Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Jack Dromey: Labour let Thatcher become the champion of aspiration

When Margaret Thatcher passed away and the broadcasters, newspapers, and casual drinkers in pubs picked over what her legacy really was, one of the key policies mentioned – and praised – time and time again by those from all sides of the political spectrum was the Right to Buy. It was an iconic housing policy that helped people who would never have had a chance of making it onto the housing ladder realise the dream of owning their own property. It was an empowering policy (the detail, of course, is slightly more complicated: the way the policy was designed led to a reduction in the overall size of the social rented sector, but as an iconic gesture to a group of people who were not traditional shire Tories, it’s hard to beat this one).

But Labour never loved it, and one of its vociferous opponents at the time was Jack Dromey, now shadow Housing Minister for the party. You’d expect, then, that he’d be keen to criticise it as vehemently as he possibly could when asked about it at a Policy Exchange fringe today, but this is what the MP really said:

‘The straight answer is no we’re not going to repeal Right to Buy, and let me just tell you a little story. I was one of those back in the 1980s that led the charge against Right to Buy. We were halfway across the field of battle, we looked over our shoulder and there was no bastard behind us. One and a half million council tenants bought their homes, and to be frank we’re not going to repeat the mistakes of history because it became a symbol and rather than being the enemy of aspiration, Mrs Thatcher became the champion of aspiration.

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