A society tainted by Thatcher’s legacy

IT IS difficult to understand precisely what Steven King (Opinion, August 17) is on about when he suggests that “small groups on this island” might take from the recent riots in England that the “British state has given up defending itself”.

Is this some form of paranoia? For example, to deny that many of the rioters are “Thatcher’s grandchildren”, on the basis that things have changed there in recent years, fails to recognise the damage that is done to children in their formative years where their families struggle in grinding poverty.

Thatcher, in conjunction with Reagan, introduced policies that created instant poverty for many families. Remember “Cardboard City”? Many of those children are now entering adulthood and beginning to act in accordance with the values that they were imbued with as they journeyed through childhood.