Sending more money to Liverpool was like making "water flow uphill", the chancellor had saidMargaret Thatcher was urged to abandon Liverpool to "managed decline" by her chancellor, newly-released National Archives files have revealed.
The confidential government documents, made available under the 30-year rule, reveal Cabinet discussions following the 1981 Toxteth riots.
The riots erupted on 3 July, following the arrest of Leroy Alphonse Cooper on Selborne Street.
Eight days of disturbance followed with 460 officers injured.
More than 70 buildings were demolished or burnt down as tensions boiled over between the police and the district's Afro-Caribbean community.
While ministers such as the then Secretary of State for the Environment Michael Heseltine, were arguing for regeneration funding to rebuild the riot-hit communities, Chancellor Sir Geoffrey Howe thought it would be a waste of money.
He warned Mrs Thatcher "not to over commit scarce resources to Liverpool".
"I fear that Merseyside is going to be much the hardest nut to crack," he said.
"We do not want to find ourselves concentrating all the limited cash that may have to be made available into Liverpool and having nothing left for possibly more promising areas such as the West Midlands or, even, the North East.
"It would be even more regrettable if some of the brighter ideas for renewing economic activity were to be sown only on relatively stony ground on the banks of the Mersey.
'Hatred of police'"I cannot help feeling that the option of managed decline is one which we should not forget altogether. We must not expend all our limited resources in trying to make water flow uphill."
Lord Geoffrey Howe: "I wasn't in any sense advocating managed decline"
Sir Geoffrey acknowledged the suggestion that the city could be left to decline was potentially explosive.
"This is not a term for use, even privately," he warned Mrs Thatcher.
But speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today programme on Friday, Lord Howe said he thought the records had not accurately reflected his conversations in 1981.
He said: "I don't recall how that argument got into the discussion at all. It certainly doesn't sound very considerate.
"But certainly I think the chancellor is so often arguing against spending money as being the only answer."
As the government sought to respond to the situation, Mr Heseltine was despatched to Liverpool. He reported back by phone to Mrs Thatcher on 25 July.
The cabinet papers note: "Mr Heseltine considered the behaviour of the police in Liverpool 8 to be quite horrifying. They were not acting in a racialist fashion. They treated all suspects in a brutal and arrogant manner."
Mr Heseltine also said there were too many young recruits in the area and the local commander had a "fortress mentality".
Speaking to the BBC on Friday, Mr Heseltine said the idea of abandoning Liverpool was never an option.
Lord Heseltine: "I haven't the slightest doubt that we did the right thing"
He said: "It never really got any traction for the simplest reason that the cabinet minister responsible for so much of the policy that affected the city was me.
"I simply wouldn't countenance that you could say that one of England's great cities, a world city, was going into managed decline here."
He added: "I think we should be judged not by all the correspondence and all the arguments, and all the classic sort of responses you get from the Treasury.
"The judgement should be about did we do the right thing? And I haven't the slightest doubt we did do the right thing - and we learned a lot of lessons."
The cabinet documents also reveal the confidential meetings Margaret Thatcher had with civic, community and church leaders.
In a meeting with church leaders she said she was amazed at the hatred for the police in Liverpool 8.
The then Roman Catholic Archbishop of Liverpool Derek Worlock said although there was a "profound mistrust" of the police this was not the cause of the rioting.
Instead he told her there was a "silent colour bar" in a city where there were no black councillors and just eight black policemen.
'Time bomb ticking'Lord Alton was a newly elected MP for Edge Hill at the time of the riots.
He told BBC Radio Merseyside: "Many people guessed that this was the impulse driving politics at the time.
"This idea of managed decline, that you can simply let one of the country's great cities slip into the River Mersey and opt for decay rather than renewal, shows an ambivalence to the north of England which still affects politics to this day."
He said that he had made a speech in the Commons warning that there was a "time bomb ticking away in the heart of the city as a result of the massive levels of unemployment".
He added: "It was like creating a museum of horrifying example that if you behaved in the way that they claimed that militants were doing in Liverpool, then the warning was that what was happening to Liverpool will happen to the rest of you.
"So I think it was used for very crude political purposes."
Previous Article
Post a Comment