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Notes -
Thatcher didn't want to save them, selling them off wasn't an act of desperation it was an act of political ideology.
"Margaret Thatcher strongly supported the initiative, as did the majority of her government, and considered it as a fundamental to improve the economic performance. “As she explained in her memoirs, [she] saw privatisation as ‘fundamental to improving Britain’s economic performance’. But it also chimed with her political ideology.”"
She believed that private industry with decreased regulation was the best way forward. She also wanted council houses and social housing in general out of public ownership and into private hands.
Indeed her famous "The lady's not for turning" speech was given because she was under significant pressure to stop her neoliberal policies. This wasn't desperation, this was exactly the culmination of her principles. Even if they had been performing well and the UK economy was doing well, she would have tried to do the same.
As for unions, she didn't kill them but she crippled them (or they crippled themselves depending on your opinion of Scargill et al). Trade union membership dropped nearly 10 percent during her tenure and days lost to strikes dropped 10 fold by the end of her final year. British Steel had returned to profitability by halving the workforce among other changes, but was still privatized/ This wasn't a fire sale, it was a strategy. And largely she was proven correct, most of the privatized companies showed improvements in performance and labor productivity, even those that were already running reasonably well.
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