Burnham pines for a fantasy paradise cheered by the loony Left – but socialism is as bad today as it’s always been

AH, the 1970s . . . the age of misty-eyed Hovis ads, bolshie shop stewards and the tyranny of the trade union closed shop. Times of wildcat strikes, tinned Spam suppers by candlelight and militant water workers threatening to flood the streets with raw sewage. Andy Burnham pines for a fantasy socialist paradise, cheered on by the loony Left Credit: Christopher Furlong/PA Wire The new PM, along with most people, is far too young to remember the industrial chaos of the 1970s that left Britain dubbed the Sick Man of Europe An era when communists, Marxists and Trots put their “tanks on Labour’s lawn” and declared war on hated Tory PM Margaret Thatcher. Most people, including Andy Burnham, are too young to remember the industrial ­carnage which reduced Britain to The Sick Man Of Europe back then. Sign up for The Sun newsletter Thank you! Yet our new PM pines for this fantasy socialist paradise, cheered on by the loony Left. In Andy’s sentimental view, this was the golden age of trade union power, destroyed by ruthless “Maggie” along with the jobs and dreams of working men and women. READ MORE FROM TREVOR KAVANAGH The truth, I can testify from eyewitness experience as a “strikes” reporter, was precisely the reverse. Margaret Thatcher’s premiership transformed Britain from bankruptcy into an economic success story envied worldwide, including throughout the European Union. The Iron Lady was swept to power by voters sick of sky-high Labour taxes to bribe striking train drivers, postmen, electricity and steel workers and NHS orderlies. They were sickened by a genuine cost-of-living crisis as inflation hit 26 per cent and shop staff had to run around supermarkets updating day-old price stickers. Most read in The Sun This was not pay bargaining by honest union bosses on behalf of downtrodden workers. It was an undisguised hostility by ideological class warriors against the elected governments of the day — both ­Labour and Tory. Arthur Scargill led the year-long miners’ strike in 1984, which destroyed both the National Union of Miners and Britain’s coal industry Credit: News Group Newspapers Ltd Margaret Thatcher’s premiership transformed Britain from bankruptcy into an economic success story envied worldwide, including throughout the European Union Credit: Getty Many union barons then were active members of the Communist Party of Great Britain. Their first loyalty was to the Soviet Union and their Cold War slogan was “Hands Off Russia”. Ray Buckton’s striking train drivers paralysed Britain when roads were blocked by snow. Strike-happy fellow communist Hugh Scanlon, of the AEU engineering union, was blacklisted by MI5 as a risk. Derek “Red Robbo” Robinson crippled British Leyland with 523 impromptu strikes. Even some of my journalist colleagues were “fellow travellers”, often found after edition time swigging vodka at the hardline Bulgarian Embassy. The industrial editor of one right-wing paper told me: “I always try to include a ­message to the comrades in my stories.” The greatest union betrayal of all — equivalent to MI6 ­double agent Kim Philby — came with the unmasking of Jack Jones, the “most powerful man in Britain”. Jones led the 2.2million-strong TGWU union — the world’s biggest — and is still blamed by bitter Labour figures for the Winter of ­Discontent and the 18 years of Tory rule that followed. After he retired, Jones was exposed by Russian spy Oleg Gordievsky as a KGB agent on the Kremlin payroll. He denied the allegations. But even his gobsmacking treachery was dwarfed by the destructive ambition of Arthur Scargill, the Marxist leader of the National Union of Mineworkers, known as “King Coal”. His year-long strike began in 1984 without a ballot and destroyed both his proud union — “lions led by donkeys” — and the coal industry. Socialism brought the UK the Winter of Discontent in 1978–79 Credit: Getty The Burnham regime should not underestimate the appeal of blunt-speaking Tory leader Kemi Badenoch to its voters Credit: Getty His goal had nowt to do with pit closures. It was to bring down the democratically elected Thatcher government as it fought to save the UK ­economy from going bust. The “enemy within” failed on that occasion, but they did not surrender. They simply switched to the public sector, the charities and quangos which they infest today. Lefties such as Burnham still insist it was Thatcher who laid waste to mining communities, starving them into submission. But it was Scargill — still ­living today in the £2million grace-and-favour flat once owned by the impoverished NUM — who betrayed his ­members and his country. While miners’ families were being reduced to poverty, he twice rejected peace deals which could have put them back in work and bread on the table. Scargill’s revolt collapsed, driving his “lions” to extinction. But the crisis he provoked paved the way for a Tory landslide and a new industrial revolution. These dramatic events are literally a red flag to today’s Left-lurching Labour Party. The Burnham regime should not underestimate the appeal of blunt-speaking Tory leader Kemi Badenoch to its voters. Lifelong Labour voter and screen legend Maureen Lipman is already a convert. “I’m a Kemi Badenoch ­supporter,” she told Sky TV. “She’s amazing, I think she’s absolutely a truthful politician and I’ve never voted Tory in my life.” Maureen played the Jewish grandma, Beattie, in the hilarious 1980s TV commercials for British Telecom. BT had been a lumbering state monopoly until Mrs Thatcher set it free on the open market. Privatisation saved the company and put the UK on track for two decades of low tax, high growth, strike-free prosperity and full employment. That was the real Golden Age, Andy — a thriving period of freedom and op-portunity that you and your backward-looking socialist allies can only dream about. SHAMELESS Angie Rayner, sacked from Cabinet last year over a £40k tax “error”, is clinging like a limpet to her £17k redundo – some of it tax free. Now back in the same job, the firebrand redhead refuses to hand back a penny. Not a good look. As Andy Burnham will know, Keir Starmer never fully recovered after grabbing freebies from a dodgy donor. The new PM might want to have a word with Ange, before the taxman does. Comment now