Mentioning Thatcher-Surely a mistake?

I only caught snippets of David Cameron's speech yesterday,but what horrified me was the mere mention of Mrs Thatcher's name.
Why did he do it?
Was it to keep the old side of the party happy?
With all the talk of financial irresponsibility why would you want to hark back to the days of Thatcherism when the days of financial de regulation began and the broken society began to be broken?

I think he may have made a mistake