Tebbit was a close ally of
Margaret Thatcher and served as her
Secretary of State for Employment, Secretary of State for Trade and
Industry and President of the Board of Trade (October 1983-September
1985), as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and as party chairman
(1985-1987). During the Brighton hotel bombing he was injured and his
wife, Margaret, was permanently disabled.
In the aftermath of urban riots in the summer of 1981, Tebbit responded
to a suggestion that the rioting was caused by unemployment by saying:
"I grew up in the 1930s with an unemployed father. He did not riot. He
got on his bike and looked for work, and he went on looking until he
found it.".