LETTERS Seven deadly sins

Sir: Perhaps distance does lend enchant- ment. It certainly promotes objectivity.

As one of the English diaspora, I confess myself puzzled, if not astounded, as to why Mrs Thatcher should be promoted to the peerage. Is this just because she was prime minister?

There are numerous cogent and com- pelling reasons why she should not have been thus honoured, but I can only think of six right now.

The Falklands war: If anything was an unnecessary war this was. Mrs Thatcher provoked it by her mean penny-pinching, (the withdrawal of HMS Endurance from station), plus the denial, before the war, of British citizenship to the Falklanders.

Hong Kong: We were not required to give up the whole of Hong Kong in 1997 — only the New Territories. Apparently the Chinese communists were very surprised at the quite unexpected gesture of Britain in returning Hong Kong. To those who say Hong Kong without the New Territories was not viable economically or militarily defensible, the same held good for Hong Kong with the New Territories. At a stroke she made five million refugees.

Zimbabwe: I was in Zimbabwe immedi- ately after Independence for three years. Mrs Thatcher backtracked on all her elec- tion promises and helped to install a com- munist government, which is now starving the people to death.

Northern Ireland: There may be an argu- ment for Northern Ireland being part of the United Kingdom, or alternatively part of the Irish Republic. There is no sensible argument, in my view, for it being part of both.

Europe: Mrs Thatcher signed the Single European Act, the greatest abdication of British sovereignty in history. Now she poses as the anti-Maastricht champion!

Cambodia: Mrs Thatcher announced on Blue Peter our support for the Khmer Rouge coalition. British troops were employed in training guerrillas of the coali- tion, and according to General Tea Banh, Cambodia's Defence Minister, such train- ing inevitably helped Pol Pot.

Monstrous. And yet in the last election there was no mention of 'the Cambodian Horrors and the Question of the East.' Would that we had another Gladstone.

That's six reasons. I have thought of a seventh — her lack of a true moral agenda. Presidents Reagan and Bush took on board the pro-life case, and before she was elect- ed in 1979 Mrs Thatcher promised Catholic Herald readers that for her abortion would only be 'for the early months of pregnan- cy'.Yet now Britain has the most barbaric abortion law in the world (if you can call child-destruction abortion), with the Infant

Life Preservation Act dismantled for all practical purposes.

Mrs Thatcher's legacy is all around you. In corruption, the slump, in the lost chil- dren of England, the battered babies, the paederastic social workers, the litter, men- tal and material, overflowing London, the uncouth generation.

I think the House of Lords should seri- ously consider the procedure for her impeachment. It is sickening to see her take her seat in the upper chamber, when the most distinguished parliamentarian of our time is left without a platform.

William Spring P0 Box 10868 Jubail

Saudi Arabia