The Public Image of Margaret Thatcher
Findings from our polls remind us how the public viewed Margaret Thatcher during her Premiership. We identified May 1983 and February 1990 as the high and low points of her public image.
Throughout Margaret Thatcher's time as Prime Minister, Ipsos polled the opinions of the British public on what they thought of her. Taking an average of positive and negative scores, we identified May 1983 and February 1990 as the best and worst points of her public image.
Shifts in public opinion often reflected key events in Mrs Thatcher’s time in government, with highs around the time of the Falkands War and lows around the introduction of the Poll Tax. Mrs Thatcher is often praised by supporters for her strength of leadership and the inforgraphic shows that at her best she was seen as a Capable Leader and Good in a Crisis by 62% of the public. However, by the end of her time in office that had fallen to 34% and 30% respectively while two in three (62%) British adults felt she was Out of touch with ordinary people.
At the very end of her Premiership 71% of the British public disliked her policies and 60% disliked her. In 1984 the figures stood at 54% and 50% respectively.
With volumes written on Mrs Thatcher’s legacy in the weeks following her death, the findings of our polls provide a useful reminder of how the public viewed her at the time.
Designer's Note
by Hannah Williams
Due to the newsworthiness of the Thatcher infographic, it was a requirement of the brief that this was turned around pretty quickly. My colleague Tom Warren had previously produced the ‘Leaders Infographic’ and it was suggested that I might be able to use this format for this data set.
It can be a challenge to reproduce another designer’s work, and as a result this visualization took three versions to get right. The final outcome, although faithful to Tom’s display of data needed some reordering layout-wise in order to make sure the story was clear and the different information legible.
