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Just one point in your post to follow up on, Dave. You refer to the freeing up of consumer credit. You were fair to point out that Mrs T thought people would be more responsible, but also to be fair, she did bring in regulation of retail financial services. During her years (and Major's) the level of consumer debt also played a part in the setting of interest rates.
The recent problem was when the Bank of England was given responsibility, their brief related to inflation targets, with no reference to consumer debt levels. The use of the CPI measure instead of RPI being a reform too far. It is that which led to the house price bubble and huge extension of credit card debt, being a major cause of the present problems. You have to add in the way the tri-partied regime affected the manner of which the major banks were regulated, leading to the City boom which was also based on a bubble, which combined with the impact of Clinton's reforms and the British Bank's activities in the USA, created the foundation of the credit crunch and undermining of our financial system.
Under the old system with Mrs T the Banks would have been under much closer scrutiny and are not likely to have got away with some of their riskier ventures, particularly in the American market. Dont forget, under that regime the bank's senior management teams went to the Bank of Engalnd every quarter where they were grilled on every aspect of what they were doing. That all ended under Brown.
Brown was proud of the impact of his reforms hence his boast 'an end to boom and bust' after consumer credit allowed the UK to avoid the minor recession in 2000. We now know that we would have been better off if he had not made those changes and if we had 'enjoyed' a 2000 recession, the present recession would not be nearly as deep or as long if we had.
The attempts, by some, to blame Mrs T for what is happening now just ignores the changes that Brown was responsible for, which Mrs T would never have contemplated. He basically tinkered with Mrs T's reforms without understanding them to a disasterous affect.
