HOW WAS Margaret Thatcher’s funeral costed at £10 million?

Does this include the military presence which we pay for on a regular basis whether marching endlessly round barrack parade grounds or exercising on Salisbury Plain?

Doubtless the logistical training and expertise involved is meat and drink to those officers whose job it is to plan the next war.

The police? They put that many on the streets to police football matches. What of the benefits to the economy, the thousands who attended paid their own way to be part of this spectacle?

Tourists came from abroad to witness and take part. The money spent in this way eventually finds its way to the Inland Revenue and makes jobs more secure in the shops, bars, restaurants and other outlets. At the risk of sounding mercenary, I would suggest that the country probably made a profit from this occasion, as we do from other state occasions.

Mr J Smith, Willow Glade, Huntington, York.

 

• WHAT a cheap shot by columnist Sue Nelson (The Press, April 22) castigating George Osborne for showing emotion at (“his heroine”) Lady Thatcher’s funeral while assuming his total lack of feeling concerning the impact of the current benefits reforms.

This is another example of the tired narrative from the political left and their fellow travellers, denouncing all things Tory and having been driven to a frenzy of bile and spite in the wake of Lady Thatcher’s death.

From Glenda Jackson’s “she wasn’t a woman” comment to George Galloway’s hope that “she is burning in the hellfires”, to the effigy burning on the day of the funeral, the range of sheer nastiness has been breathtaking. And they call the Tories the ‘nasty party’.

I would, however, congratulate Ed Miliband for his measured tribute in the House of Commons and also suggest to Mr Galloway that he follows that old saying to “be careful what you wish for”.

Martin Smith, Main Street, Elvington, York.