Petition for Thatcher's state funeral to be privatised

[Sydney Grew]

. . . it was Mrs Thatcher who inspired me to join a political party (not the Conservatives) thirty years ago and to become an activist ...

It was Mrs. Thatcher who inspired me to leave the country (along with those spiky hair-styles) . . . but what is worrying is that I found myself agreeing with her about several things - on council rates and on one or two other issues which I cannot for the moment remember.

[MrGongGong]

It was Mrs. Thatcher who inspired me to leave the country (along with those spiky hair-styles) . . . but what is worrying is that I found myself agreeing with her about several things - on council rates and on one or two other issues which I cannot for the moment remember.

Nelson Mandella ?

[Flosshilde]

Bonfire of the Vanities?

Are you thinking of a funeral pyre in Trafalgar Square, Am? With perhaps her political descendants (eg Mr Blair) throwing themselves on to it?

[Lateralthinking1]

Interesting comments. Did Lord Liverpool have a state funeral before his burial in Gloucestershire? I'm not sure.

Still, one thing's for certain. His funeral wasn't organised by a "devout church-goer" who managed to combine being a Director both of a "Trust" with investments in an American pornographic actress's adult DVD business and a company that profited from sub-prime mortgages. Expect tasteful when it happens like never before.

[ahinton]

Any chance of someone explaining why it's an obsession and not a strongly-held legitimate view?

Whether or not I could provide you with such an explanation - and, even if I could, whether and to what extent you might accept it - may be neither here nor there if one believes, as I do, that the one is not necessarily incompatible with the other; some people have "strongly-held views" - and they and others may consider them to be "legitimate" - but others again may consider them not to be legitimate or at least disagree with them. The evidence that there is still an obsession about Thatcher seems to me to be plain from the sheer amount of expression of opinions about her almost a quarter century after her demise as Prime Minister which far exceed those about any other British Prime Minister since Churchill. Anyway, for the record, I,for one, did not suggest that certain thoughts about Thatcher today are necessarily other than either "strongly-held" or "legitimate". Furthermore - and, again, for the record - I do not believe that she should be granted a state funeral, even if it were to be one in name only (in the sense that it would simply have all the outwarads panoply of one but not be funded by the taxpayer); a state funeral for Churchill is one thing, given his achievements during WWII, but one for other British Prime Ministers is quite another, so why Thatcher but not Attlee, Eden, MacMillan, Hume, Wilson, Heath, Callaghan, Major, Bliar or Broon?

[Lateralthinking1]

For God's sake, lets not make it a way of life. I could be tempted to say that if a state funeral for a PM is ever to be done at all it should be based on length of service. That was why I mentioned Robert Jenkinson with whom there are repressive parallels. However, I am not going down that road because TB would have to be included and frankly that very notion makes me feel ill.

Two brief points. First, like some others, I feel uneasy about all the speculation. It seems unnecessarily macabre. Here I do believe in taking the moral higher ground. Secondly, the politics of it on both sides should be enough in this case to rule such a funeral out. On balance, I think I favour guidelines - perhaps based on contributions towards significant unification of the country in adversity a la Churchill - with individual events confirmed by the monarch and then if necessary arranged by apolotical quango.

[Pilchardman]

a state funeral for Churchill is one thing, given his achievements during WWII, but one for other British Prime Ministers is quite another, so why Thatcher but not Attlee, Eden, MacMillan, Hume, Wilson, Heath, Callaghan, Major, Bliar or Broon?

I can think of extremely good reasons why not Major, Blair or Brown.

However, one wonders whether a state funeral for Ian Paisley Snr, come the event of his death, might not be contentious. I don't think opposing that would be "dancing on his grave", no matter how strongly one disagreed with his politics. However it wouldn't be without precedent, since Edward Carson, the Ulster Unionist leader and founder of the the Ulster Volunteers (later UVF), the first loyalist paramilitary group, was afforded a British state funeral in 1935.

[Pilchardman]

The petition now has 11,404 signatories.

[Frances_iom]

I wonder if we could follow the precedent of that set by the other arch wrecker of the country - Oliver Cromwell

[Pilchardman]

I can think of extremely good reasons why not Major, Blair or Brown.

On consideration, though, perhaps those reasons are not so compelling as to be insurmountable...

[french frank]

I don't understand why objecting to a state funeral for Margaret Thatcher is "this kind of dancing on her grave when she's not even in it." Unless planning a state funeral is this kind of dancing around her grave when she's not even in it. Margaret Thatcher will apparently be given a state funeral (or that's the plan) and people who think that is a wrong thing to do (including the Conservative Peter Oborne, who makes this very point) wish to raise perfectly reasonable objections while it's still possible to do so (before the event, as it were).

I agree.

As far as the petition is concerned (and I did understand that the wording was tongue-in-cheek), it might have been better to have treated the matter more directly. A state funeral represents the nation paying its last respects to the deceased. Given that her political life has been so divisive and that so many have no respect for her and the results of her political leadership, it would be - as Peter Oborne suggested - unwise to organise a state funeral unless the authorities are prepared to deal with people paying their 'respects' in their chosen way.

A state funeral so that the nation can demonstrate its feelings about her? Sounds like madness.

[Serial_Apologist]

Euphemism of the day:

it would be - as Peter Oborne suggested - unwise to organise a state funeral unless the authorities are prepared to deal with people paying their 'respects' in their chosen way.

[MrGongGong]

A state funeral so that the nation can demonstrate its feelings about her?

Surely thats what "democracy" is for ?
though I would bet you that it would be made illegal to say anything in opposition .......... actually come to mention it, if you can get 4 years for saying "lets have a riot" on Facebook it probably is already illegal

still as MrP always says ..........Nothing to hide, nothing to fear

[ahinton]

The petition now has 11,404 signatories.

Whilst admittedly not an inconsiderable number, especially given the short time that it's been up and running, it's still a long way from the requisite 100,000 that present arrangements prescribe for its achievement of legitimacy as a subject for debate in HoC and, since it is in any case by no means one of the more serious issues that has been launched as a petition in the hope of attaining HoC debating legitimacy, I take leave to speculate that it may well run out of steam long before it reaches anywhere near six figures, especially since no vote on it in HoC could in any event be turned into an Act of Parliament for implementation, for the sole but hardly insignificant reason that Margaret Thatcher happens not to be dead when last I looked.

[Lateralthinking1]

It is a pity that this petition only currently has 16 signatures - http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/19023.

We need to support what is right even more than opposing what is wrong. I don't think any of us does this well.

I think it is right that the discussions are being held privately. However, I would like to know the specific reasons why a state funeral is thought right in this case and who is proposing it. E-petitions are rejected where the issue is not the responsibility of the government so one for the time being must assume that it is an initiative of the Coalition.

That rioting could ensue is not to my mind a satisfactory reason to oppose it. That it could be used for party political purpose
is more of a worry. No doubt the powers-that-be will seek to draw clear lines between the past and the present while secretly considering the political capital. That makes me uneasy.

Mark Serwotka explained recently that many in South Wales whose parents' lives were so devastated by the mining dispute became Civil Servants and are now losing their jobs. I think that they would see an unbroken line.