22 November 1990, Westminster, United Kingdom

On her last day in parliament, Margaret Thatcher was questioned on the widening gap between richest 10% and poorest 10% during her Prime Ministership.

All levels of income are better off than they were in 1979. But what the honorable member is saying is that he would rather the poor were poorer provided the rich were less rich. That way you will never create the wealth for better social services as we have. And what a policy. Yes. He would rather have the poor poorer provided the rich were less rich. That is the Liberal policy. Yes it came out. He didn’t intend it to but it did.

Opposition questioner: The Prime Minister is aware that I detest every single one of her domestic policies…

I think the honorable gentlemen knows that I have the same contempt for his Socialist policies as the people of East Europe who have experienced it (rest of sentence drowned out by cheers). I think I must have hit the right nail on the head when I pointed out that the logic of those policies are they’d rather have the poor poorer. Once they start to talk about the gap, they’d rather the gap be [indicates an everything lower gap]. Not up here [indicates an everybody higher gap]. But that [indicates an everything lower gap]

So long as the gap is smaller, they’d rather have the poor poorer.