do not believe is in the character of Britain, and I would feel equally upset if there were any suggestion of a coalition government.

If you are in politics and you believe passionately certain things, and most of us do because that is why we are in politics, then I believe that the system that we have in Britain, which is based on the character, the British character, and the way in which we do things, and we really believe, I think, in a bigger degree of freedom under a rule of a law than I think would be likely to be the case under the present management of the Labour Party, which is very very much more left wing than it was when I came into politics many years ago.

So I gave you the instinctive answer. Awful!

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Nicole, can I ask you: would you like to be Prime Minister? [end p29]

Nicole

I am not too sure.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Not too sure?

Nicole

No.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

What is it you do not like about the idea of being Prime Minister?

Nicole

You would have to be responsible for so many things.

P.M.

Yes you do, but you see, if each person is responsible for the things which they can do, it makes the job of a prime minister very much better. If each person is responsible for doing their own job or their own lessons well, if each house, for example, were responsible for seeing the pavement outside was nice and clean and tidy, would that not make a world of difference to how things looked? If each family was responsible when its children are young for how they were turned out and for courtesy, would that not make a difference?

So if each of us does something for ourselves it makes for the sort of country that I want to see and then Government has [end p30] to do the things which only governments can do.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Do you actually think that we expect too much from a Prime Minister?

P.M.

Oh dear, I think we are talking to a telephone line that has stopped!

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

No, no. She said thank you very much.

P.M.

Oh I see!

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

It is a magic way of doing it, because if we say “Hallo, Goodbye” to everybody, it cuts down the time we have to speak, but to follow up from that question &dubellip;

P.M.

It was very interesting, wasn't it? “You have to be responsible for so many things.” Yes, you do, but as I said earlier, democracy is about a personal response from people, not holding up banners saying &oq;More for me!’ but about a personal response. [end p31]

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

But do you think we do expect too much from a Prime Minister?

P.M.

I think so, in these days. I am lucky. I meet quite a lot of other prime ministers and travel and see their system. I do not know of any other prime minister in the world that has quite as much to do as we do these days.

We each have a constituency, which is important. It keeps your feet on the ground and your head about five feet four or five above it, not in the clouds.

We have to go across and be in Parliament and I have to answer questions twice a week. I do not know, the majority of those, what the questions are going to be, so I have got to have a very very good briefing, so in Parliament, answering questions, in the constituency, doing all the international things, seeing ministers and people who are coming to London. It suits me because I am a workaholic. I love it and I am totally and utterly fascinated by the questions that come before us.

But it is an enormous responsibility and it gets heavier.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Well I do not think Nicole is going to be challenging you for two lines missing [end p32]

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Not yet, because she is a bit worried about the responsibilities.

Let us talk to Ralph who is calling from Fulham about something entirely different.

Are you there, Ralph?

Ralph

Yeah, I am here.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Go ahead with your question to the Prime Minister!

Ralph

Yeah, it is about housing benefit.

P.M.

Housing benefit, yes.

Ralph

I was working for the council and went up to see about housing benefit to see if I can get some on there and they said yes, but what they do is they take it off your gross pay instead of your net pay, so what is actually happening is before your tax and everything else are taken out, they are estimating your housing benefit on that.

My rent is £45 a week and when they took it off my gross pay they said I am allowed £11. By the time I got my wages, net paid [end p33] after paying tax and everything, it was £76, so I could not actually work. I had to go back on the dole.

P.M.

This is what, you know, one of our previous people was saying. I am sad you went back on the dole.

Ralph

Well no, I got laid off you see, but carried on working anyway.

P.M.

You see, housing benefit goes now to about one in every three houses, so two households are in fact helping a third household with their rent or with their rates.

If you think that it has been wrongly calculated, then just raise it with the authority, but I think they will have done it right.

Ralph

Yeah, but what I am saying is why should they take it off your gross pay before your tax and all that is taken off instead of take it off your net pay what you are left with after tax?

P.M.

Well, if you think they have done it wrong, will you raise it with them? I think they will have taken your tax into account. [end p34]

Ralph

No, I asked them that. They said no, this is the way they are doing it and they are waiting &dubellip;

P.M.

They will be doing it according to the way in which the regulation is, to get the amount to you - the reduced rent or rates, whichever it is, or both, with the extra subsidy that you are allowed.

What you are saying is you think that that perhaps is not enough?

Ralph

No, what I am saying is they think they should take it off the net pay instead of the gross pay. You see, if they was to turn round and say right I have got £76 after tax and everything, what am I allowed off my rent on that, then I would say yeah, that should be fair, but not before tax.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

I did hear you correctly. You did say to the Prime Minister and it was something that Mrs. Thatcher commented on earlier on. I did hear you correctly. Did you not say, Ralph, that you got laid off but you could not have carried on working anyway because the wages were not high enough and you were better off on benefits? Is that right? [end p35]

Ralph

I would walk home with £37 after I had paid the rent and everything out of me wages. All I was left with was £76 to live on for a week. If I pay £35 rent out of that I am left with £30-odd.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Did I hear you correctly? Did I hear you say you would be better off on benefits?

Ralph

Yeah, because they would pay me rent plus I have got two children so I will get money for them as well.

P.M.

Are you on a family income supplement?

Ralph

No.

P.M.

You are not. I just wonder if there is some possibility of getting the family income supplement for people like you. I hope you will enquire, and that is going to become a family income support, because we are very anxious that people like your good self who have a comparatively small net take-home wage should have it topped up so that it still pays you to go to work, because we believe that is better, but it might be worth asking about family income supplement. [end p36]

Ralph

Yeah, they do do that. You see, they do exactly the same thing. They do it on your gross pay instead of your net.

P.M.

Look! I wonder Ralph, would you like to write to me about it. Just No. 10 Downing Street, I think, in spite of the Post Office returning one thing &oq;name unknown’, I think they now know it. Would you like to write to us and we will look into it and see that you are getting everything to which you are entitled, because we are very very anxious to try to persuade people to take jobs and to try to top up their income.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Yeah Ralph, and when you write can you be specific again with your figures and the departments that you have been too. If you are specific with your figures, it will then be possible for 10 Downing Street to give you a very positive answer.

P.M.

Yes, and can you just mention, Ralph, because there might be a lot of other letters from Ralph. We get about 4,000 a week. Could you just mention that I asked you to write on this programme.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

It is 2.21. My guest is the Prime Minister.

P.M.

Goodness me, it is going fast isn't it? [end p37]

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

486 7744 is the number and we have a question from Nick calling from Harlow. Nick, go ahead to the Prime Minister.

Nick

Thank you. Good afternoon.

P.M.

Good afternoon.

Nick

A bit earlier, you were talking about the Health Service and I was remembering back to the election when you were saying in fact the Health Service is safe in our hands, education is safe in our hands, those sort of things.

Now, if this so, how come - Tory Cabinet Ministers are a prime example - how come they boycott these services? They subscribe to BUPA. Their kids go to public schools. Indeed, I think in the Cabinet at the moment there are only two people who did not go to public school. If this is so how can the Tory Party claim to be our equals in any way? It is blatant &eacu;litism.

P.M.

Look! You started off by saying the National Health Service is safe in our hands. I indicated earlier there are more hospitals, more new hospitals, more nurses, more doctors, more patients being treated. That is a very very good record in fact. Those are the facts and I think the National Health Service is [end p38] doing a very good job.

I pay my dues to it like everyone else. As I indicated, every family in this country on average pays £26 a week towards the National Health Service. That is where your taxes go and I pay my dues just like everyone else, but while I am Prime Minister I am not going to take someone else's place in the queue. Yes, I can afford to go and have it done privately. It does not lessen the amount I pay to the Health Service. Indeed, I do not stop at that. I do not take all my salary, and so that falls back into the Treasury and that helps too.

But you know, why do you try to deny us from going, not coming on the Health Service in any queue, but just looking after ourselves? You do not object if a person buys his own house. You do not object if a person spends his money on buying a better suit. You do not object if a person spends their money on going to the dogs or to the horses. Why should they not be able to pay if they wish to go to a doctor, when at the same time they are also paying for the Health Service?

I tried in Education to keep grammar schools and fortunately, there are some. I do not know how many people there are in the Cabinet who went to State schools. I went to a grammar school and for me it was the ladder from the bottom to the top. It was not my Party that tried to abolish grammar schools. I would still like to have them and we still do have some, fortunately. Not as many as I would wish.

We had direct grant schools. Manchester Grammar School was a direct grant school. There were schools - grammar schools - which said: &oq;Look! It does not matter what your background is. If you [end p39] can pass the test to come to this school, you come in!’ It did not cost a penny piece!

But do not deny people the right, in a free country, if they wish - there are three million people on BUPA - to say: &oq;Right, I want to spend some of my money having private health insurance or taking out insurance for education!’ You do not deny them the right to have a private house. You do not deny them the right to spend on any form of pleasure. What is wrong in saying: &oq;I want to give something different to my children!’?

Nick

The earlier guy phoned about having to wait so long. If he had been on BUPA he would have been able to go much quicker, but simply because he is on a lesser wage he seems to have less right to good health.

P.M.

Yes, but you know, there are still quite a number of unions … some unions certainly … who put their people on BUPA. There used to be a marvellous trade union hospital called Manor House Hospital just outside my constituency. Not on the National Health Service. No-one thought that wrong. And how would it help the National Health Service if the people who had gone BUPA came straight on to the waiting lists and added to them? It would not.

Indeed, let me go further and say that if there is a regional hospital or a district hospital that knows that there is a private hospital somewhere that has spare beds and they could pay a certain amount for an operation for a person on the Health Service, why not? [end p40] Why not, if it helps reduce the waiting lists? Our job is to get those operations done quicker so people do not have to wait as long.

Nick

Yes, but if for instance you are paying dues to BUPA, if you were to pay an equal amount - if you could afford to pay for BUPA, you could afford to pay an equal amount to the National Health Service &dubellip;

P.M.

Everyone in the country pays towards the National Health Service and you pay income tax according to your income and believe you me, it is not only people in my Party who use BUPA. It is not only people in my Party who use a private education service.

But I want to know from you what is it about your beliefs that enables you to say to someone: &oq;You have earned your money, you have paid your tax, but I, this great bloke who can tell everyone else what they should do with their lives, am going to say you can spend it on cinema, on racing, on cars, on better cars, on luxury products, but to spend on education or health, no.’ That is not a free society.

Nick

Health is not a consumer product. Cars and the rest of it. That is the difference isn't it? Something like health, I would say in a modern nation like Britain, is a basic right. Now if you are being denied that right because people are paying for BUPA's costs which pulls people out of the NHS to work for BUPA simply [end p41] because they earn more money that way, that is a bit unfair on the rest of us.

P.M.

We are, under a Conservative Government - you may not like it but we are spending well over twice … let me give you the figures again. The day I walked into No. 10 Downing Street the annual amount of money which went to the National Health Service was £7½ billion. This year, when I have been there 7½ years, it is £18.3/4 billion. There are 55,000 more nurses. We have restored to the Health Service programme hospitals which were cancelled during Labour's time because they ran the finances of the nation so badly.

So whichever way you look at it, we are doing better under the Health Service for the overwhelming majority of people who in fact go to the Health Service.

There are also quite a number of other jobs in BUPA and we have a number of doctors - excellent doctors - who are partly in the private service and partly in the State service.

This is a free country. If you pay all your taxes and all your dues to the National Health Service and Education, I do not see why you should stop people spending the rest of their money as they wish. [end p42]

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Prime Minister, thank you for joining us on the Robbie Vincent Telephone Programme. That hour has absolutely whizzed by.

My apologies to all of you who were not able to put your questions to the Prime Minister. Thank you to those who took the trouble to call.

It is coming up to 2.30. We move on here on Radio London to things different and we thank Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher for her answers to your questions.

P.M.

Thank you very much for the telephone calls. It was a great pleasure.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

I was just thinking. To get all the questions answered, I wonder if you could take three years out? Do you think you could have a break for three years?

P.M.

You know, we go much faster in the House of Commons. There I have about fifteen or sixteen minutes and I sometimes get about fifteen or sixteen questions.

Robbie Vincent, BBC Radio London

Yes, but you give politicians short shrift!

P.M.

Sometimes they deserve it.