Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Prime Minister, I know your family is very important to you.
Can you say why the family is particularly important in society?
P.M.
I find that you should even ask the question very strange, because it is the fundamental unit of society. All our life is based upon the belief that the family - the ordinary family - will be the overwhelming majority of our society.
It is the means of providing for the future generation. No-one provides so well as parents who feel deeply about their own children.
Of course, there are exceptions, because there is evil in every society.
I have thought about it. There are about four reasons:
The family provides the children with the basic physical needs: the food; the shelter; for the [end p1] husband and wife it provides mutual support; and it provides care for the elderly. But it does a lot more than that.
It teaches children the basic values of right and wrong; it can teach them respect for others; it teaches them discipline; and it can teach them faith.
It is … assuming what I would call the normal family … it is the greatest and deepest practical demonstration of affection and love that there is. It is the first school of life, the earliest school of life. It is the place to which you can always return, knowing you belong and knowing you will always be welcomed. It is the place where you are valued, not for your talents or abilities, but you are loved for what you are.
I would say … I have always put it … the family is both the refuge and the inspiration of your life.
You will say: “But you know, there are quarrels in every family!” Yes, of course there are. Yes, of course there are days when you get bickering and things go wrong, but a family is about … all the basics are there. You know that these quarrels on the whole are superficial and really, what I am saying is I think the family is so fundamental, so deep, that when it does go wrong ... ... when you get child abuse and some of the terrible things you get and the child is deprived, I think, of the fundamental right … and I believe passionately in the responsibility of parents for their [end p2] children. You should not bring children into the world unless you are prepared to look after them, both in their physical needs and the affection and love which should be every child's birthright.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Prime Minister, do you see threats to the family now in our society more than there used to be?
P.M.
Unfortunately, there are far more one-parent families - and I am not so much talking about widows and people who have been deserted; those carry their own human tragedy but one-parent families who have never know what it is to have a father - but I did notice something I was hunting for in New Society the other day. I think it is right. I think sometimes we overdo that. The majority of people still live … this was it … if you look at numbers of people rather than numbers of households, you will find that 78% of people living in private households in 1983 lived in families headed by a married couple. That is virtually unchanged from the 82% in 1961, so although there has been some deterioration, it is not as great as perhaps other statistics would have us believe; and the article in the New Society of all places summed up the message that I thought was good. Most adults still marry and have children; most children are reared by their natural [end p3] parents; most people live in a household headed by a married couple; most marriages continue until parted by death; no great change seems currently in prospect.
So I think that we have to still bear in mind that in spite of the problems - and I could not be more concerned for the children, particularly where you get neglect or abuse or cruelty; it is the thing which angers me most of all - that most children still live in the ordinary fundamental basic family.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Could we take now that there is one area which, according to a recent survey was put top of the concerns among people, which is unemployment. Of course, you are more aware of that than anybody else I think, and it is also known that this does cause stress, it causes family breakdown.
The point I have taken is that you acted very quickly in the crisis over the AIDS business. You sent out literature very quickly and so on giving specific advice.
Now, what can you say to people who are desperate, who have no job? I am not talking about the future; I am talking about now.
P.M.
You said about AIDS leaflets. Can you [word missing] “Action For Jobs”? [end p4]
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Yes, Prime Minister, I have seen “Action For Jobs”.
P.M.
Well it is far more fundamental than any other …
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
It is rather cosmetic isn't it? I mean a lot of it is …
P.M.
It is not cosmetic!
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
A lot of it is talking about jobs and training and so on.
P.M.
Yes! And how are you going to get jobs if you are not prepared to train for the jobs that are available?
As you know, in the midst of unemployment we have employers who cannot get people for the jobs that are available because they are not trained and so we have the biggest training scheme ever known in the history of Britain.
Last week, I went to see the Youth Training Scheme as it is being operated at Fords of Dagenham. It was [end p5] quite outstanding. Young people … some of them were being taught all the things about commerce, with all the latest information technology. Others were being taught all the things about engineering, all the things about construction, and others all the things about catering. It was a fantastic thing.
It was not only the care in which they had worked out the course and the breadth of it, so that you could go into many different jobs. You could go on to many specialist trainings after that. What struck me was the care - the deep concern - about each of the foremen and the people who are in charge of the young people, every one of them.
Now look! Last week, David Young announced a further extension.
We started off with everyone who has been unemployed for a year is called in for interview to see if we can get them either a job or training for a job, because as I say there are jobs available … training for jobs … no, you asked me about care and what am I doing and I am telling you. Please listen! Please record!
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Yes, but where do they go afterwards? Where do they go afterwards? [end p6]
P.M.
Well, you had better ask! Most of them go off either into training and a lot of them get a job, or they go on to what we have especially for them: the Community Programme.
We have now extended that to six months - interviews after six months of unemployment - and it is not only after six months; it is every six months.
Now we are finding out all sorts of things. A number of adults who are no longer literate, because you know, by the time you have left school and you have not perhaps read any newspapers, you have got all your news from television or radio, you lose the facility.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
It is seven million isn't it at the moment?
P.M.
Yes, and so they are having to start and train again for literacy, because you cannot read instructions.
They are finding out these things. But they are taking action, and we have the Community Programme. We have more places on the Community Programme, so these people can be given a job which they will work at, which is a community job, and also, we are finding all over the country that young people are responding to the Youth Enterprise Allowance. [end p7]
Look! This country was built by the talents and abilities of its people, before there was a Department of Employment, before there was a Department of Industry, and so what we have to do is to help with the fundamental education, the fundamental training. Help with people who have been out, to get them back into the habit of work, on the Community Programme.
No, it is not cosmetic! A million people on youth training for two years is not cosmetic! It is real!
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
But it is just the two years?
P.M.
Yes, it is for two years and the majority get a job. We will give you the figures.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
O.K. I take the point.
P.M.
It is not cosmetic! How much have we spent on it? Give me the figure! I think it is something like £8&en;10 billion on special measures. Cosmetic! Go and look at it! [end p8]
P.M.'s Assistant
We will. We will give you the figures. And I think if you ask those that benefit from the scheme if it was cosmetic … they did some interviews on Radio 4 last week and they were thrilled to be on the scheme.
P.M.
And I will tell you something else: they are much more strongly motivated on the YTS than they were at school, because they can see the point of learning specific things for jobs and they were learning how to build houses; they were learning how to lay bricks; they were learning how to plaster; they learn how to do electrical work; they learn how to do plumbing; they learn how to do all the engineering connected with cars so they can go straightaway home and help look after father's car. They learn all the right things for catering. They learn all the latest office equipment. They were learning all the latest electrical equipment that you use in manufacturing, so that when they go for a job they can say: “Please! I know these things!”
And look! When I went to Birmingham a few weeks ago I was confronted by one of the newspapers - was it the “Evening Mail”? That that day said: “Look at this, Mrs. Thatcher! This is our record situations vacant in all our history!” Twenty-nine pages of situations vacant in Birmingham in the Midlands! “That”, they said, “is a record in our history!” [end p9]
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Fine. Let us leave that for a moment and go on to another area! I would like to go on to the area which we are concerned about …
P.M.
And, let me finish! Unemployment has been coming down for the last five months. We have created or business has created - business has created - one million new jobs since 1983.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
… they cannot wait.
P.M.
All right, but Britain was built by people who had talent and ability starting out to see what they could do on their own, and we are helping them to do that.
Business has created, together with the self-employed, one million new jobs in 1983 (Note: since 1983?)
The population of working age is getting bigger and it is going to go on getting bigger until the 1990s so that was not enough to make inroads into unemployment, but it would have been much worse without the creation of those jobs. Now, for the last five months, it has started to reduce unemployment. [end p10]
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Fine! I take your point.
Let us go on now to the Moral Reawakening Society because I think it is something we are all concerned about.
Now, what can the Government do? I mean, we are a Christian country, Christian prayers are said in Parliament and so on. What lead can the Government take in … let us take schools first?
P.M.
Well as you know, there is a fundamental … it is, I think, the only piece in legislation about the moral … the society ... ... that you do insist that there is religious education in schools. Some people would say that that is not always carried out, but it is right fundamentally in law that there should be religious education in schools. As you know, the syllabus is drawn up by the churches locally, and some people, of course, who do not wish to be brought up in the Church of England opt out of the school assembly or others - we have these days more and more different religions - who make their own facilities.
It is the Government's concern for moral standards that there is. That is the only statutory piece of legislation about it. [end p11]
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
And this will continue?
P.M.
It will continue.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Because it has been eroded.
P.M.
Now also we are looking at what I would call a “core curriculum” because we believe that certain basic education things should be taught, but you see, the first contact a child has is with the family and the first idea of right and wrong is with the family, and no government can take the place of a good family. No government can take the place of a church.
A government can make laws and say: “Thou shalt not do things and if you do them you will be punished!” It is the deeper things that make you kind and neighbourly, but then, we do say … part of Government's job is to see that the law is upheld, because a society cannot live without laws.
But what you are saying, which I so wholeheartedly agree with is, Government through Parliament, can make the laws; it can provide for the law to be upheld, and this is why I am so concerned that the rule of law [end p12] be upheld by everyone, whatever political party. The law must be obeyed.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Well, what about what is happening in Haringey at the moment?
P.M.
Well, I think it is terrible. Unfortunately, local education authorities have the responsibility for the curriculum and I think what is happening in Haringey is dreadful, and the parents are on to it. This is the 1944 Education Act. The local authority schools or the governors of a voluntary aid school have responsibility for the curriculum and we are now having a look at that. It has taken us a long time to say that, but really, when we feel these things are happening and parents are in revolt, what we are doing is giving more and more power to parents in the conduct of the schools, and this is because we believe that the kind of thing that you are getting in Haringey … revolt of the parents against it … that our duty is to give more responsibility to parents because we believe that they will be the best guardians of their children, and it is interesting in Haringey. It is parents of all backgrounds absolutely recoil from what is happening - all backgrounds, all ethnic backgrounds - and that is one of the most encouraging things about what I have been saying to [end p13] you: that the overwhelming majority of families are still what I would call the “traditional family”.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
In the community as a whole, to be more specific here on one area which we are particularly concerned with, which is the whole area of respect for life, obviously the question of abortion and embryo research is very important to us now.
Could you say yourself, as a politician and mother and as a scientist as well, are you happy with the way the Aborton Act is being used at the moment?
P.M.
As you know, it is not a party political matter at all. I mean, I personally would be very happy - indeed, would prefer it - if we got the reduction from twenty-eight weeks to twenty-four. The Rt. Rev. Hugh MontefioreBishop of Birmingham introduced a Bill in the House of Lords. I personally, speaking as an ordinary Member of Parliament, am personally supportive of that.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Do you feel that it has been misused. It was brought in for general ... ... [end p14]
P.M.
Let me put it to you this way: medical research has gone on and I think it very strange that on one side of medicine you are trying to save children at younger and younger premature birth and are able to, and yet on the other, the Act permits abortion up to twenty-eight weeks.
There will still be times when, for medical reasons, you might have to have that, and you always have had to have if the life of the mother is at stake, but then you would endanger - then you struggle to save the child.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Can I ask you about now the old age pensioners in our society?
If you can just say briefly … I mean, there has been a lot of publicity given to them … there always is every winter, they have made an enormous contribution to society in their lifetimes; are you happy with the quality of life that they have at the moment, that they do have this fear and confusion?
P.M.
We have tried, we have, I think there are nearly a million more pensioners, because, you know, we are all living longer and we have tried to do as much as we can and we tried to set out to do everything we can. You know that you have to bear in mind, the needs of [end p15] pensioners which are considerable and great and the fact that all pensions are paid by a transfer of income from the working population to a pensioner. So every pension that is paid out this year is met by a contribution from a worker which is paid in this year. I am not sure that everyone realises that and so you have to keep the needs and interests of both in mind, and as you know, we have honoured our pledge to protect the pension against inflation but not only that but we got inflation down so that the savings of pensioners are not eroded; I mean that was one of the worst things, that pensioners, particularly in the older generations, that pensioners put money aside for a rainy day - they put money aside - they owned their own house, say, “Well suppose something happens to the roof, I must have £2000 in the bank account always in case we have to meet the value of the roof”, and then when something happened to the roof that £2000 was not enough because of inflation, so we have helped with that immensely. More and more pensioners have a second pension.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Would you like to see the quality of life improve though for them?
P.M.
But oh yes, I opened in my constituency the other day, a day-centre at our Finchley memorial hospital for [end p16] the elderly and they were absolutely thrilled with it because the great thing is that old folk wish to stay in their homes as long as they can and many hospitals now are doing what we are doing: taking some of their older or smaller hospitals and turning them into really centres for care for the elderly and medical attention, and these were coming in two days a week, being collected by mini-bus from their homes, brought into hospital, having treatment, or sometimes brought into a day centre, so we are doing more and more of that as well. But do not forget also what I said at the beginning: one of the things about families is that they also provide care for the elderly and there is no substitute for that. Of course the majority of families still do.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
But the majority of old age pensioners now live alone so …
P.M.
That is true, that is why we have the day centres at hospitals and that is why there is a fantastic amount of voluntary work done and never underestimate that. But there is no way a government can substitute for a good neighbour or for a family and that is the centre and essence of life. [end p17]
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Actually, I was recently at the launch of the International Year of Shelter for the Homeless, and the statistics there - there were a lot of, very many old people living in sub-standard homes not to mention over a hundred thousand families homeless - what actually is your concrete contribution going to be?
P.M.
Well, I can tell you there are one and a quarter million more houses than there were seven and a half years ago. One of the problems, I can tell you, is that of the 30% who are not in the ordinary homes, you will find that whereas in days gone by, in which it was enough to provide one home for a family, there are now a lot of families that do split, and expect somehow society to provide them with two homes. You will be told about, this is the number of single-parent families, which is the worrying thing, so that you will find that where there has been decline it has had this enormous effect and they turn round and say “Oh, Society, I am a mother, I have an illegitimate child, I must be entitled to a house, and society must provide me with a house and must keep me”, but we try to because of the child, we try to, that means an increasing demand on housing and again it is the working population who are having to find it. [end p18]
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
So one answer could be fewer one-parent families perhaps?
P.M.
Well, you are saying “Do you think things should be taught at school?” As I was saying to you, you do not have to bring a child into the world.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
I think on housing too probably, is that the local authority policies in many cases have not - you know, houses are sub-standard - because local authorities are not doing …
P.M.
We have also got the bed and breakfast for young people who are looking for jobs, but I am just looking, we have one and a quarter million more and also, if I might say so, there are over a hundred and twenty thousand houses vacant, council properties vacant, up and down the country. It is absolutely scandalous as some local authorities complain when they still have this number of properties vacant and the properties are not put into reasonable order quickly enough. I was just looking for my customary figures. It is one and a quarter million more. [end p19]
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
But can I just ask you, you are concerned, aren't you about the homeless people?
P.M.
I am always concerned if children are not brought up in a good home and I am always concerned, the natural way for a family is two parents and I am always concerned if there aren't. When you think how widows cope, they are fantastic, bringing up a family, turning round and earning for them, they are absolutely fantastic, and some deserted wives too, they are absolutely fantastic, and all of the love and affection, sometimes the greatest love and affection I have ever known between children and their mother in these families.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
I think yes, we all agree with that. If I can just come onto an area which is related to the family, it is of special interest to us; we were talking about morality, we are very concerned about injustice, we have had a case here which has aroused a lot of concern from a lot of very responsible people, the case of the Guildford Four and the Maguire family who have not been granted an independent enquiry, a lot of people feel they have had a miscarriage of justice. Can you comment on that? [end p20]
P.M.
Well, I have nothing more to add to what Douglas Hurd said in the House, and he gave the reasons and I think the reasons were valid. You simply cannot just upset the law with all the rights of appeal unless either there is some new evidence to do so, and he set it out there very well.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Do you feel compassion for him in spite of the fact you cannot do anything for him?
P.M.
I have nothing to add to what Douglas Hurd has said.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Now in our wider community we have got terrible things happening in Northern Ireland, splitting families splitting the wider family which is our community, what hope do you see, what hope do you see for the Anglo-Irish agreement and a solution there?
P.M.
I think we often feel, on this side of the water in Great Britain, the Great Britain part of the United Kingdom, great anxiety about it, we always feel great anxiety about it. The great concern and to most of us, [end p21] you see, we would say, “How come you have two peoples of different tradition but living in the same country who do not get together and say ‘for the sake of our children let us make a new start’?”. To us it is almost inconceivable that that should not happen, for the sake of our children let us make a new start and unless there is a feeling there that they somehow want to get it together and learn to live together, unless they want to build on the things they have in common and not on the things on which they differ, then I think you will find it almost impossible to have any settlement or solution from the outside. All you can do is try to be fair to all parts of the community and to try to uphold the law and overcome violence.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
But there is a lot of violence going on at the moment.
P.M.
Yes indeed, and the police are absolutely fantastic.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
… get away with verbal attacks as well, a lot of politicians are being allowed to get away with verbal attacks there in Northern Ireland which is not helping things … [end p22]
P.M.
Verbal attacks from all sides, verbal attacks are better than bombs. You have to be very careful, freedom of speech I should soon be …
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Prime Minister, can I ask you quickly about education, we know about the national curriculum, we know about the ideas that have been put forward and so on, is there one specific change you would like to see made in schools?
P.M.
Look, we are doing quite a lot about schools, we are having a look at what is called a basic or core curriculum so that we can be certain that every child that goes through education has a certain standard in the reading, writing, arithmetic, certain standard in the basic sciences and of course there is a compulsory part of religious education. As a matter of fact in Northern Ireland, the educational results, as far as children taking exams and ‘O’ levels are concerned, are some of the best in the United Kingdom. It is of course that the schools have not been reorganised, you know, they have the old structure.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
You are thinking about re-introducing Grammar [end p23] schools aren't you?
P.M.
Well, if people want to re-introduce Grammar schools, we do not stop them. They can apply to do so but we have major changes in the educational field forecast. Already as you know, we are trying to give more and more power and control to parents, we want to give more and more to the head teacher in the school and it is really a dispersal of power from the local authority to the school.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
… to avoid the sort of situations ... ... in Haringey.
P.M.
Yes that is right.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Could you say, I would like to cover two more areas, so if you could say very briefly about the health service waiting list, a lot of people are very worried about; do you see them disappearing in the 1990s?
P.M.
Well, they are smaller than they were and far more patients are being treated than ever before. [end p24]
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
I know that, there are still lists.
P.M.
Yes, there are still waiting lists because, look, we have a new thing for example, you get new research, look at the number now of cases for heart operations. Some heart operations would not have been possible years ago. So every time you get an advance in research and medicine you get a new waiting list. I mean cataracts were extremely, very rare to be able to do a cataract operation or put in a new retina, put in a new part to the eye years ago; as you do it, so you get a new waiting list. As you know, we are having a drive on trying to reduce waiting lists now and there are far more hip operations than ever before, far more cataract operations, far more heart operations than ever before and people that say “Well, I do not care about that, if I cannot have it”, but of course it is just not possible to suddenly reduce it - you have to have the skilled doctors to do it - we have a drive on getting waiting lists down, it is our top priority. We allocated £25 million for it extra, over and above the £18¾ billion. Do you realise the average family is already paying by tax, every week to the health service throughout the year whether they go to a family doctor or hospital or not, £27 per week per average family. That is what they pay already, so every [end p25] extra service we give, it comes again, the average family has to pay more. I say this because I get fed up of hearing the State has money. The State has none. It has to go and put its hand more deeply into the pockets of its citizens. But now we are doing that but we have to make some judgement, it is no good believing in the family and then the State saying “Well I am going to be so generous with the family's money”, that the head of the family himself, or herself, has not enough money to look after their own children or look after their own old folk, so we have to have, that is what I said, fairness. So this year we have decided to take an extra £25 million from the tax payer over and above the £18¾ billion, and we are allocating it to those regions which indicate that if they have this extra money they can get down their waiting list by most. So they are putting up their plans and the ones who can get down their waiting lists by most will get the bigger part of that money and another £25 million next year.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Finally, because we have come to the end; what contribution, what main contribution to the well being of the family would you like to be remembered for, I mean this sounds rather as if your career has come to its end?
P.M.
I think the main one that we have done is to say [end p26] “We would like, I will remember,” let me put it this way: listening to a lady from a Young Women's Christian Association speaking to a group of people, this was years and years ago, of families, and them saying “Please we have a home, but we haven't a house in which to put our home”; you see the meaning? These are family, we are a home in our family but we haven't a house in which to put our home. So we have to struggle to give more and more people the opportunity to own their home right from the beginning because if you get your rung on the first step of the ladder, even if you are a young single person in your own career, you get a small flat of your own and that gives you a basis, and then you get a bigger one, and then when you get married you get a bigger one. Do you know that in this country now, there is a bigger proportion of young people in home ownership than throughout any other country in Europe, so it is, what I feel, we are enabling them at a very early age to start on the first rung of the ladder of home ownership and that will give them the basis when they get married to have a home. They might not be able to furnish it very well, heaven knows we did not either for a start and this is a very practical contribution that one can make. Also if you cannot afford the whole house, we have something in this country called shared ownership, whereby you say, all right, that is the house I would like and mortgage relief in this country is comparatively small compared with other countries where [end p27] you can get total mortgage relief on your ... ...
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
By the way that is discriminating against people who are married, doesn't it, mortgage relief?
P.M.
Well, it is not discriminating against people that are married. I mean the whole mortgage relief was never done believing that there would be so much co-habitation as there is and certainly if you have got two young people living together who are single, they can both get mortgage relief and certainly it causes a lot resentment.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Are you going to change that at all, are you thinking of changing it?
P.M.
Well we are having a look at it. The question is which way do you change it? As you say, shared ownership, if you cannot afford to buy the whole house, all right you buy the half a house and then you get mortgage relief on that and then you pay rent only on the other half and then you can gradually buy the other half when you are able to, again it is another way of getting the first step, the first rung on the ladder. [end p28]
P.M. Assistant
If you live in a council house with your parents, you can all put in towards …
P.M.
Yes you can, in council houses yes, and the other thing I was saying that we have done is to enable people who are tenants in council houses to buy their homes at enormously preferential prices and a million have already done it. And I am beginning to think, just as Christine says, where everyone is put in, to help mum and dad to buy it, everyone is putting in to help mum and dad to buy it because in the end that the whole society will be changed because when grandma and grandpa, great-grandma and great-grandpa die they leave their home and that gives a means of starting other young people to start in purchasing; you see most of us had to start from our own resources, but by the time you have got great-grandma and great-grandpa being able to help generations three or four times on with a better start, that is what the family is all about.
Do not believe that what we are doing for unemployment is cosmetic, it is real.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
I am voicing the opinions of people who express those opinions. [end p29]
P.M.'s Assistant
Well those who shout loudest are not always the majority.
P.M.
Those who shout loudest, you have seen with those people, as you have seen with severe weather allowances and heating allowances for old people, those who shout the loudest are those who did not do as well themselves when they had the chance to do so.
Alenka Lawrence, The Universe
Yes, well, you did make that point, certainly.
P.M.
So, it is not cosmetic, it is for real. The classic thing which I get, everything that you are doing, we acknowledge what you are doing, but it is only cosmetic or you do not believe in it, or it is for ulterior motives.