The re enactment of the Thatcher/Lawson/Howe split was poor. It missed the main point that Margaret was right to resist their wish to go into the ERM. When she was finally forced to do so by the replacement Chancellor, John Major, it proved ruinous for the UK economy. The drama was so inaccurate in lots…
The re enactment of the Thatcher/Lawson/Howe split was poor. It missed the main point that Margaret was right to resist their wish to go into the ERM. When she was finally forced to do so by the replacement Chancellor, John Major, it proved ruinous for the UK economy.
The drama was so inaccurate in lots of annoying detailed ways . She did not talk to senior colleagues from behind a desk and did not make them stand. There were twin armchairs in her drawing room /study with other comfortable chairs in a semi circle. Bernard Ingham was her press Secretary. He did not see people in and out. Advisers did not speak at political events or gatherings of Cabinet colleagues. Alan Walters did add to tensions with Nigel Lawson at the end and was wrong to get into the press with his views. He did not cause the fissure over the ERM which started years earlier when the Treasury and Nigel started shadowing the DM as if we were in the ERM without permission.
I advised her of this and set out how ERM membership would lead to inflation when the pound was rising as you then needed to print too many pounds to sell, and to recession when the pound wanted to go down and you needed to buy. The scheme gave us both, a nasty inflation followed by a worse recession. She understood this and had to fend off the ill judged and dangerous joint Treasury/Foreign Office line. My paper setting out the problem is I am told now released with other government papers for those interested.
