Funnily enough I have just spent an hour watching a fascinating interview with Nigel Lawson where he was aked about unemployment during the Thatcher years.
He explained that had they not taken on the very difficult task of reshaping the economy and industry of the country, unemployment would have not only been higher, but would have been permanent.
We were the sick man of Europe (which is why it made some sense to join the common market when we did) with huge overmanning in both the public and private sectors. The situation was completely unsustainable and had to change.
They came up against the miners first. Joe Gormley (Scargills predecessor) and moderate Labour MP,s warned Lawson that Scargil was a Marxist, who was even too far left for the British Communist party. His only aim would be to bring down the elected Govt.and he would use the Union and its members to try to do this.
As we know, they took on Scargill and beat him, which killed off militant unionism in the private sector and allowed for the British economy to be completely reshaped.
This resulted in high unemployment, which caused much consternation and argument within the Govt. but Thatcher and Lawson knew there was no real alternative, and within 5 years we had one of the strongest economies in the world, and unemployment falling sharply.
What was done, wasn't nice or pleasant, but due to the unions being allowed to virtually run the country (and run it into the ground) during the 70,s, it was absolutely necessary.
If only we had someone in Govt. now with the vision and guts to do what really needs doing, rather than pandering to every bleeding heart liberal pressure group.