The Victoria and Albert Museum last night faced calls for it to be stripped of public funding after naming Margaret Thatcher on a list of “unpopular public figures” alongside Hitler and Osama bin Laden.
Britain’s first female prime minister is described as a “contemporary villain” in a current presentation of British humor through the ages.
This appears beneath a set of Victorian Punch and Judy puppets with a caption titled: “Is this how it should be done?”
The words state: “Over the years, the evil character of this seaside puppet show has evolved from the Devil to unpopular public figures, including Adolf Hitler, Margaret Thatcher and Osama bin Laden, to come up with contemporary villains.”
A puppet of Baroness Thatcher from the satirical TV show Spitting Image is also included in the comedy exhibition at the London museum whose director is former Labor MP Tristram Hunt.
Britain’s first female prime minister, Margaret Thatcher (pictured), is described as a “contemporary villain” in a current exhibition of British humor through the ages.
This appears beneath a set of Victorian Punch and Judy puppets with a caption titled: “Is this how it should be done?” Pictured: Judy and Baby puppets
A puppet of Baroness Thatcher from the satirical TV show Spitting Image (pictured) is also included in the comedy exhibition at the London museum whose director is former Labor MP Tristram Hunt.
According to 2022-23 figures, the museum received most of its income, over £67 million, from the taxpayer via the Department of Culture.
The V&A was last night branded “disgraceful” and “moronic” amid calls for ministers to cut its financial support.
Sir Connor Burns, former trade minister and Conservative MP for Bournemouth, said: “Whoever wrote this legend should be publicly denounced as a fool, or perhaps more usefully sent to read a Ladybird book on the history of the modern world.
“This is unfortunately symptomatic of the woke, luvvie-dom nonsense that persists in our public institutions.
“They should get a serious punch to the knuckles and bugle instruction to grow up.”
Former Conservative leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith agreed.
“Given that MPs now regularly receive death threats, myself included, from extremists and others, this V&A exhibition is poorly thought out and misleading,” he said.
“They must be living in a bubble, far from the real world, to think it is rational to suggest that a politician of Margaret Thatcher’s stature be equated with any of these mass murderers and human beings vile.
“This kind of stupidity raises the question of funding. It would be a good idea if those who thought of this worked hard among us, rather than sitting on their high perch and coming up with stupid ideas.
Nile Gardiner, former aide to Baroness Thatcher and director of the Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom at the Heritage Foundation, also commented.
According to 2022-23 figures, the museum received most of its income, over £67 million, from the taxpayer via the Department of Culture. Pictured: Adolf Hitler
The V&A was last night branded “disgraceful” and “moronic” amid calls for ministers to cut its financial support. Pictured: Osama bin Laden
“Shameful of the Victoria and Albert Museum. It should be deprived of all public funding,” he wrote on X.
Political commentator and businessman Russell Quirk told GB News: “Thatcher was the mother of entrepreneurship. How can you say she was a bad guy? She was one of the heroes of political history.
“She stood up to militant unions to ensure they did not destroy Britain’s economy and social fabric. She should be applauded rather than called evil. She gave ordinary people access to wealth, aspirations and success, and for that she should be considered a hero.
This is not the first time that the museum’s treatment of Baroness Thatcher, who died in 2013, has sparked controversy.
In 2015, the V&A was widely criticized for refusing to accept a selection of its suits and handbags.
Her family donated hundreds of items, from her wedding dress to her red Prime Minister’s shipping box, because she wanted them kept together and on public display rather than auctioned off and scattered across the world.
But the museum reportedly “politely declined,” saying it only collected objects of “exceptional aesthetic or technical quality” rather than those with “intrinsic social historical value.”
This is not the first time that the museum’s treatment of Baroness Thatcher, who died in 2013, has sparked controversy. Pictured: Tristram Hunt, Director of the Victoria and Albert Museum
In 2015, the V&A was widely criticized for refusing to accept a selection of its suits and handbags. Pictured: The Victoria and Albert Museum
Bosses later claimed no formal offer had been made. A year later, the V&A held an exhibition of some of the former Conservative prime minister’s clothing, including the distinctive royal blue suit she wore when voting in the 1987 general election.
At the time, senior fashion curator Claire Wilcox said it was “a record of the work wardrobe of one of the most influential and powerful women of the 20th century.”
The V&A is the largest museum of decorative art and design in the world with more than two million objects.
He was contacted yesterday but no one was available for comment.