Lee Anderson reminisces about Thatcher bashing

Lee Anderson isn’t one to shy away from controversy and his speech on Monday evening at a fringe event at Tory conference certainly did not disappoint. The party’s deputy chairman addressed a packed out room at a Manchester club. While recounting his life story, Anderson couldn’t resist taking a pop at Guardian journalists, Diane Abbott and, er, Margaret Thatcher. A rather brave move in a room full of Tories…

Anderson said being voted ‘the worst man in Britain’ by the Mirror was the ‘greatest honour’ of his life. ‘Funnily enough, that year was a very close competition. I’d just beat Prince Andrew to it. Did you get that, Guardian?’

‘I was brought up on a strict political diet of Skinner, Scargill and Tony Benn,’ Anderson continued. ‘We hated Maggie with a passion!’

She came along and all of a sudden our industry started closing down a bit, started closing… That was something that I find very difficult to forgive Maggie and the Tory party for.