Aide’s distress over abuse hurled at Maggie
ONE of Margaret Thatcher’s most trusted advisers urged her not to stand for another election after she overcame a disastrous campaign to secure a third term in office.
Private secretary Charles Powell described the level of abuse ahead of the 1987 vote as “unbelievable” in a personal note to the late prime minister, and told her: “It’s not right that you should be subjected to a further round like this time.”
The letter, signed “with affection and respect” by Lord Powell and his wife Carla, has been published in full for the first time as part of the latest release of Lady Thatcher’s private papers. She died in 2013, aged 87.
Victory
Lord Powell, who was shown the letter ahead of publication, said he was “distressed” by the nature of the election and sought to discourage her “from any inclination to go on and on”.
Two days after the end of the heavily criticised Tory campaign, he offered “warmest congratulations” to Lady Thatcher on a “remarkable election victory”. He wrote: “If ever a party and a country were carried to success on the shoulders of one person, it has been over this last eight years, and the election was the reward.”
But he added: “All the same I hope that you will not put yourself through it again. The level of personal abuse thrown at you during the campaign was unbelievable and must take some toll, however stoic you are outwardly.
“There comes a point when your reputation and standing as a historic figure are more important to your A “MYSTERY starter” made from beef consomme, cream cheese and curry powder was one of Margaret Thatcher’s favourite dishes, the private papers reveal.
The course was served with jellied soup and a black olive, according to the Iron Lady’s recipe – one of several found in a file of her “favourites” dated 1979-1987.
Also in the newly released documents are the former prime minister’s recipes for orange and walnut cake, “lamb chops in a parcel” and stuffed courgettes which she served with prawns and mornay sauce.
Chris Collins, of the Margaret Thatcher Foundation, said: “I don’t think she was a genius in the kitchen. But she was game. She actually liked doing things like that.” party, to your cause and to the country than even you yourself can be, and it’s not right that you should be subjected to a further round like this time.
“I fear that – because the Left know that they cannot defeat you on substance – they will only redouble their abuse over the next few years.” He went on: “In two or three years time, you will have completed the most sweeping change this country has seen in decades... That’s the time to contribute to some other area!”
Lord Powell said it was an “unusual” letter for a civil servant to send to a PM but said he had discussed it at the time with the PM, who felt there was “as yet no suitable successor”. He added: “In the light of subsequent events my advice to her looks pretty sound.”
The Margaret Thatcher Archive Trust is overseeing the release of her private files through Churchill Archive Centre at Cambridge University.