Thatcher must be proud of George Osborne, her political successor, says correspondent Ian Hernon

TWENTY-ONE years ago this week, Margaret Thatcher left Downing Street in tears.

Yesterday, her political grand-nephew delivered an Autumn Statement she must be proud of.

It was not just Chancellor George Osborne’s promise to revive the right-to-buy social housing scheme credited, in part, for her 1979 election victory.

It was more the broad thrust of his deficit-busting package, including major infrastructure projects which will boost the private sector and which will be paid for by the squeeze on the public sector and the less well-off.

Pure genius, not just smoke and mirrors but also, Mr Osborne insisted, “British savings for British jobs.”

Mrs Thatcher would also approve of his red rag to the 2.6m public sector workers due to strike today over the raid on their pension.

Not only did he reveal that, once a two-year pay freeze ends next year, future rises will be capped at barely a third of the inflation rate, he also signalled that future deals will advantage the South above the North.

That will be particularly hard on Merseyside, where more than half the workforce are in the public sector at the lower end of the wage scale.

Mr Osborne, a small man in all but physical stature, told the unions: “Bring it on, if you think you’re hard enough.”

Which is pretty much what Maggie said to the miners . . . but she had sense enough not to alienate to this extent teachers, NHS staff, local government, sewage workers, binmen and all the others who effectively provide a daily lifeline to millions.

Jim Callaghan did that before her, and she learnt that lesson from the Opposition benches.

Whether Cameron and Co are facing a new-style winter of discontent is problematical.

Broad swathes of the public are too broke, too depressed and too scared for their own jobs to take such action. For now at least.

But this economic strategy has all the hallmarks of being scribbled on the back of a Carlton Club menu.

As former Treasury Chief Secretary Angela Eagle, MP for Wallasey, said: “The pain inflicted in austerity budgets since the last election clearly isn’t working.

“The Chancellor has admitted that he is extending borrowing to beyond what Labour was planning.

“Why does his plan for growth depend entirely on cutting wages and reducing the lifestyles of those who can least afford it?”

Why indeed?