Margaret Thatcher is leaving a fund-raising function for the Tory party and extolling the virtues of individualism and limiting the powers of the State, when she sees a one-legged man leaning on a crutch, playing a banjo, with a sign reading: 'Falklands Veteran'.

She walks up to the man, and waxes proudly to her colleagues: "You see here a patriot and hero; someone who is not content to live off the State; who has tried to make a living using his own talents and abilities: this wounded soldier is what Britain should be all about!" And, with a tear in her eye, gives the man £500 from her purse.

As she walks away, convinced of the rightness of this fine example of an independent and self-made entrepreneur, the man doffs his hat and shouts after her: "Gracias, Senora!"