THE power of the press was something Margaret Thatcher was only too aware of, so a visit to Southampton in support of the local Tory candidate Chris Chope for the 1992 election included a tour of the Southern Daily Echo where I was deputy news editor.

Our first clue to the impending visit was the arrival of a police sniffer dog in the newsroom. Then the lady herself arrived in full Thatcher mode. She was helped by members of her entourage onto the balcony and from there delivered a speech to the throng of supporters, hecklers and surprised shoppers in the precinct below.

Having resigned office as prime minister just 16 months earlier, she was in an uncompromising mood. She told the ever-increasing crowd that the abolition of trade union legislation had led the way to expansion and success.

“We did what we did because we believe there is something rather special about the British character, which was not being allowed to show itself under the old laws and trade union power,” she said.

Then she climbed back through a window into the building and made her way through the newsroom, talking to the occasional member of staff on her way.

She stopped and looked over my shoulder as I sat at the newsdesk reviewing that day’s stories on the computer screen, knowing that very shortly it would be her visit that would be the top of the priority list and taking the lead headline of the day.

This time she was in control of the news agenda and was happy to play it for what it was worth. But before that, in 1990, she had made our front page for very different reasons.

Downing Street had announced her decision to stand down as prime minister at 9.30am after her cabinet colleagues had refused to back her in the second round of the leadership election sparked by a challenge by Michael Heseltine.

It was the perfect time for a regional daily newspaper like the Echo because the national newspapers for the day were already at the newsagents and we had a clear field. We were a seven-edition paper, but editor Pat Fleming took the decision to scrap all bar one of the editions so we could deliver a newspaper with the most up-to-date news, analysis and reaction.

The plan worked perfectly, with an extra 30,000 copies of our newspaper sold that day.

We were among the first to the news, and many of the people we called were hearing it for the first time.

Chris Chope was among those we broke the news to and, according to our political reporter, was struggling with his emotions.

I remember her saying: “He sounded as if he was in tears.”

Bill Browne, editor