Margaret Thatcher - a woman in a man's world

Laura Kuenssberg

Former Business Editor

Margaret Thatcher arrives at 10 Downing Street after winning the 1979 election Credit: PA

One of the most vexed questions about Lady Thatcher's record is whether she helped or even hindered the progress of other women.

Once comparing feminism to 'poison' she is said to have cooked her husband a full breakfast every morning.

Can you do that and be an example to other women?

She did not make a point of promoting female colleagues - in fact only ever bringing one woman into her Cabinet.

She did not pursue policies particularly designed to further the female agenda - her detractors would argue the opposite, that decisions like freezing child benefit in fact made women's lives harder.

Yet to rise to the highest office in the land, arguably smashing, not breaking the mould, supporters would argue that just by making that journey she led by example.

The cases for and against are made passionately.

This afternoon, Janet Street-Porter told me that Lady Thatcher was a 'traitor to her sex', telling me that she does not even consider her to have been really a woman, 'she was a machine' she told me.

'She was like a warrior... her hair like a helmet', who pretended that she was 'invincible - that was a lie.'

Yet Kirstie Allsopp, Conservative and property expert by contrast told me, 'just by being she was a feminist icon'.

She believes that 'contemporary feminists cannot acknowledge the importance of Margaret Thatcher because she declared herself to be anti-feminist'.

You can hear what these two had to say about Lady Thatcher's impact on them and progress for other women here, and watch our report on News at Ten tonight.