It used its influence to lobby the party nationally for more market-based policies;[1] the association published pamphlets calling for the sale of the Post Office; for the legalisation of the offshore "pirate" broadcasting stations; abolishing exchange controls; and ending council house subsidies.
[3] Largely thanks to Douglas Mason, the University Conservative association also served as a training ground in the running of election campaigns.
[5] In the 1983 general election, he stood unsuccessfully as Conservative candidate for Central Fife,[1] a safe labour seat.
There he argued for the compulsory contracting-out of most local services such as refuse collection, proposed scrapping the existing local-government tax, in favour of a per-capita charge.
Other policy recommendations included the privatisation of the Royal Mail The Last Post (1991); the privatisation of the Forestry Commission[3] the complete removal of arts subsidies Expounding The Arts (1987), abolition of restrictions on drinking Time To Call Time (1986), and ending free reading in public libraries Ex Libris (1986).
[7] Following a ratings revaluation in Scotland which pushed up bills by 30 per cent, Deputy Prime Minister William Whitelaw returned from Edinburgh urging Margaret Thatcher that "something must be done" in anticipation of the potential unrest in store for the rest of the country.
This accountability appealed to Thatcher,[5] who adopted Mason's 1985 report Revising the Rating System as her Government's policy.
He put together one of the world's biggest collections of science fiction, including rare runs of Astounding and other magazines.