How Did Margaret Thatcher’s Speech Influence Her Audiences

How did Margaret Thatcher’s speech influence her audiences

Nathan Cheung, 8A (6)

Introduction

Margaret Thatcher was Britain’s first female prime minister. She served three consecutive terms of office from 1979 to 1990 and was one of the dominant political figures of 20th century Britain with huge influence. Thatcher’s first two years in office were not easy, the economy gradually showed improvement yet unemployment was very high.  She had battled the country’s recession by at first raising interest rates to control inflation. Under her leadership, the government followed a radical program of privatization and deregulation of social housing and public transport, reform of the trade union of mine workers, tax cuts and introducing market mechanisms into health and education with an aim to reduce government’s role and increase individual self-reliance. As the UK prime minister for more than 10 years, Margaret Thatcher had gave more than 8,000 public speeches and statements throughout her “Downing Street Years”. One of the significant speeches she made was the one in the Conservative Party Conference on 10th October 1980. The speech made her winning laughter and applause. It not only successfully delivered her political direction on the nation issues to the public but also raised the public awareness of her tenacity being the leader of the Britain. The phrase of “The Lady’s Not for Turning” in her speech had become the famous quote and formed a tough image that contributed to her nickname of “The Iron Lady” thereafter by the Soviet. This essay will focus on discussing the famous speech Margaret Thatcher made in the Conservative Party Conference on 10th October 1980, how she delivered her stand on the economic policies and resolute in administering it in the face of adversity and the techniques she used to appeal the audience.

Subtopic 1: Background of Margaret Thatcher

According to Margaret Thatcher’s teachers, she was a fairly good student. (Margaret Thatcher, Biography.com) She was accepted to Oxford University for studying chemistry. As both of her parents were Methodists, she was politically active and she served as the Chairman of the Conservative Association at the University.  

After graduated in 1947, Thatcher ran as the Conservative candidate for a parliamentary seat in the 1950 elections. Despite failing to get a seat in the parliament, she earned the respect of her peers from her political party. She ran again in the next year, but once again failed. She married a wealthy businessman, Dennis Thatcher, two months after her defeat.

In the 1970s, the Conservatives, the party that Margaret Thatcher belonged to, was led by Edward Heath. Thatcher was appointed as the Secretary of State for Education and Science in the year 1970 and gained negative media attention from critics after her abolition of the Universal Free School Milk Scheme which saved money for the country. She claimed that her job was frustrating, not because of all the negative media attentions towards her actions, but because the leader of her party, Prime Minister Edward Heath refused to listen to her ideas. With her grave disappointment, she once believed that she had no hope for becoming a successful politician. She even said, "I don't think there will be a woman prime minister in my lifetime," during a 1973 television’s appearance. (15 quotes from Margaret Thatcher, Women’s Agenda.com)

Yet Margaret Thatcher’s negative expectations were wrong. When the Conservative Party lost in the General Election in 1974, she gained a lot of power and dominated her political party. She beat Edward Health and was elected as the President of the Party in 1975. This victory was a major breakthrough as she had become the first woman to serve as the opposition leader in the House of Commons.

On the General Election in 1979, Margaret Thatcher won and was appointed as the Prime Minister of Britain. During her terms of office, she went down in history not only as Britain’s first female Prime Minister, but was the leader who transformed Britain’s economy. Her strong leadership also reflected in her policies of reducing the power of Trade Union. A lot of miners protested and went on strike, but Thatcher had stood strong to their protests. While she had played the role as a formidable rival on the international stage, she was determined in the Falklands War and quickly solved the issue by sending troops to defend the Falklands in 1982. With the nickname of “Iron Lady”, Margaret Thatcher led Britain for over 10 years under different national crisis and critics. In November 1990, she agreed to resign and was succeeded by John Major as party leader and Prime Minister.  Margaret Thatcher retired from public speaking in 2002 after suffering a series of minor stokes and passed away in 2013.   

Subtopic 2: The  Speech: “The Lady’s Not for Turning”

When Margaret Thatcher was appointed as the Prime Minister in 1979, she was facing the economic recession and high unemployment. Edward Heath, the former Prime Minister had pumped money into the economy by increasing in pensions and benefits and reducing the amount of tax, and this method was known as the “U-Turn”. This method was found not stopping the unemployment problem, because pumping money into the economy had reduced the reserve in Britain. With the reserves being used, more and more people got unemployed. When Margaret Thatcher became the Prime Minister, the unemployment problem continued. The no. of unemployed was even doubled the amount than before. As the Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher decided to implement the Free Market System. However, many of her political rivals and even some members of her party showed disagreement with her action of liberalizing the market. Instead of privatization, a lot of politicians encouraged her to response public sentiment by following Edward Heath to “U-Turn” as it could temporarily reduce the level of unemployment. (Biography, Margaret Thatcher Foundation.org)

On 10th October 1980, Margaret Thatcher gave a speech to fellow conservative members in the Conservative Party Conference at Brighton. In her 3879 words’ speech, Margaret Thatcher touched on the controversial economic and social problems facing by the country, the tasks in which the Government were engaged and the Government’s stand on foreign affairs. The speech was about 45 minutes. She had spent most of the time to address the problems of inflation, unemployment and the public concerns and resentment on the government policies in tackling the matters. While she was being pressured to perform a “U-turn” on her economic policies from all sides at that time, she had reinforced in the speech on her determination of imposing policies to defeat inflation and improve unemployment by liberalizing the UK economy. She stressed that only if the country had courage and resolve to sustain the policies for long enough could break through to success.