Lady Thatcher won her own Battle of Britain

There used to be a rule about 'not speaking ill of the dead' in obituaries, on the grounds that it was unfair to remind St Peter of the thoughts and vices of the deceased just at the very moment when he or she was arriving for judgment at the Pearly Gates.

That rule, judging by some of the recent obituaries, has since fallen into desuetude. That is bad enough, but even worse is the latest demonstration of bad-mouthing a person who is not yet dead - only very old and sorely ailing. ­ Namely Lady Thatcher.

The spark for this was the ill-judged decision of Gordon Brown to announce in advance his decision to give the former Prime Minister a state funeral; ill-judged because in doing so he underestimated the sheer nastiness of many members of his own party whose letters in the Guardian deploring his decision have been unbelievably cruel.

One went so far as to say that he had opened a bottle of champagne, under the mistaken impression that the lady was already dead. For two or three days the letter columns was full of such filth, demonstrating once again that not only conservatives are 'nasty'.

So why a state funeral? Because she rid the land of a dangerous group ­ - the trade union barons - who were ruthlessly promoting their sectional interest at the expense of the nation. They were an evil lot whose conspiracy against the public interest could only be defeated by a show of force ­ in this case the mounted police.

Every previous prime minister knew this and only she had the guts to do it. In that way she really was another war leader who won her own Battle of Britain. ·