Word: thatchers
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Conservatives, led by shadow Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, have been quick to capitalize on Callaghan's plight. In a brilliant parliamentary performance, Thatcher seemed to be speaking for the British people when she recited the lengthening litany of stoppages, layoffs, shortages and closings. "If that isn't mounting chaos," she cried, "it is difficult to see what...
...promise for the new Parliament. The most important item in the Queen's speech was an assurance to Scottish and Welsh nationalists that there would be referendums on March 1 on local assemblies for these areas-the first step toward devolution, or limited home rule. Opposed by Thatcher's Tories, who have 281 seats, and the Liberal Party (13), Callaghan's Labor minority of 312 can now stay in power only with the help of smaller parties. Callaghan needs the votes, or at least the abstentions, of the nationalists this week in the vote of confidence that...
...voluntary wage restraints, under which unions would limit pay-hike demands to no more than 5%. That stand is fiercely opposed by the 11.5 million-member Trades Union Congress, and was violently attacked by Callaghan's own Labor Party Conference at its annual meeting in Blackpool last month. Thatcher is leading a Tory assault on what she has described as "rigid pay policies" and calls instead for "responsible" collective bargaining...
...concerned about which major party can best cope with union demands, appears to favor Callaghan's position. In the past month Labor has climbed in the political polls from a seven-point deficit to a five-point advantage over the Tories. Callaghan is also 17 points ahead of Thatcher in personal popularity, a gain of six points in a single month. In a by-election last month in the marginal Scottish border district of Berwick and East Lothian, Labor managed to retain a seat that the Conservatives had strong hopes of winning...
Callaghan is also being helped by an embarrassing internal feud within the Conservative Party. Former Prime Minister Edward Heath, whom Thatcher deposed as party leader three years ago, broke with party policy by openly sup porting Callaghan's wage stand, even as he campaigned for the Tory candidate in the Scottish by-election. Conservative M.P. George Gardiner, a Thatcher brain-truster, last week complained that "receiving support from Ted Heath is like being measured by an undertaker." A Labor Party spokesman had a quick retort: "Perhaps the result means that rank-and-file Conservatives prefer their former leader...