F***ing pissed off

[Southover Street Seagull]

What social problems? There weren't any worse social problems in the coal field areas than any other part of Britain.
As I have said before, those that didn't transfer to the Pontefract coalfield (the most modern one) took thousands in redundancy money. My own next door neighbour got employement within a month as a trainee manager with Victoria wine company.
My father in law worked for British Steel and lost three jobs in two years but still retired working for British Steel (so there were still jobs available in that industry - it just became far more streamlined and productive) at Templeborough.

Read this article Yorkie and think again about the social problems that you claim were no different to any other aprt of Britain:

http://society.guardian.co.uk/socialexclusion/comment/0,11499,1491108,00.html

 

[Southover Street Seagull]

Another article to read about social problems caused by the closing of the pits and a bit more recent too:

http://society.guardian.co.uk/societyguardian/story/0,,2043852,00.html

 

[Yorkie]

So you believe a journalist rather than someone who lived there and has inlaws in these places?

 

[Southover Street Seagull]

So you believe a journalist rather than someone who lived there and has inlaws in these places?

I thought you might say that!
If you read the article a lot of it is based on research by a chap called Steve Fothergill, he's a professor at Sheffield University "who has long studied the impact of the rapid rundown of the mining industry on pit communities".
So I am believing him.

 

[binky]

Another article to read about social problems caused by the closing of the pits and a bit more recent too:

http://society.guardian.co.uk/societyguardian/story/0,,2043852,00.html

Ah. Guardian reader... That explains a lot.
Do you take your information from any other source other than the Guardian and the BBC?
A balanced view is what you are after.

 

[GNF on Tour]

No not really. I can vaguely remember stuff about Harold Macmillan at that age but I couldn't have held a full scale political debate about it.
I was living in Yorkshire amongst miners and knew quite a bit about what was going on. My son was born in late 1970, so I am aware of what someone of that age can remember.

How on earth can you be so condesending? Are you related to Maggie? I and many others who may or may not have been classed as "children" back then still have the ability to remember and to read, its called "history" and form an opinion.

Whether you go along with this opinion is not the point.

I'm just staggered you can be so dismissive of other peoples intelligent opinions and in such a blase fashion. And please don't tell me I have indoctrinated by left-wing press, that would be the weakest argument in the whole world, no hang on I think you have already said that before (I remember laughing about it now).

 

[Shizuoka Dolphin]

Der's more to Oirland dan diss.

 

[Dandyman]

I am not a Thatcher lover but you are wrong about the Falklands too.
My StepMum is from the Falklands and we had friends there. Jack worked with Sir Rex Hunt for the British Government.

I am for ever grateful that we got the Falklands back from an illegal invasion. Argentina have NEVER owned the Falklands and have no international claim on it whatsoever.

So..that will be the same Government that palled up to the Argentine dictatorship, attempted to hand the Falklands over to Argentina before the invasion and wihdrew "The Endurance" from it's patrol duties ?

 

[Yorkie]

The Endurance came home every May after doing its tour of duty from October. My Dad did the same tour three years in a row with HMS Protector.

Not that I need to defend my point of view but I am not a Tory nor did I think that everything that Thatcher did was right. What I do object to, is the over the top 'Thatcher is a bitch hang her' type of posts when the reality is a lot more balanced than some posters on this forum like to think. I felt that some more experience from the actual situations involved (and I had personal involvement of two of the situations mentioned) was called for.

 

[Dandyman]

The Endurance came home every May after doing its tour of duty from October. My Dad did the same tour three years in a row with HMS Protector.

Not that I need to defend my point of view but I am not a Tory nor did I think that everything that Thatcher did was right. What I do object to, is the over the top 'Thatcher is a bitch hang her' type of posts when the reality is a lot more balanced than some posters on this forum like to think. I felt that some more experience from the actual situations involved (and I had personal involvement of two of the situations mentioned) was called for.

Richard Norton-Taylor and Rob Evans
Tuesday June 28, 2005
The Guardian


Margaret Thatcher's government offered to hand over sovereignty of the Falkland islands at a clandestine meeting with a senior Argentinian official less than two years before the invasion of the British territory, it is revealed today.
Colleagues of the British minister involved set up a diversionary cover story to explain his absence, saying he was off to Switzerland to do a little painting with his wife.

The secret meeting is disclosed in the official history of the Falklands by Sir Lawrence Freedman, professor of war studies at King's College, University of London.

He reveals that in June 1980, the Foreign Office drew up a proposal, approved by the cabinet's defence committee, whereby Britain would hand Argentina titular sovereignty over the islands, which would then be leased back by Britain for 99 years.
The British and Argentinian flags would be flown side by side on public buildings on the islands. British administration would continue with a view to guaranteeing the islanders and their descendants "uninterrupted enjoyment of their way of life".

The driving force behind the plan was the Foreign Office minister Nicholas Ridley.

He proposed a secret meeting with his Argentinian opposite number, Comodoro Cavandoli, in Venice in September 1980. He would be accompanied by his wife, ostensibly on a private holiday.

However, Lord Carrington, the foreign secretary, was worried about the choice of venue. "Why Venice?" he asked. "It all looks very hole in the corner."

Eventually, a Swiss location was chosen - the Hotel du Lac, situated in the picturesque lakeside village of Coppet, about 10 miles from Geneva.

The government invented a cover story - that "Mr Ridley's visit to Geneva with his wife is private, for a short holiday break, and that he hopes to do a little watercolour painting".

Mr Ridley had already agreed the sale of Lynx helicopters and naval missiles to Argentina and he and Mr Cavandoli seemed to enjoy a mutually warm relationship. Their meetings in Switzerland appeared to go well - certainly, Mr Ridley thought so - and they met again in New York soon afterwards.

However, the plan was wrecked after Mr Ridley, whose mission was not helped by a rather offhand and patronising manner, made an ill-fated trip to the Falklands in November, where he tried to sell a deal to the islanders. Suspicion about the government's long-term intentions grew, fuelling opposition among both Conservative and Labour MPs to any such deal.

Sir Lawrence also reveals how the Thatcher government came under unrelenting pressure from Washington to agree a ceasefire after the Argentinian invasion and before the islands had been recaptured.

Lady Thatcher and President Ronald Reagan were engaged in heated exchanges as Washington's concern about its relations with South American countries led to strong pressure on Britain to come to a deal with the Argentinian junta.

Alexander Haig, the US secretary of state, proposed a ceasefire with an international peacekeeping force, including US troops. Lady Thatcher told Reagan in a telephone call at the end of May 1982 that Britain could not contemplate a ceasefire before Argentina withdrew from the Falklands.

According to Sir Lawrence, she asked Reagan: "How would the Americans react if Alaska were invaded and, as the invaders were being thrown out, there were calls for the Americans to withdraw?" She is said to have been "dismayed" by Reagan's attitude and wanted him to know just how "upset" she was.

Washington pointed out that the US had secretly supplied Britain's special forces with communications satellites and ammunition. But Lady Thatcher was adamant. "We have lost a lot of blood, and it's the best blood," she told Sir Nicholas Henderson, Britain's ambassador to the US, on an open line. "Do they not realise," she added, "that it is an issue of principle? We cannot surrender principles for expediency."

Meanwhile, France from the start proved to be Britain's staunchest ally.



· The Official History of the Falklands Campaign, Sir Lawrence Freedman, published by Routledge Taylor & Francis Group, volume 1 (£ 39.95), volume 2 (£49.95).

story

 

[Yorkie]

Nicholas Ridley is not Margaret Thatcher (and neither is the article proved as fact)
Jack Sollis (our friend who worked with Rex Hunt) would have told us.

Btw just as an extra bit of info about me. I was a trade union member for 25 years in the electricity supply industry.

 

[Dandyman]

Nicholas Ridley is not Margaret Thatcher (and neither is the article proved as fact)
Jack Sollis (our friend who worked with Rex Hunt) would have told us.

Btw just as an extra bit of info about me. I was a trade union member for 25 years in the electricity supply industry.

Yorkie, I'm not trying to have a pop at you but simply trying to remind people of the real history of that conflict and how the war actually came about.

http://www.falklands.info/history/history6.html

 

[Southover Street Seagull]

Ah. Guardian reader... That explains a lot.
Do you take your information from any other source other than the Guardian and the BBC?
A balanced view is what you are after.

The BBC is balanced. I found the article on Google after I did a search. Did you read both articles?

 

[Southover Street Seagull]

Ah. Guardian reader... That explains a lot.
Do you take your information from any other source other than the Guardian and the BBC?
A balanced view is what you are after.

Oh and by the way I am not a Guardian reader, I jjust found the article when I was doing a search on Google.

 

[Southover Street Seagull]

Richard Norton-Taylor and Rob Evans
Tuesday June 28, 2005
The Guardian


Margaret Thatcher's government offered to hand over sovereignty of the Falkland islands at a clandestine meeting with a senior Argentinian official less than two years before the invasion of the British territory, it is revealed today.
Colleagues of the British minister involved set up a diversionary cover story to explain his absence, saying he was off to Switzerland to do a little painting with his wife.

The secret meeting is disclosed in the official history of the Falklands by Sir Lawrence Freedman, professor of war studies at King's College, University of London.

He reveals that in June 1980, the Foreign Office drew up a proposal, approved by the cabinet's defence committee, whereby Britain would hand Argentina titular sovereignty over the islands, which would then be leased back by Britain for 99 years.
The British and Argentinian flags would be flown side by side on public buildings on the islands. British administration would continue with a view to guaranteeing the islanders and their descendants "uninterrupted enjoyment of their way of life".

The driving force behind the plan was the Foreign Office minister Nicholas Ridley.

He proposed a secret meeting with his Argentinian opposite number, Comodoro Cavandoli, in Venice in September 1980. He would be accompanied by his wife, ostensibly on a private holiday.

However, Lord Carrington, the foreign secretary, was worried about the choice of venue. "Why Venice?" he asked. "It all looks very hole in the corner."

Eventually, a Swiss location was chosen - the Hotel du Lac, situated in the picturesque lakeside village of Coppet, about 10 miles from Geneva.

The government invented a cover story - that "Mr Ridley's visit to Geneva with his wife is private, for a short holiday break, and that he hopes to do a little watercolour painting".

Mr Ridley had already agreed the sale of Lynx helicopters and naval missiles to Argentina and he and Mr Cavandoli seemed to enjoy a mutually warm relationship. Their meetings in Switzerland appeared to go well - certainly, Mr Ridley thought so - and they met again in New York soon afterwards.

However, the plan was wrecked after Mr Ridley, whose mission was not helped by a rather offhand and patronising manner, made an ill-fated trip to the Falklands in November, where he tried to sell a deal to the islanders. Suspicion about the government's long-term intentions grew, fuelling opposition among both Conservative and Labour MPs to any such deal.

Sir Lawrence also reveals how the Thatcher government came under unrelenting pressure from Washington to agree a ceasefire after the Argentinian invasion and before the islands had been recaptured.

Lady Thatcher and President Ronald Reagan were engaged in heated exchanges as Washington's concern about its relations with South American countries led to strong pressure on Britain to come to a deal with the Argentinian junta.

Alexander Haig, the US secretary of state, proposed a ceasefire with an international peacekeeping force, including US troops. Lady Thatcher told Reagan in a telephone call at the end of May 1982 that Britain could not contemplate a ceasefire before Argentina withdrew from the Falklands.

According to Sir Lawrence, she asked Reagan: "How would the Americans react if Alaska were invaded and, as the invaders were being thrown out, there were calls for the Americans to withdraw?" She is said to have been "dismayed" by Reagan's attitude and wanted him to know just how "upset" she was.

Washington pointed out that the US had secretly supplied Britain's special forces with communications satellites and ammunition. But Lady Thatcher was adamant. "We have lost a lot of blood, and it's the best blood," she told Sir Nicholas Henderson, Britain's ambassador to the US, on an open line. "Do they not realise," she added, "that it is an issue of principle? We cannot surrender principles for expediency."

Meanwhile, France from the start proved to be Britain's staunchest ally.



· The Official History of the Falklands Campaign, Sir Lawrence Freedman, published by Routledge Taylor & Francis Group, volume 1 (£ 39.95), volume 2 (£49.95).

story

Be careful you have quoted from a Guardian article and as you haven't got the story from another newspaper you are therfore not balanced enough. I was told this earlier in a post on this thread!

 

[binky]

Be careful you have quoted from a Guardian article and as you haven't got the story from another newspaper you are therfore not balanced enough. I was told this earlier in a post on this thread!

But does it not seem odd to you, does it not start to ring alarm bells, that most of the references found to support the "kick Thatcher and the Tories" viewpoint are from the Guardian?

I'm not advocating one political standpoint over another, but the guardian is known for its left wing viewpoint as much as the Telegraph is known for it's right wing stand. Exactly the same events are spun to make entirely different stories in those papers.
Quoting from one only, in order to make a point is futile.

 

[m20gull]

The BBC is balanced.

No it isn't. It sees itself as independent and therefore spends a lot of time challenging opinions instead of asking for them. As a result any particular article has the risk of being heavily biased. That is compounded by their continual presentation of the views of their correspondents as "news".

 

[Southover Street Seagull]

No it isn't. It sees itself as independent and therefore spends a lot of time challenging opinions instead of asking for them. As a result any particular article has the risk of being heavily biased. That is compounded by their continual presentation of the views of their correspondents as "news".

Isn't being balanced the same as being independent. I thought being independent was not having a particular political viewpoint?

 

[algie]

No it isn't. It sees itself as independent and therefore spends a lot of time challenging opinions instead of asking for them. As a result any particular article has the risk of being heavily biased. That is compounded by their continual presentation of the views of their correspondents as "news".

Spot on.The bbc are known to be biased

 

[m20gull]

Isn't being balanced the same as being independent. I thought being independent was not having a particular political viewpoint?

I don't see it that way. The independence means that any one piece can be very slanted depending on what is being presented. A lot of the time that independence also makes the BBC feel like an unofficial opposition party. Balance would involve every item looking at every issue from every angle and is a lot harder.