Thatcher, Margaret Hilda (1925– )

Former Conservative prime minister Margaret Thatcher. Thatcher was born in 1925, and was educated at Somerville College, Oxford, where she read chemistry. She was leader of the Conservative Party from 1975, and in 1979 she became Britain's first female prime minister, serving three terms in office.

British Conservative politician, prime minister 1979–90. She was education minister 1970–74 and Conservative Party leader 1975–90. In 1982 she sent British troops to recapture the Falkland Islands from Argentina. She confronted trade-union power during the miners' strike 1984–85, sold off majority stakes in many public utilities to the private sector, and reduced the influence of local government through such measures as the abolition of metropolitan councils, the control of expenditure through ‘rate-capping’, and the introduction of the community charge, or poll tax, in 1989. In 1990, splits in the cabinet over the issues of Europe and consensus government forced her resignation. An astute parliamentary tactician, she tolerated little disagreement, either from the opposition or from within her own party.

Margaret Thatcher was born in Grantham, the daughter of a grocer, and studied chemistry at Oxford University before becoming a barrister. As minister for education 1970–74 she faced criticism for abolishing free milk for schoolchildren over eight. She was nevertheless an unexpected victor in the 1975 leadership election when she defeated Edward Heath. As prime minister she sharply reduced public spending to bring down inflation, but at the cost of generating a recession: manufacturing output fell by a fifth, and unemployment rose to over 3 million. Her popularity revived after she sent a naval force to recapture the Falkland Islands in 1982. Her second term of office was marked by the miners' strike 1984–85, which ended in defeat for the miners and indicated a shifted balance of power away from the unions. In October 1984 she narrowly avoided an IRA bomb that exploded during the Conservative Party conference. Her election victory in 1987 made her the first prime minister in 160 years to be elected for a third term, but she became increasingly isolated by her autocratic, aloof stance, which allowed little time for cabinet debate. In 1986 defence minister Michael Heseltine resigned after supporting a European-led plan for the rescue of the Westland helicopter company. In 1989 Nigel Lawson resigned as chancellor when she publicly supported her financial adviser Alan Walters against him. The introduction of the poll tax from 1989 was widely unpopular. Finally, Geoffrey Howe resigned as deputy prime minister in November 1990 over her public denial of an earlier cabinet consensus over the single European currency. She retired from public life in 2002 on medical advice.