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GRIEF-STRICKEN Tories are pressing for Big Ben to be silenced while Margaret Thatcher’s coffin leaves Westminster on the way to her funeral.

In response to demands from MPs, the plan is set to be presented by Speaker John Bercow to Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude this morning.

If Maude, an organiser of ­Wednesday’s funeral, agrees, the clock tower will not chime as her coffin is taken to St Paul’s cathedral.

Tories have been going over the top in a bid to honour their heroine, who served as Prime Minister from 1979 to 1990.

MPs Christopher Pincher and Thatcher’s close friend Conor Burns originally wanted the bell to chime 87 times, once for each year of her life – but Thatcher’s family vetoed the idea.

Emails seen by the Daily Record showed leading ­Westminster ­official Black Rod wrote to the Speaker’s office requesting information on how the bell can be silenced.

In one, Black Rod told officials: “It would be helpful if Mr Speaker could put the idea of silencing the chimes of the clock to Francis Maude, so that the family might also be consulted.”

No decision has been made by Bercow, whose ­left-wing wife Sally is boycotting the funeral.

The Speaker only agreed reluctantly to recall ­Parliament to commemorate Thatcher last week.

However, officials have been assured that it is ­“relatively straightforward” to silence the chimes of the 154-year-old clock.

The tower the Big Ben bell is housed in was renamed the Elizabeth Tower last year in honour of the Queen’s diamond jubilee.

The plan to silence it came as questions were raised about the £10million cost of the funeral and concerns about trouble.

Shadow Foreign Secretary Douglas Alexander said: “There is a responsibility on us to conduct ourselves with an appropriate degree of decorum and respect for a family that are laying to rest one of their own.”

Rich Tories also plan to raise £15million to build a memorial library in her honour, like Americans do for their ex-presidents.