British Politician Quotes

When the British Empire finally sinks beneath the waves of history, it will leave behind it only two memorials: one is the game of Association Football and the other is the expression 'Fuck Off'.

Richard Turnbull (colonial governor)

Continually measuring women's wants by men's achievements seems out of date, ignominious, and intolerably boring.... Now that we have secured possession of the tools of citizenship, we intend to use them not to copy men's models but to produce our own.

Eleanor Rathbone

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

From the days when the miners' leaders thought they owned the Government to the day when every miner owns part of his own mine – that's the British revolution.

Cecil Parkinson

The tendency everywhere in America to concentrate power and responsibility in one man is unmistakable.

The worst enemy of science is also the bitterest enemy of democracy, cest le clericalisme. The interests of science and the interests of democracy are one.

Despite the fact that hundreds of thousands of people have died — and that is a tragedy — I still believe that it was the right thing to do.

I will be sad if I either look up or down after my death and don't see my son fast asleep on the same benches on which I have slept.

Michael Onslow, 7th Earl of Onslow

I believe with all my heart that the Church of Jesus Christ should be a Church of blurred edges.

The world is made up, for the most part, of fools and knaves, both irreconcilable foes to truth.

George Villiers, 1st Duke of Buckingham

I don't use or recognize the term 'bog standard' but what I do recognize is the critical importance of honesty about what some children, in some schools, have had to put up with over the years.

On NATO "I am convinced that the present solution is only a partial one, aimed at guarding the heart. It must grow until the whole free world gets under one umbrella."

Jesus Christ was not a conservative. That's a racing certainty.

The Empire of China is an old, crazy, first-rate Man of War, which a fortunate succession of able and vigilant officers have contrived to keep afloat for these hundred and fifty years past, and to overawe their neighbours merely by her bulk and appearance. But whenever an insufficient man happens to have the command on deck, adieu to the discipline and safety of the ship. She may, perhaps, not sink outright; she may drift some time as a wreck, and will then be dashed to pieces on the shore; but she can never be rebuilt on the old bottom.

George Macartney

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.

To Chris Bryant who posted his photo wearing only underwear on a gay dating website while being a Member of Parliament:

Ah, Bryant, there you are. Nearly didn't recognize you with your clothes on.

Nicholas Soames

When asked if he was in good heart about being Archbishop:

The phrase 'in good heart' gives me pause…We are here as a church to represent Christ crucified and the compassion of Christ crucified before the world. And, because that is so, it may be the will of God that our church should have its heart broken and perhaps the heart of its Archbishop broken with it.

English physicians kill you, the French let you die.

William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne

It would be desirable if every Government, when it comes to power, should have its old speeches burnt.

Philip Snowden, 1st Viscount Snowden

Polluted rivers, filthy streets, bodies bedded down in doorways are no advertisement for a prosperous or caring society.

Michael Heseltine

There is no security for any power unless it be a security in which its neighbours have an equal share.

Edward Grey, 1st Viscount Grey of Fallodon

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

Look, my job is to upset The Guardian and the BBC. I love it, I love it.

[National Socialism] has survived the flames of war and the tempest of vilification because, when war has done its worst and vilification has run its entire gamut, National Socialism remains, in the final analysis, synonymous with higher man's will to survive, his instinct for health and strength, and his desire for beauty in life; and, as long as that will, that instinct, and that desire remain on this earth, the creed of National Socialism will remain, indestructible.

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