We have become a grandmother.
Margaret Thatcher
On 28 February 1989, Mrs Thatcher emerged from the doorway of 10 Downing Street at great speed. Sporting blonde hair as rigid as fibreglass, oversized pearl earrings and a purple winter coat trimmed with black fur, she had the distinct air of Cruella de Vil. Tottering over to the waiting television cameras, she smiled and then said the immortal lines, ‘We have become a grandmother.’
It seemed to the world as if the prime minister was losing touch with reality. The use of the so-called ‘royal we’ (the majestic plural) is normally restricted to the head of state alone. Even then, it is heard only once a year when the queen reads her speech from the throne at the beginning of the parliamentary session. Its use by a mere prime minister was pure hubris. Such conceit resulted in some linguistic jokes at her expense: ‘Why is Margaret Thatcher like a pound coin? Because she is thick, brassy and thinks she’s a sovereign.’
This is the story of two powerful women who met and disliked each other on sight. For over a decade, they politely waged a quiet war on both personal and political fronts. Elizabeth found the means to snub and undermine her prime minister through petty class put-downs and press leaks. Margaret attacked her monarch by sidelining her, upstaging her and allowing Murdoch to crucify the royal family (although he was aided considerably in this by their own sheer folly).
In writing this book, I’ve identified four stages in their complex relationship: their first encounters, when the queen was suspicious of a female politician and the new prime minister was awed by her sovereign; Thatcher’s victory in the Falklands, marking the start of her hubris and her usurpation of the queen’s role; the queen’s genuine fear that her radical prime minister was dividing her country and threatening her beloved Commonwealth, and finally, the shock and sympathy felt by the queen for Margaret when she was thrown out of office by her own Cabinet colleagues.