General Chat

and Alf Roberts refused to have an indoor toilet OR to have hot running water in their house


He refused to support MT at university, and left her scratching to obtain grants to pay her living expenses.

Yet MT was his favourite daughter ....... he often ignored Muriel.



Not the nicest family man, if you read more about him



There's 2 sides to every story ............

........... there's even one written comment that his shop was a mean little place!

If you start with Alf Roberts then is it any wonder she went the path she did....

Local positions he held.
---------------------------
Justice of the Peace,

President of the local Chamber of Trade(all local people who had a buisness)

Dircetor of Grantham Building Society.

A Trustee of National Savings Bank.

Chairman of the Worker Educational Movement.

Chief Welfare Officer of Civil Defence.

President of the Rotary Club,,(members local buisness people).

Chairman of the Finance and Rates,(local borough council)

Govenor of the local Boys and Girls Grammer Schools,which there were 2,,,,,,GKHS and Kings,

Council elected Alderman also a term of Mayor from 1945--1946,

He was taken out of offce of Alderman.

He was a Conservative and belived in indivual responsiblity and sound finance.

During the 1930s he shut his shop as the Jarrow miners march to London would take them directly outside their shop on the Great North Road,

The Thatcher childrens friends consisted of children of,,,
and those of local buisness people.

great friends of the Thatchers included ,Sir Warrender,SIr Longmore,and more with a pile of cash and large houses.

so he wasnt some little shop keeper working round the clock to strive,.....neither was she an undernourished shop keepers daughter.as has been quoted.
,,,,,,,,****we all loved going to Margarets birthday parties they were the best,as all children of local buisnesses went to each others,,that was the done thing back then,****

Margaret was having political lessons from an early age at local level and persued her life aim,,,,,to be a politician.

I live not far from where you was brought up Sylvia, even though I wouldnt like to walk it :)

My Dads family were from Ashton under Lyne which is just down t'road from Oldham, when I think of Oldham I picture them lovely Moors and t'hills and them 2 up and 2 downers are refered too as cottages ;-) and only 20 yrs ago thought as ideal starter homes. :-D

Hayley


thank you xxx


My parents would never tell anyone, including brother and I, how they voted ............. but I have good reason to believe they voted Tory

They were working class, born in 1903 and 1904, so lived through WW1, the Depression, and WW2, had a strong belief in unions and the good they did for many many years .............. yet the Tories were closest to what they wanted from life for themselves and their children.

Mum might have been a little more "upper working class" than Dad ................ her father had his own business, as a plasterer and house repairer. She worked in the cotton mill from the age of 12, working her way up to the specialty of velvet weaver

Dad was one of 6 children, feckless drunkard father who died in 1914, leaving his wife to raise 5 children on very little money ............ the eldest was serving in WW1

In spite of that ............... I have cousins, children of the eldest, who knew my grandmother (she died before I was born), who said that she had a much better life after her husband died than before, despite the lack of money.

There are rumours he was also a wife beater ............. regardless of the truth of that, he spent most of the money he earned on drink..

All the children left school at 12, and had to go to work, regardless of what they would have really liked to do.


I was lucky ............... I had parents who believed in education, as did so many of that generation. I was born with some brains, and managed to earn scholarships that let me go to grammar school and then to university, and get myself out of the cotton mill town, without actually costing my parents too much money. Apart, that is, from not leaving school at 15 or 16, and going out to work, handing over my pay to them.

I did work on Saturdays all year from the age of 11, and almost every summer, from the age of about 13 or 14 ................ and Mum took most of the money I earned if I didn't get it into the bank fast enough

We lived in a typical row house until I was 11 ................... no indoor bathroom, toilet at the end of the backyard (although it was ours alone :-D ). It was a typical 2 up, 2 downer, and I had to sleep in my parents room until we moved ............... in fact, I think that was the deciding factor in them buying another house, and going deep into debt.

Of course, as such things always happen .............. my brother got engaged within weeks of us moving, and married the following year! He and his wife then lived with us for about a year, before he moved up to Scotland to get a job.

That house was still standing in 2001 ............ we went to look at it on a trip back that year. I didn't have the nerve to knock on the door. I do hope they now had indoor plumbing!! I did take a picture of it .............. and the outside had barely changed from 50 years earlier!



I am so glad to hear that the class thing is disappearing or has disappeared.


One thing I have always liked about being over here is that your achievements are based on what you have done for yourself, and have no bearing on where you came from.

No black marks for having the "wrong" accent, or going to the "wrong" school, etc etc etc.



Strangely, Oldham was always a place where the Tories ran candidates ............ and some of them won.

Winston Churchill first got into Parliament by winning the 1900 election in Oldham

Hayley...I scored the same as you in the political thingy lol.

You explained that beauiful and in very simple terms thank you Sylvia :-D

In my opinion I no longer feel that class divides the policital parties, working class was labour I dont think thats the case now, my OH parents was working class and was always Conservative and a big supporter of MT, where as mine same working class same income brackett but big supporters of labour, I personally think the class system has shifted dramatically in the last 15 yrs and very much a mixed bag with regards political parties. Although its interesting that only in the last 8 years have we had a local Conservative canidate in our area and he has never done well here. Years ago The Grean party members were mainly thought as middle class lesbian youth project workers, which obviously was untrue.
:-D

:-D :-D :-D

@ SylviaInCanada It seems we are kindred spirits :-D :-D

Hayley


we have exactly the same system as you in the UK .........

.......... Prime Minister who is the Leader of the party that has got most votes in the election.

We have the same names for the political parties as you ............... but their actual positions on the political spectrum is much different to the UK, at least for some of them.

Liberal is centre .......... some are centre right, some are centre left

Conservative Party now is right to far right (ultra-Conservative)

New Democrat Party (or NDP) ............. is our version of the Labour Party, left but in actual fact really very close to centre. We don't seem to have the really left leaners. Union supported to a large extent, but nowhere near as intertwined as in the UK

Green Party ............. exactly the same as elsewhere in the world, but also many Liberals are close to the Green's beliefs.


Then we have the added problem of the Provincial governments ................... with all the same parties, but the added complications that a Provincial Conservative often is not a Federal Conservative (or Liberal or NDP)


It can all get very confusing!

The parties are also not as much linked to "class" as I remember them being in the UK.

Although big business tends to support the Conservatives, which tends to be the one that gives to business and takes away from the individual.


I think I am much more of a Liberal ..................... but have voted for each of the 3 main parties in different elections ............

........ I tend to go for the candidate that is going to be best for my constituency!



does that answer you???


or more confusing :-D



s
xx

Good evening Sylvia Ive done the USA one, once Janey Canuck post the link on here, as during the gentral election I was saying I didnt know what I was red or blue labour or Tory as I have never taken any interest n politics, I cant remember how I faired in it though.

So how does it work for you in Canada? Do you have the same political parties as we do here, do you have a PM?

That political compass test??

not being in the UK, I still tried it .................


I'm right bang in the middle of Left Libertarian!!

Haven't tried the US one



but we are right in the middle of political campaigning for a new Provincial government (voting on May 14) .......................... and it's time to "get the Liberals OUT" :-D


In 2 years time, it will Federal campaigning .................. and it will be time to get the Conservatives OUT, and the Liberals IN!



Sounds weird I know .......... but the Provincial Liberals are a coalition of Liberals and Conservatives, they've been in 12 years, and they're driving us into the ground.

The Federal government is far right Conservative.

The Federal Liberal Party has just elected a new leader ................ Justin Trudeau, age 41, the very charismatic son of the extremely charismatic Pierre Trudeau, Prime Minister of Canada from 1968 to 1984.

Hopes are high for him.

Communication skills? Or just lying low once one has been discovered? As I say who knows and who would dare contest rubbish?

Or it wasnt going in the direction he wanted, like I said communication skills ;-)

Just looking for that myself......

LilyL you are spot on - for whatever reason, the thread seems to have been pulled.
Maybe the original poster realised they had been discovered for talking absolute rubbish again that they could not back up!

Has the thread about Mrs Thatcher's Biography been pulled?!!! I can't seem to find it! Just wanted to say that I looked up Muriel's marriage to William Cullen on Free BMD's and it was:-
Cullen; William Roberts Grantham June 1950 ref: 3b 259
It was the same for Roberts Muriel etc.
No sign of Muriel having changed her surname from Roberts to Thatcher as has been suggested. Just thought I'd mention it!

I'm in the the pale green box - middle but towards the top. The questions were OK
Can't understand the outcome

Vera

Same as Gwynne,,,,,which is no suprise,,,,,, :-D

but we may not have agreed to the same answers.

John I would be fascinated to know what you have based that comment on

Errol. To be honest, I saw you as more Gandhi than me a few months ago. But recently (particularly since Lady T went to another place) you appear to have been to the right of Genghis Khan. So I am relieved that I read you reasonably well some months ago. :-)

Lady T may have ascended to her "mansion in the skies" but I expect she will be complaining bitterly when she realises Joe Gormley and Ted Heath have the same magnificent standard of accomodation as herself :-) ;-)