ABSTRACT
Under the second Thatcher Government privatisation became a dominant economic policy with the privatisation of major nationalised industries notably British Telecom and British Gas and the initial planning for the privatisation of the water industry. Between 1979 and 1983 the policy had developed, cautiously at first. From 1983 it was extended into the heartlands of the nationalised sector in a seemingly unbounded fashion. There appeared to be no industry that could not be privatised including those with substantial market power, even if in a number of cases the corporations had to be made more efficient before they could be successfully sold. As part of the process often new management was brought into the nationalised industries, including management from overseas, notably Ian MacGregor (a Scot with a career in the US, brought in first to British Steel in 1980 and later, in 1983, to the National Coal Board) and Graham Day (a Canadian, first to British Shipbuilders in 1983 and then to British Leyland in 1986). This chapter details the general evolution of privatisation as government policy during these years while providing relevant information on the political and economic environment. Later chapters provide more detailed coverage of each of the main privatisations completed during the second Thatcher administration.
