“The death of Margaret Thatcher is a reminder of her vicious campaign against the working class at home and abroad, and of the need to defeat the governments pursuing the policies she set in motion in London, Belfast and Dublin”, said Workers’ Party General Secretary, John Lowry.

“Maggie Thatcher was ruthless in pursuit of one goal throughout her time in power – to rob the working class of the gains it had made in employment, healthcare, education, social and trade union rights in the century before her election, and to hand over the most valuable assets of the people to profiteers at a knockdown price.”

“Right from her days as ‘Thatcher, Thatcher, Milk Snatcher’, she waged a merciless struggle against ordinary working people and the most vulnerable in our society, depriving them of everything she could. She attacked the national health service, and abandoned the mentally ill; she deliberately destroyed manufacturing, throwing millions out of work and replacing high-wage, high-skill jobs with part-time and unskilled work; she sold off the assets of the state for a song so that her speculator friends in the banks and the City of London could make a killing; she squandered billions of pounds of North Sea oil to cut taxes for the rich.”

“She did everything she could to destroy the lifestyle and values of working class communities, attacked the rights of workers to organise through anti-trade union laws, promoting the insidious idea that there is no such thing as society, and spouting the nonsense that there is no alternative.”

“Thatcher was an unashamed opponent of the most fundamental principles of any decent human society – civil rights, equality, and justice. This explains her support for brutal dictators such as Pinochet and for reactionary religious tyrants in Afghanistan. It explains why she called Nelson Mandela a terrorist and opposed sanctions against the Apartheid regime.”

“She was a war-monger, who went to war and supported the equally vile Ronald Reagan in his support of right-wing dictatorships and his global war in support of the monopolies. The vicious campaign she waged against the miners demonstrated that she had no hesitation in using war and violence against her own citizens for her own electoral ends, from Belfast to Bolton.”

Mr Lowry concluded, “We do not mourn for Margaret Thatcher. She was truly an enemy of the working class. Her death will do nothing to defeat the austerity policies being implemented by her heirs. Thatcher is gone. The struggle against privatisation, cuts, and the erosion of solidarity that is her legacy continues. There is an alternative and that alternative is socialism.”

Issued 9th April 2013