A HIGHLY-publicised 'confidential' report drawn up by Tory deputy chair John Maples has helped underline the scale of the crisis faced by John Major's divided government.
Many of the measures Thatcher relied on for support are now reasons for disaffection among Tory voters, according to Mr Maples' market research.
Among the issues which most annoy the Tories questioned are:
• Jobs, housing, health service, business, family values, crime - where "There is a feeling of powerlessness and insecurity ... and no vision of where we are heading".
• "Although in the 1980s the Conservatives seemed to promise a classless society of opportunity, the reality is now that the rich are getting richer on the backs of the rest, who are getting poorer."
• "Privatisation has not been nonlar ane cmai buc nescmen in particular feel 'let down'."
• "While we trumpet the recovery, the voters do not think the recession has ended. They still fear unemployment, have no more "money in their pocket'. What we are saying is completely at odds with their experience."
On key issues of the welfare state - education and the NHS - Maples warns that "business methods' and talk of competition simply alienate voters.
On the NHS in particular the public believe the hostile comments of doctors and nurses denouncing the market-style reforms, and not the banalities of Virginia Bottomley.
The best solution for the Tories would be a total media blackout.
Maples' warnings have fallen on deaf ears. Clarke's Budget, due as we go to press, will do nothing to restore plunging living standards, but is likely to tighten the squeeze on public services and weifare spending.
The tide of redundancies, cuts and closures continues.
Discontent at the effects of past privatisations has been exacerbated by new price increases hitting the lowest-income gas consumers, combined with the flagrant greed of top British Gas bosses.
Michael Heseltine is reportedly to sell Royal Mail, while Brian Mawhinney is lumbered with the equally unpopular task of selling Railtrack.
The Tories, feuding and fighting, sleazy and incompetent, cling on, as long as Labour is too feeble to drive them out.