British Politician Quotes

You can bend it and twist it... You can misuse and abuse it... But even God cannot change the Truth.

Michael Levy, Baron Levy

The Germans, if this Government is returned, are going to pay every penny; they are going to be squeezed as a lemon is squeezed—until the pips squeak.

When I came here seventeen years ago and I said that I wanted to lead a campaign to get Britain to leave the European Union, you all laughed at me — well, I have to say, yow're not laughing now, are you?

No one for a moment can pretend that printing is so great a discovery as writing, or algebra as a language.

Benjamin Disraeli

We can all agree–it has already been a measure of the debate–that Saddam Hussein is an evil tyrant with no regard for the sanctity of human life, for either his own citizens or the people of other countries. We all agree that he is in flagrant breach of a series of UN resolutions, and in particular those relating to his duty to allow the inspection, and indeed participate in the destruction, of his weapons of mass destruction. We can also agree that he most certainly has chemical and biological weapons and is working towards a nuclear capability. The dossier contains confirmation of information that we either knew or most certainly should have been willing to assume.

Menzies Campbell

A system which betrays the greatest distrust of the people must never look for popular support.

He thinks nothing more absurd than the common notion of Instruction, as if Science were to be poured into the Mind, like water into a cistern, that passively waits to receive all that comes.

James Harris (grammarian)

If a sportsman true you'd be
Listen carefully to me.
Never, never let your gun
Pointed be at any one;
That it may unloaded be
Matters not the least to me.

Mark Hanbury Beaufoy

Trial by jury, instead of being a security to persons who are accused, will be a delusion, a mockery, and a snare.

Thomas Denman, 1st Baron Denman

We are now more Socialist in many ways than any other developed country outside the Communist bloc—in the size of the public sector, the range of controls and the telescoping of net income. And what is the result? Compare our position today with that of our neighbours in north west Europe—Germany, Sweden, Holland, France. They are no more talented than we are. Yet, compared with them, we have the longest working hours, the lowest pay and the lowest production per head. We have the highest taxes and the lowest investment. We have the least prosperity, the most poor and the lowest pensions. We have the largest nationalized sector and the worst labour troubles.

Of course there are regrets. I shall regret always that I found my own authentic voice in politics. I was too conservative, too conventional. Too safe, too often. Too defensive. Too reactive. Later, too often on the back foot.

Where the Left imagine social justice to be the realization of certain abstract ideas — equality and emancipation — the Right see it as a system of naturally occurring and beneficial relationships. Social justice is the fulfilment of the individual's need for positive liberty through social membership.

After all, facts are facts, and although we may quote one to another with a chuckle the words of the Wise Statesman, "Lies — damned lies — and statistics," still there are some easy figures the simplest must understand, and the astutest cannot wriggle out of.

Leonard H. Courtney

The success of a leader will rise or fall on the decisions that he or she makes about the people around him or her.

Of British Cabinet government:

I don't think collective responsibility is a myth. I think it is a reality. It is cumbersome. It is difficult. It has all sorts of disadvantages and it is possible it may need to change [...] probably under any of these systems it is going to be a bit of a shambles. But I do think it has got to be, so far as possible, a democratic and accountable shambles.

John Hunt, Baron Hunt of Tanworth

Of Margaret thatcher:

She was a tigress surrounded by hamsters.

What right does the public have to interfere with my private life? None.

On his parliamentary expenses

When once you have plunged into the strife for power, it is the fear of those who are seeking for power over you that so easily persuades to all the great crimes.

Auberon Herbert

O worship the King, all-glorious above;
O gratefully sing his power and his love:
Our Shield and Defender, the Ancient of Days,
Pavilioned in splendour, and girded with praise.

A long line of cases shows that it is not merely of some importance, but is of fundamental importance that justice should not only be done, but should manifestly and undoubtedly be seen to be done.

The personality conveyed by the utterances which are put into her mouth is that of a priggish schoolgirl, captain of the hockey team, a prefect, and a recent candidate for confirmation. It is not thus that she will be able to come into her own as an independent and distinctive character.

Of Queen Elizabeth II

You are ordered abroad as a soldier of the King to help our French comrades against the invasion of a common enemy…In this new experience you may find temptations both in wine and women. You must entirely resist both temptations, and, while treating all women with perfect courtesy, you should avoid any intimacy. Do your duty bravely. Fear God. Honour the King.

Before the Battle of Trafalgar:

Now, gentlemen, let us do something today which the world may talk of hereafter.

Cuthbert Collingwood, 1st Baron Collingwood

I am not a saint. I never claimed to be a saint. My suits are not white, they're off-white.

India has left a deeper mark upon the history the philosophy and the religion of mankind than any other terrestrial unit in the universe.

George Curzon, 1st Marquess Curzon of Kedleston