Our house historian HOWARD ELSTON (OBE) explains why Baroness Thatcher will always really be remembered in  Uk-land

With Mrs Thatcher’s funeral only days away, I think it is time for me to lay aside my laudatory unbiased tradition of reportage and explain why the former Prime Minister will not be forgotten. I will give you this list below of accomplishments that made England (and those other attached bits with funny accents)  a better place to live in

FACT 1. She stopped an Argentinian invasion of Britain.

There is no doubt that Argies wanted to use The Falklands as a stepping stone  to the Home Counties and set up a military bastion on our shores. Secret documents minuted  in the Ministry of Defence  war archives  in 1981 revealed  how the Buenos Aires junta wanted desperately to join the EU.  It would  implant its vicious colonels in southern Britain with a capital in Newport Pagnell  for easy access to the M-1 and Milton Keynes shopping.  It would supplant the British £ sterling  with the Galtieri- a new unit of currency. It would also   ban curries, and force us to eat big steaks reared on the pampas. Gaucho cowboys would patrol the streets and everyone would have to speak whatever second rate gutteral  language the Argies then spoke.

FACT 2.  She stopped terrorism

Mrs Thatcher single-handedly blocked terror groups by identifying Nelson Mandala and his crowd as  murderous nasty bad guys thus allowing apartheid to breathe freely. Since that landmark speech, not one trace of UK based South African terror has been identified here or in the US.

FACT 3. She wanted to block  the reunification of Germany.

The PM took on the re- emergence of Germany knowing, if it happened,  it would lead to a third world war. She successfully called for East Germany to remain its own master  and she wanted that wall kept up. We can sleep easier at night.

FACT 4. She played fair,  especially  with dictators.

Maggie, as she was known when dressed for combat, always entered a political fray with a straight bat. She hated tin pot soldier Gen Galtieri (see above) but greatly admired Chile’s Pinochet who killed many of his own countrymen and had a music hall  moustache

FACT 5. She laid the foundations for a family dynasty

Mrs Thatcher’s death is not the end of the name. Her son Sir Mark will take on the baronetcy she so kindly bestowed on her own husband. St Mark will rule fairly but sternly on his  estates and will re introduce serfdom, religious wars with France and the burning of witches on Tuesdays. Her daughter Carol will have more time to appear on ridiculous celebrity ‘reality shows’ and make a pretty penny from flogging more literary  tat  about her mother

FACT 6.  She valued real friendship.

The baroness stood by her pals. She was a friend of  convicted perjurer Jeffrey Archer, gave Chilean torturer Pinochet (see above) a safe haven in London, stood stolidly behind apartheid bosses de Klerk and de Botha (see above) and would not henpeck Ronald Reagan even when he illegally invaded  the Commonwealth country of Grenada without referring to Downing Street.

FACT 7. I forgot what it is. But it was important at the time.