Give the public what they want...

[shewhomust]

It seems that Margaret Thatcher's funeral will not be a state funeral but a ceremonial funeral with military honours. poliphilo explains the difference: a state funeral must be voted for by parliament. All that makes a state funeral is parliament saying that it's a state funeral? These are the minutiae of ritual which matter enormously to the bereaved in the emotional days of preparation for a funeral, but very little to anyone else.

I mind rather more that all the ballyhoo is being conducted at public expense.

I don't know if this is still the case, but long ago, when I was a volunteer on a welfare rights advice project, the means test which decided who qualified for supplementary benefit disregarded a certain level of savings: this was widely believed to be the sum you had put aside to pay for your funeral. Providing for your funeral was the last vestige of respectability, a pauper's funeral the ultimate disgrace. Even then, this was an old-fashioned attitude, the sort of value I was more likely to encounter in old novels than in people I actually met - but those were the values that Margaret Thatcher embodied, of self-reliance, standing on your own feet, not looking to society for support. Wikipedia doesn't have much to say about pauper's funerals. In fact, here is the article in its entirety: "In England, a Pauper's funeral was a funeral for a pauper paid for under the poor law. The phrase is still sometimes used to describe a funeral paid for by the state when the estate of the deceased person or the relatives of the deceased person do not have sufficient funds to cover the cost." That describes the impending ceremony exactly, doesn't it? Unlike Oscar Wilde (in this as in so much else), Mrs Thatcher would not have wished to die beyond her means, so the expense of her funeral should be carried by her estate.

It's what she would have wanted.

Comments

[gillpolack.livejournal.com]

If it isn't what she wanted, then her policies were not honest. Policies with that much side-effect should be honest so yes, her estate should pay for her funeral.

Having said that, a state-funded funeral is one of the odder perks of PMship, so it will happen, no matter how the logic fails.

[shewhomust.livejournal.com]

And, of course, her policies weren't honest. But I take comfort in pointing it out.

[http://users.livejournal.com/la_marquise_de_/]

This household is very much of the opinion that, given her political views, her funeral should be paid for by PFI. (Ack, sorry: stange keyboard)

[shewhomust.livejournal.com]

In this household too, it has been suggested it should be privatised.