Margaret Thatcher

Thatcher took a Conservative Party that had accepted the post-war consensus of nationalised industry, strong unions and incomes policy, and turned it into a party of privatisation, trade union law reform, monetarism and council house sales. Right to Buy and the share offers brought in skilled working-class voters the party had rarely won. The changes lasted: Labour under Blair kept most of them. The cost included deep industrial job losses in the north, Scotland and Wales, and the poll tax that ended her leadership.