Lord Heseltine on Mrs Thatcher: I never liked her...but that shouldn't matter in politics

Join our Director, Anand Menon, for a fascinating conversation with a stalwart of British politics, former Deputy Prime Minister and current President of European Movement UK, Lord Heseltine.
He will reflect on his time in government, including his roles in the Thatcher and Major cabinets, and his significant contribution to urban regeneration. Discussion will also focus on the current state of British politics, including Brexit, levelling up and the future of the Conservative Party.

[@brianevans2819]

The best thing that happened to our city, when Michael became the Minister for Merseyside, thank you Michael. From Liverpool.

[@Blubatt]

The Good Tory

[@adamcormie3362]

Difference was people like Heseltine and ofcourse Maggie, were a far different league to the ineptitude and cluelessness of today's politicians. They were intelligent and classy people of the old school...ok the public school but they were more like the ticket to run a country.

[@PlayMoreGolf-RipOff]

Intelligent, pragmatic and not engulfed with their own self interest or self indulgence.... get on with the job, implement what you think is right and do so with conviction and let history be the judge of how successful you were not the populist loud noises of the day!

[@MrDaiseymay]

WELL, with that kind of comparison, My Hamster Albert would be a contender too.

[@PlayMoreGolf-RipOff]

@@MrDaiseymay your hamster Albert went to a uk Public School?

[@jjones5083]

Mrs Thatcher also had a degree in Chemistry. The current crop all seem to have studied PPE or something similar. I won't call it a Mickey Mouse subject, but it produces useless politicians and there is clearly a lack of diversity by educational background in the commons these days. Where are the scientists & engineers ? People who can count. People who can understand and explain things like energy policy.

[@PlayMoreGolf-RipOff]

@@jjones5083 Thatcher also went on to get a law degree and pass the bar exam! She was academically a very intelligent individual… possibly the most academically intelligent and astute to have held office!

[@pauldockree9915]

I remember him "Tarzan" walking out Westland Helicopter Company. 9 January 1986. Those were the days. You could walk out and be noticed.

[@lucysmith594]

Flouncing I think you call it. His mean thin mouth is indicative of his character.

[@davidmurphy563]

Wow, the Brexiteers came out in full force in this one.

[@davidharvey4059]

One of the great things in recent history is that this terrible narcissist was not Prime Minister

[@stephenholmes1036]

Well said

[@FixUp.LookSharp]

Tarzan was great. He is a Conservative with principles. I struggle to think of one in the current gov.

[@clivebirch4066]

Of course he he didn't like her. She muscled out his and his friends aristocratic comfortable control of the Tory looking after their own interests. Never mind the interests of ordinary people.

[@stephenhill545]

One nation tories they were called. They had a sense of their own privileged position, and this imbued them with a degree of responsibility for social inequality and the ills it produced. She, being classical Liberal middle class, saw no such responsibilities existing on the part of the state, and so we have food banks and warmth banks.

[@winny8420]

He’s right you don’t have to like everybody you work with, it’s about working together for the greater good and a common goal.

[@rowejon]

What a dreadful admission, "I was at the forefront of the sale of council houses". That was the beginning of unaffordable housing for the less well off.

[@ftumschk]

Agreed - although Heseltine points out later in the interview (this is only an excerpt) that, when he was involved, the idea was to reinvest 75% of the proceeds in new social housing. This percentage was drastically lowered by his successor(s), resulting in much reduced funding for councils to build new council houses.

[@californiadreamin8423]

Everyone wants to own their own homes. What occurred was Thatcher refusal to let local authorities use the money generated , to build new ones, or raise funds to do so. Then you had the decimation of so called lame duck industries, and Norman Tebbit telling the out of work to “get on their bikes”…..so they did…South. Well there we have it , the predominantly Tory south , struggles with the rat race to put a roof over their heads, and yes the poor too for whom Thatchers descendants don’t give a toss. My heart bleeds for every Tory and Tory wannabees with negative equity and a mortgage they can’t afford. The grocers daughter from Grantham has a lot to answer for.

[@ftumschk]

@@DB12347 _"i managed to purchase mine and sold it after the 3 year no sale period. Made 10 times what i paid in profit selling it privately"_ - Which is one important reason why Thatcher's scheme was so flawed. Many people took advantage of the scheme to buy their council houses relatively cheaply, then sold them for a fast buck a few years later. It effectively took millions of affordable homes out of the equation and transferred them to the private sector, helping to fuel a sharp increase in house-prices from the mid-1980s which we haven't really recovered from.

[@californiadreamin8423]

@@DB12347 To get that level of discount then you must have paid rent on it for a long long time . How long was it ?

[@johnsinclair2672]

@@DB12347 so basically she allowed you to miss appropriate public cash that didn’t belong to you. The country has been on a downward slope ever since.

[@Jimboken1]

I'd have been terribly disappointed in Lady Thatcher had Heseltine liked her.

[@bbell1549]

👍👍👍👍👍🙏

[@robin231176]

But he made a colossal tactical error by resigning as he could well have become leader if he'd stayed. Just like Arthur Scargill had done, he played into her hands.

[@Janus-fn2uz]

He did not have the nerve, though. A thoroughly weak man.

[@paul-emilelecavalier1819]

A model to follow or to get inspired by

[@tessamorgan7076]

Better to keep quiet a vow of silence

[@ansanch]

“You get together as a vehicle for power”…not to do good or change society but a vehicle for power. A huge Freudian slip there…

[@vertugallery7099]

I met Heseltine and his wife on a few occasions and they were two of the most rude obnoxious snobby people I have ever met. I remember being at a dinner to which they were invited and they treated the waiting staff like dirt (and by the way, he was not brought up with that fake upper-class accent, it was affected with the help of countless election lessons). By comparison, Thatcher, whom I also met, was far far more humble.

[@stephenholmes1036]

He was our MP in Goring on Thames, I met them.a number of times. I worked for a farmer whos wife was on OCC. I agree completely both are highly arrogant and rude. Awful people i had an open opinion on them till i met them on a number if occasions. They try to talk down to you and despise ordinary people in my personal opinion!

[@vertugallery7099]

@@stephenholmes1036 I am happy that you have also experienced these monsters.

[@stephenholmes1036]

​@vertugallery7099 It was an eye opener, I genuinely had no real opinion on them. I try not to prejudge people but they suit each other as they in my opinion are narcissistic, arrogant and genuinely unpleasant people in my personal opinion.

[@lucysmith594]

So true Lynda Lee Potter wrote a brilliant article about going to interview him. Full of witty observations. He gave her a mug of tea, but had his served in a bone China cup and saucer. 😅

[@BossySwan]

Heseltine did more to divide the party than anyone else in recent times

[@chrisnash6094]

... and yet he would have been the next conservative prime minister if he'd not walked out of cabinet.

[@BossySwan]

@@chrisnash6094 and we’d have been shackled even more closely to Europe. We dodged a massive ‘ever closer Union’ shaped bullet there.

[@chrisnash6094]

@@BossySwan is probably right about being shackled to the EU. And those shackles are the the really frightening sort that can never be unlocked. Except by invoking Article 50 whenever we choose, of course.

[@MrDaiseymay]

@@BossySwan YEP his ego triumphed in the end----thank christ.

[@robertbillington2224]

He’s a traitor

[@jeremygraves1720]

She was twice the man you were...

[@Backwardlooking]

Many people never liked him or his behaviour. In a democracy it’s the ballot box which decides and however much you dislike the outcome you have to wait for another opportunity not attempt to delay, frustrate, nullify, cancel, or overturn the result which he and his like have done post June 2015.

[@MrDaiseymay]

Good one. same with Y-Front man.

[@RM-jj4xi]

Revisionism. He saw an opportunity to tie the Westland affair (..he cared not about it when Defence Minister) to the European issue as a pretext for positioning for the leadership. Pure ambition.

[@robertbillington2224]

No different from Sunak. Traitor

[@willmck5351]

He's a tiny footnote in a Titan's legacy, it must be unbearable for him 😂

[@tonycook7679]

Sounds simple to reduce staffing by a recruitment freeze, but it actually is a very foolish move. You end up with a gap at the lower levels of entry as all the senior members move on or retire and there is nobody left to train them. A very foolish move indeed, I have seen the results myself.

[@lloydnaylor6113]

No, what you left with is an experienced workforce. As for the retirement of senior workers that's the idea to reduce it, they'd retire anyway but not on private sector terms.

[@elaineblackhurst1509]

What MH doesn’t seem to understand is that almost nobody liked him.

[@stephenguppy7882]

@@elaineblackhurst1509 And they still don't, the interfering old fool.

[@tonycook7679]

@@lloydnaylor6113 that is what you do get in the short term, long term the skilled older people retire and then you can't recover what you have lost. The UK can't build nuclear subs now, the generation who did it have retired and the skill is lost. Same situation in the US if you want to manufacture nuclear weapons, can't find the people who can do it. I'm not saying that either of these things are a good thing to do, just examples of what happens with no plans for the future.

[@lloydnaylor6113]

@@tonycook7679 the UK does build its own nuclear submarines and has won the contract to help build Australias submarines along with the US ( AUKUS).

[@DavidHughes-op6zl]

How wonderful to hear Lord Hestletine, fully artuculate at his great age. Compared to the younger Biden, whom I equally llke, the latter seems to have aged considerably in the last few weeks alas...

[@sheehan92]

🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮

[@stephenholmes1036]

I suggest meeting him and then see how wonderful hebis!

[@stephenholmes1036]

​@POPPYS454 Mr & Mrs Hestletine are two of the most narssacistic , rude and arrogant people ive ever met. A perfectly match couple in my personal opinion

[@rosreaviemore727]

So you are into incontinent old fools, Right. You do know Biden is a Genocide enabler.

[@sirrustalots]

Heseltine was always a gun for hire who agreed with whatever lobby could pay him the most. In doing so he advocated for the EU parent subsidiary directive which allows large corporates to not pay tax here, and the EU postal service directive which ordered the sale of the post office -All behind the guise of European cooperation - which the EU definately doesn't represent. Everything wrong with politics - and you would only know of this super tory demonstrationless heaven by reading the entire EU manifesto.

[@maxhobby1701]

We know why you never like her Hestletine. she probably hated you too over Europe mainly

[@songsmith31a]

Lady Thatcher had something to offer until that final debacle with the poll tax and she was a voice that offered something positive after the likes of Harold Wilson and his "£50 travel allowance" era. She brought back a sense of pride to this battered talked-down country. I don't recall any such legacy from Heseltine.

[@davidalexander2607]

All Thatcher had to offer was misery ..despair and outright nastiness to the working class and the poor .

[@songsmith31a]

@@davidalexander2607 My reservation about her not going to the courts to deal with Scargill and her intransigence over the poll tax (a misjudgement about the public mood) were my only concerns about her term in office during my working life. She brought a sense of pride back to a counyry sorely in need of it (after Wilson and his £50 travel allowance that saw us mocked abroad) and her policy of selling council housing enabled many people to get on to the housing ladder who might never have been able to do so in their lives. And didn't she dispatch Hesletine to Liverpool on a mission designed to improve things there? .No easy task in that particiular place!!

[@bereal6590]

@@davidalexander2607 100% and what we see now is her legacy!

[@bagggs007]

The incredible sulk!

[@marymorgan1498]

People don’t like you either

[@brendanbrown3100]

Tarzan is lord of jungle!

[@donalobrien7582]

SHE Never like him Either, Heseltine was always in it for what he could get out of It. Nothing to do what was Goid for the Nation. Please

[@maxthemagition]

The decline of the UK stretches right back to the Thatcher era which was saved by North Sea Oil and Gas. Made worse by Brexit which enabled the EU to control all goods coming in and out of the UK.

[@karldelavigne8134]

The decline of the UK stretches back far further, to the costs of WW2, the postwar settlement, and trade union power in the 1950s and 60s. Thatcher did much to reverse that decline, primarily by invigorating free enterprise and making the UK competitive.

[@lloydnaylor6113]

What decline? Made worse by brexit, what are you on? GDP in the UK since 2016 is the same as France, a similar sized population and economy and better than Germany which is about to enter a double dip recession.

[@annewalden3795]

Max you are correct .Margaret T had no long term plan but was only interested in bribing the voters so she could stay on top of the greasy pole. There should have been no tax cuts and the North Sea Oil revenue should have created a U K Investment Bank . Look at the mess her privatisations have created and how she has ruined local democracy with her attacks on Labour Councils.

[@stephenhill545]

​@@karldelavigne8134it began with the unification of Germany and the rise of the United States. By 1913 both had surpassed her, although she officially stopped being Queen of the waves in 1922, when the USA kindly agreed to not build a larger fleet.

[@stephenhill545]

​@@lloydnaylor6113ever asked yourself whether or not France is also in decline.

[@Paratus7]

Heseltine never got over being kicked out. A bitter old man whose achievements in life greatly exceeded his intelligence and grace. His bitterness extends to demonising Brexit voters because he lost money in the U.K. exiting the EU.

[@bereal6590]

Brexit was a disaster, even thatcher didn't want to leave

[@Paratus7]

@@bereal6590 “Brexit was a disaster”. That’s the left wing narrative isn’t it. No evidence. In fact many argue our problems are due to globalists (like the EU), a ‘fake’ lockdown and a half baked Brexit thanks to remoaners. 7 years after the vote you are still moaning.

[@robertbillington2224]

He’s no different from Sunak

[@robertbillington2224]

@@bereal6590lol yeah ok…go do some research

[@bereal6590]

@@robertbillington2224 I've done mine. Anyone who has knows brexit was a ridiculous idea. I also know it was thatcher who despite her multitude faults, did negotiate a very good deal. Something now lost due to the stupidity of people unable to grasp concept larger than flag waving and 'sovereignty'

[@wilsonfisk6626]

"They have made a grave mistake choosing that woman." - Edward Heath

[@minixtvbox]

grave for UK. reganomics/thatcherism sold UK out to foreigners

[@whovotedforthat]

We never liked him either

[@brianholmes3547]

Heseltine was a little man in Thatchers government, a little man with a huge ego.

[@davidalexander2607]

No he wasn't. He did this country an enormous service when he challenged her and then she was gone .. Thatcher worst PM ever. Great abroad..at home demonised the poor..the sick ..the disabled ..the working class

[@songsmith31a]

I seem to recall his press nickname was "Tarzan"...is my memory faulty?

[@davidalexander2607]

@@songsmith31a your memory is correct ..he was nicknamed Tarzan due to his long swept back hair

[@stephenhill545]

He was a major political figure for a quarter of a century.

[@michaeld.5699]

Two great people

[@Janus-fn2uz]

Wrong. Mrs Thatcher could never be beaten, then and after. Heseltine was always in the background who envied her superior knowledge and judgement.

[@stephenholmes1036]

Hestletine great?

[@pinchermartyn3959]

Good job we left EU. That change is marvelous.

[@alana8863]

I knew someone thought this way! I doubt if I'll ever come across anyone else with such a strange idea of what marvellous means.

[@BradleyWilliams-vu4us]

Mrs thatcher was far above his pompous attitude

[@1320613]

He was envious of Thatcher because of her strength and integrity but what really hurt was the fact she was a woman.

[@songsmith31a]

I think Heath had the same problem!

[@jeanalarson3108]

I believe wholeheartedly that was the real issue. Heseltine and his good old boys club couldn't stand the idea of a woman prime minister, especially one who came from the lower middle class and worked her way up to achieve everything she did.

[@johnreynolds6369]

To me, and for what it’s worth, he’s always sounded immensely arrogant and self-important.

[@cathydrumobich9045]

"I didn't like her but that shouldn't matter ... " Yeah, but that's exactly why he stabbed her in the back.

[@matthewshamas2803]

Listening to this, Europe aside, he doesn’t seem that different in his views from the Tory far right.

[@paulaustinmurphy]

Europe aside, perhaps that's because you implicitly believe that all Tories are "far Right". Are you Far Left?

[@stephenhill545]

He was more interventionist. The far right back then was represented by Joseph and Powell. Today mostly everyone in the Tory party is far right.

[@matthewshamas2803]

@@stephenhill545 Good point.

[@paulaustinmurphy]

Heseltine didn't like Thatcher? He doesn't like the "current crop of Tory leaders" either. He doesn't like Tory Brexiteers. So who does he like? Well, he's in love with himself. And he's also keen on money, power, and the European Union. I reckon he fuses the last three things together in his own mind.

[@songsmith31a]

He and Kenneth Clark were a right pair, that I do remember.

[@paulaustinmurphy]

@@songsmith31a He exudes arrogance and entitlement. I really believe that he thinks he was born to have a lot of political power. Many Remainers seem to ignore all that because of his views on Brexit and the European Union. Regardless of his politics, I never liked the man himself.

[@lloydnaylor6113]

I'd put him and Clarke in an old peoples home 🤔 oops sorry they are already there in House of Lords.

[@scooby1992]

@@songsmith31a They were a right pair of senior and honourable statesmen and the current crop of senior tories arent fit to lick their boots .

[@scooby1992]

@@lloydnaylor6113 Show some respect for two people who were at the senior levels of Gvt whether you agree with them or not . They are heads and shoulders above the dreadful Braverman .

[@glenpovey1297]

Ah! I remember him. He was Minister of Aerospace when the UK was peddling that piece of white flying junk Concorde and the only way Heseltine could get people to buy it was by bribing them with free antique silver Georgian coffee pots! There was a big scandal about that and the satirical magazine 'Private Eye' had a field day!

[@stringer-ik1pc]

Your parents called you Glen for a reason.😂😂😂😂asshole

[@andrewdavies8954]

silly old buffer

[@patrickrobinson7787]

He salad no jobs for l more jobs for live before they made me redundant j

[@stevebaker6149]

He and his family, seemed to believe that he had a divine right to be PM, even though he actually achieved nothing.

[@hughcaskey9542]

Heseltine thatcher had balls heseltine had none

[@TomSanderson100]

He literally stood against her for the Tory leadership in 1990

[@andrewsheppard3189]

Literally? He did.

[@markwarren2520]

Bloke jealous of a proper prime minister

[@southerncomfort7490]

I worked with Mrs Thatcher. I worked with her after I had been familiar with most leading politicians on both sides of the Atlantic. I had interviewed Enoch Powell, for example, when I was 22 years old. I make mention of this to show that I was not easily 'star-struck.' Margaret Thatcher was like none of the others. She was truly sui generis. Frankly, there was something about her which physically repelled me. I found it hard to be in the same room as her. Now this had absolutely nothing to do with her political views (with whom I wholeheartedly agreed). Rather it was the fact that she can only be described as a 'force of nature.' A somewhat disturbing force of nature, at least to me at the time. Luckily, she had an antidote always standing very nearby, namely, Denis. Oh he was a sterling chap and a great judge of character. I think one has to understand that politicians such as Thatcher and Heseltine were cut from a totally different cloth for those of today. This has little or nothing to do with education. Rather its foundations lie in the fact that they were motivated by principle. Principles largely created as a bi-product of Second World War. A consequence of this was that they cared - unlike today - far more about ideas and far less about personality. It was ideas that made the difference. Illustration: The year was 1983. We now know that the Conservative Party won the General Election easily, but in the electoral contest that was not the way it looked at the time. Michael Foot was then the Leader of the Opposition. Saatchi and Saatchi approached MT with the front cover of the Sun in which Foot was being ridiculed for wearing a Donkey Jacket. They thought that she would find it amusing. She was absolutely disgusted. In her world you 'played the ball and not the man.'

[@bereal6590]

Shame she didn't have principles when she sold off British assetts to private investors or the legacy she would leave. Her principles were imo driven by her own ideological views and her feelings,not the feelings of the nation. A selfish stupid woman who aligned britain with that idiot Reagan,creating a culture of greed and populism

[@peterjarratt8823]

Maybe Mrs. Thatcher "never liked him" --- quite understandable of course.

[@katherinestevens6528]

This man is truly nauseating! He was pro EU and Margaret was pro Britain!

[@scooby1992]

You can be both pro Britain and pro EU in fact some would argue to be pro Britain is to be pro EU from an economic perspective .

[@gerardmackay8909]

If you knew anything worth knowing you would be aware that Margaret Thatcher was one of the chief architects of the Single Market because she rightly knew how beneficial it would be to our economy. Her antipathy was restricted to what she saw as creeping federalism. The fact that the ERG loons ensured we crashed out of both the Single Market and Customs Union without any coherent plan will be having Thatcher spinning in her grave.

[@stephenhill545]

So you don't support European EU candidate Ukraine then.

[@stephenhill545]

Margaret was intrinsic to the forming of the single market. She was an absolutely central figure. Check it out for yourself.

[@stephenhill545]

​@@scooby1992and from a human rights perspective.

[@federicop1571]

I’m just going to quote Lady Thatcher: "Weak…feeble…" Heseltine was one of the insufferable obstacles that should’ve been removed from the beginning 👎🏻

[@lucysmith594]

Ghastly man who just won’t go away. Wheeled out to give his view on everything. Still irrelevant. It was funny at the time when both he & his wife & children all set to move in to no 10 and it didn’t go his way. 😅

[@scooby1992]

Arent right wingers in favour of free speech ? Not if it is free speech you dont agree with obviously .

[@irreduciblerascal]

There is misunderstanding...Thatcher was a catastrophe

[@andrewsheppard3189]

...for idiots on the left.

[@stringer-ik1pc]

Only for those who were lovers.

[@firebyrd437]

I didnt like Thatcher either, I didnt like Heseltine either, in fact i dont like any tories, so i dont singke out any one person

[@paulaustinmurphy]

Are you a tribal "hater".... and a tribal "bigot"?

[@firebyrd437]

@paulaustinmurphy No, I'm a realist. Unlike you, it seems, Thatcher destroyed whole communities, and Helseltine helped. The tories have done absolutely nothing for the disenfranchised, those burning flames of injustice May talked about have been furthered fanned by a series of inept, corrupt, and dishonest tory policies.

[@stringer-ik1pc]

You're obviously from a low class family.with zero prospects.

[@neilwalker1931]

He didnt like women

[@johncopeland3826]

I don't think Heseltine was the life and soul of any party ...was he ? Too busy counting his money and collecting the monthly rent from his vast land ownership ! Oh ,and being an unelected Lord with massive expenses ,would take up a lot of one's valuable time too ,to be a likeable sort ....

[@petewitkowski5315]

Heseltine the Remoaner who wanted to remain so he could claim his £90.000 a year subsidies from the E/U.😂😂😂

[@californiadreamin8423]

You mean like Farage !!

[@damianleah6744]

Heseltine doesn’t need the money. He’s worth about £200 million. £90k is small fry

[@tcsl7764]

Like farage does. Yet another illustration of the hypocrisy of the right.

[@MorganHayes_Composer.Pianist]

I agree: the subsidy argument is tiresomely trotted out. It has no bearing whatsoever. He speaks from conviction. A giant in comparison with most of the current lot.

[@stephenhill545]

He sees Europe as sinking into irrelevance if it doesn't work as one. Europe is of course militarily weak, and economically far behind the USA and China. In fact, without American support, there is little there to stop Russian expansion westwards. The British have 260 tanks and the germans have 300, hardly reassuring.