Background Image

...

There Are Big Questions About The Sort Of Skills You Need In Modern Government Today. You Put Politicians In Charge Of Billions Of Dollars With Absolutely No Training And Very Little Support System Around Them. It's An Extraordinary Thing.

-Tony Blair

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

There Are Big Questions

Tony Blair

...

There Are Big Questions About The Sort Of Skills You Need In Modern Government Today. You Put Politicians In Charge Of Billions Of Dollars With Absolutely No Training And Very Little Support System Around Them. It's An Extraordinary Thing.

Views: 56731

Topic

Support Systems

More From Tony Blair

I'm An Avowed Centrist, And I Believe That - Centrism Is Often - It's Almost The Wrong Word To Use, Because It's Often Seen As Sort Of Splitting The Difference Between Right And Left.

We Fall For... The Theories Of Betrayal Very Easily, And One Of The Things That's Always Depressed Me About The Left, Ever Since I Started In Politics, Is Their Ability To Imbibe The Propaganda Of The Right And Regurgitate It To The Left.

I Want My Son To Grow Up In A Place Where The People Are More Powerful Than The Government And Not The Other Way Around.

Whatever The Dangers Of The Action We Take, The Dangers Of Inaction Are Far, Far Greater.

Because I Happen To Believe That The Best Policy Solutions Lie In The Center Ground, Then I Want To See, How Does The Center Revitalize Itself? How Does It Develop The Policy Agenda For The Future? And How Do We Link Up People Who Have The Same Basic Ideas And Attachments To The Same Basic Values Across The World?

Times Are Tough But They Are Tough Because The Government Is Trying To Do The Right Thing, Whether On Public Service Reform, Education, Health, Anti-social Behaviour And Welfare, Or In Counter-terrorism.

I Do Not Want To End Up With An American Style Of Politics, With Us Going Out There Beating Our Chest About Our Faith. Politics And Religion - It Is Not That They Do Not Have A Lot In Common, But If [religion] Ends Up Being Used In The Political Process, I Think That Is A Bit Unhealthy.

The World Is A Better Place With Saddam In Prison Not In Power.

I Mean, You Can Agree Or Disagree With Iraq Or Afghanistan, But By The Way, Now The Great Campaigning Cause Out There Is The Absence Of Intervention In Syria. And Then In Libya, It's Partial Intervention. And That Doesn't Really Explain Why Some Countries That Have Literally Nothing To Do With The Interventions In The Middle East End Up Getting Targeted.

What We Also Know Is We Haven't Found Them [weapons Of Mass Destruction] In Iraq - Now Let The Survey Group Complete Its Work And Give Us The Report... They Will Not Report That There Was No Threat From Saddam, I Don't Believe.

Mass Destruction

Yes, I Did Have To Struggle Very Hard To Get This [the Vote On The Iraq War] Through, But The Reason I Did It Was Because I Thought It Was The Right Thing To Do. I Didn't Take This On Myself... Just Because I Thought, 'let's Give Myself A Really Hard Time For A Couple Of Years!'

There Can Be No Freedom For Africa Without Justice; And No Justice Without Declaring War On Africa's Poverty, Disease And Famine With As Much Vehemence As We Remove The Tyrant And The Terrorist.

In No Relationship At The Top Of Any Walk Of Life Is It Always Easy, Least Of All In Politics Which Matters So Much And Which Is Conducted In Such A Piercing Spotlight.

There Are People Who Are Anxious About Immigration For Reasons That Are Perfectly Sensible. They Think It's Uncontrolled. They Think It's, Therefore, Arbitrary In Its Consequences, And There Are Some Communities Affected Much More Deeply Than Others.

I Couldn't Live With Myself If I Thought That These Big Strategic Choices For My Generation Were There, And I Wasn't Even Making Them - Or I Was Making Them According To What Was Expedient Rather Than What I Actually Thought Was Right.

Any Parent Wants The Best For Their Children. I Am Not Going To Make A Choice For My Child On The Basis Of What Is The Politically Correct Thing To Do.

If You're Interested In Politics And You're Not Following It, Then It's A Little Bizarre.

I Cannot Think Of Any Circumstances In Which A Government Can Go To War Without The Support Of Parliament.

In Retrospect, The Millennium Marked Only A Moment In Time. It Was The Events Of September 11 That Marked A Turning Point In History, Where We Confront The Dangers Of The Future And Assess The Choices Facing Humankind.

I Think All Of Our Experience With Iraqi President Saddam Hussein Teaches Us That Diplomacy Has Very Little Chance Of Working Unless It Is Clear To Him That If Diplomacy Does Not Work, That The Threatened Reality Of Force Is There.

The Thing Always Is To Go To Where People Really Are And What They're Really Feeling About Life.

You Don't Have To Keep Looking At The Future Foreign Policy In Terms, Simply, Of The Past.

I Think What Happened With 9/11 Is That People Sort Of Felt That It Came From Nowhere. Whereas I Think Now We Understand The Roots Are Very Deep. I Say It's Like Revolutionary Communism, Something That Is Going To Have To Be Knocked Out Over A Very Long Period Of Time. This Strain Of Extremism Continues To Be Very Strong, Whether It's In Afghanistan, Or Somalia Or Yemen, Or Any Of These Places.

Ah Yes, Liberal Democrats Unified As Ever In Opportunism And In Error.

Terrorist Threats Are Not Happening Just In This Country, But In Every European Country And Every Country Across The Globe. As A Result Of That, We Do Sometimes Have To Take Measures We Would Rather Not Take In Order To Give Us The Security We Need.

I Think Conspiracy Theories Have Gotten More And More Close To The Mainstream Because What You've Got Is A Fragmentation Of The Media, Where The Media Becomes Much More Polarized Today, Left And Right.

Fifteen Years Ago, If You Said Business Will Help Save The Environment People Would Have Laughed At You. Today, I Believe That Is A Serious Proposition.

I Shall Not Rest Until, Once Again, The Destinies Of Our People And Our Party Are Joined Together Again In Victory At The Next General Election Labour In Its Rightful Place In Government Again.

Sometimes It Is Better To Lose And Do The Right Thing Than To Win And Do The Wrong Thing.

There Are Those People Who Basically Don't Like Those Who Are Different. Now, That Is A Prejudice And It's A Prejudice That's Dangerous Because In The World Today, The World Works Through Connectivity. It Works Through Going Across The Boundaries, But Faith And Culture And Race In A Nation.

I Have Absolutely No Doubt In My Mind That The Intelligence Was Genuine.

I Actually Did Trouble To Read Marx First Hand. I Found It Illuminating In So Many Ways; In Particular, My Perception Of The Relationship Between People And The Society In Which They Live Was Irreversibly Altered.

Actually The Royal Family Were Very Gracious And Good To Me. But I Also Found That The British Establishment Were Never Quite Sure What To Make Of Me. I Was A Labour Figure, But I'd Come From A Very Middle-class Background. In One Sense I Offended Both Traditional Right And Traditional Left. But I Thought That Was No Bad Thing.

I Also, As I Think Most People Do, Have A Healthy Instinct That If We Upset The Balance Of Nature, We Are In All Probability Going To Suffer A Reaction. With World Growth, And Population As It Is, This Reaction Must Increase.

The Only Society That Works Today Is Also One Founded On Mutual Respect, On A Recognition That We Have A Responsibility Collectively And Individually, To Help Each Other On The Basis Of Each Other's Equal Worth. A Selfish Society Is A Contradiction In Terms.

One Of The Things That I've Been Doing Over The Past Few Years Is Reevaluating My Own Powers Of Political Analysis.

We Know The Problems, And We Know The Solution: Sustainable Development. The Issue Is The Political Will.

I Think The Journey For A Politician Goes From Wanting To Please All The People All The Time, To A Political Leader That Realises In The End His Responsibility Is To Decide. And When He Decides, He Divides.

The Fear Of Missing Out Means That Today’s Media, More Than Ever Before, Hunts In A Pack. In These Modes It Is Like A Feral Beast, Just Tearing People And Reputations To Bits. But No-one Dares Miss Out.

There Are Millions Of Young Children Being Educated To A Very Narrow-minded View Of Religion. And It's Out Of That Education Of Large Numbers Of Young People That You Then Get This Extremism.

Sovereignty Rests With Me As An English Mp And That's The Way It Will Stay.

Now, Again, What The Center Ground Has Got To Do Is To Respond To People's Genuine Concerns And Fears.

Genuine Concern

You've Got To Listen But You've Also Got To Lead.

Mine Is The First Generation Able To Contemplate The Possibility That We May Live Our Entire Lives Without Going To War Or Sending Our Children To War.

Now You May Do It Badly, You May Do It Well, Some People Like You, Some People Hate You, All The Rest Of It - But You Have Got A Real Motivating Life Purpose. [on Being Prime Minister

Ideals Survive Through Change. They Die Through Inertia In The Face Of Challenge.

My Course Has Never Been About Triangulation, And Neither, Really, Is Bill Clinton's. It's Not - It's About Applying Your Values To The Future In A Practical And Unblinking Way, And That Is An Ideological View That Is Every Bit As Strong As Views From The Left Or From The Right.

I Will Do What It Takes To Help Ed Miliband Win General Election.

Our Party: New Labour. Our Mission: New Britain. New Labour New Britain.

I Haven't Got The Time To Sit Here Arguing With Someone Whose Idea Of A Coherent Foreign Policy Is What Comes Up In Google When You Type In Peace!

What I Don't Know Is Whether There Is A Way Politically That You Can Beat Away These, Some Of These Populist Movements Because In The End I Don't Think They Really Do Provide Answers. They Ride The Anger. But They Don't Really Have The Answers. Or Whether This Is An Experiment We're Just Going To Have To Go Through First.

The Great Advantage Of The Lib Dems Is Precisely That No-one Knows What They Stand For.

All The Way Through, We Have Been Willing To Take Risks, Provided At The End Of It We Can Get A Decent Lasting Settlement In Northern Ireland

People Know Where I Stand In The Labour Party And What I Believe In.

If People In The End Think That You Can't Do Something In A Way Which Is Acceptable Then It Won't Fly. The Only Way You Get Anything Like This Done Is If People Think, 'i Understand Why It Is Being Done.'

Can We Be Sure That Terrorism And Wmd Will Join Together? If We Are Wrong, We Will Have Destroyed A Threat That, At Its Least Is Responsible For Inhuman Carnage And Suffering. That Is Something I Am Confident History Will Forgive. But If Our Critics Are Wrong And We Do Not Act, Then We Will Have Hesitated In Face Of This Menace, When We Should Have Given Leadership. That Is Something History Will Not Forgive.

We Are Going To Expand Enormously -- Our Economy, Our Consumption, Over The Years To Come ... But The Consequences Of That On Emissions Are Going To Be Severe Unless We Change Direction.

Look, I Am Very Competitive.

There's A Great Frustration With The System. There's A Lot Of Anger Out There. But In The End, You Need Answers And Not Just Anger. But Anyway, Let Me Not Trespass Too Much Into Your Politics. I've Got Enough Problems In My Own Politics.

If We Are Going To Carry On Growing, And We Will, Because No Country Is Going To Forfeit Its Right To Economic Growth, We Have To Find A Way Of Doing It Sustainably.

My View Is That You Still, In Order To Win From The Labour Perspective, Have To Have A Strong Alliance With Business As Well As The Unions. You Have Got To Be Very Much In The Centre Ground On Things Like Public Sector Reform.

Where Radical Islamism Is Going To Be A Factor, It's Going To Be Very, Very Tough.

Climate Change Is The World's Greatest Environmental Challenge. It Is Now Plain That The Emission Of Greenhouse Gases, Associated With Industrialization And Economic Growth...is Causing Global Warming At A Rate That Is Unsustainable.

The Problem Is Some Of The Populism On Both The Far Left And The Far Right, It Can Make A Tweet But Not Make A Policy. And, You Know, When You Are Dealing With Issues That Are As Important And Serious As This, I Understand Why People Search For Simple Solutions.

I Am Absolutely Delighted To Give My Full Support To Gordon As The Next Leader Of The Labour Party And As Prime Minister And To Endorse Him Fully.

What I Will Say To People Is What You Require Are Rules And Not Prejudices.

Whatever The Short Term Clashes Between Protecting The Environment And Eradicating Poverty, Medium Term And Long Term It Is Clear. Unless We Grow Sustainably, At Some Point We Face Catastrophe

We Are Asked Now Seriously To Accept That In The Last Few Years-contrary To All History, Contrary To All Intelligence-saddam Decided Unilaterally To Destroy Those Weapons. I Say That Such A Claim Is Palpably Absurd.

My Faith Foundation Works To Bring About A Greater Respect And Understanding Between Different Faiths. We Basically Work With Six Popular Religions In The World Which Are The Three Abrahamic Religions, Hinduism And Buddhism And Sikhism.

At The Heart Of My Politics Has Always Been The Value Of Community, The Belief That We Are Not Merely Individuals Struggling In Isolation From Each Other, But Members Of A Community Who Depend On Each Other, Who Benefit From Each Other's Help, Who Owe Obligations To Each Other. From That Everything Stems: Solidarity, Social Justice, Equality, Freedom.

If What The Science Tells Us About Climate Change Is Correct, Then Unabated It Will Result In Catastrophic Consequences For Our World.

I Have Absolutely No Doubt At All That We Will Find Evidence Of Weapons Of Mass Destruction Programmes.

Mass Destruction

I Don't Concede It At All That The Intelligence At The Time Was Wrong.

Anywhere, Anytime Ordinary People Are Given The Chance To Choose, The Choice Is The Same: Freedom, Not Tyranny; Democracy, Not Dictatorship; The Rule Of Law, Not The Rule Of The Secret Police.

You've Got Problems In Central Asia. And You've Got Problems Within Our Own Communities Back Home. So If We End Up Saying, Look, This Has Nothing To Do With Islam Or It's Got No Connection With That Broader Question, Then We Look, Frankly, As If We're In Denial About The Problem. And The Interesting Thing In The Middle East Is That They Have Absolutely No Problem There In Identifying That As Islamist Extremism And Calling It That.

The Spanish Pm Rang Me To Say: 'i Have The Support Of Only 4 Per Cent Of The People.' I Said, 'crikey, That's Even Less Than Think Elvis Presley Is Still Alive.'

As The World Transforms, Moves Closer Together, Jobs Are Displaced, And The World Of Work Completely Changes The Way We Live, The Way We Think. As That Revolution Goes On Around Us, It Is Going To Pose Political Challenges Of Which Immigration Is One Very Obvious One, Which Are Going To Be Extremely Difficult To Deal With. But It's Like Free Trade. You Know, In The End, If We Go Protectionist, We'll Make A Mistake.

All The Evidence Here, For Example, In Britain, Is That Migrants, Particularly From The Rest Of Europe, Who Come Here Contribute Far More In Taxes.

We Expected, I Expected To Find Actual Usable, Chemical Or Biological Weapons After We Entered Iraq. But I Have To Accept, As The Months Have Passed, It Seems Increasingly Clear That At The Time Of Invasion, Saddam Did Not Have Stockpiles Of Chemical Or Biological Weapons Ready To Deploy.

When Europe And America Stand Together The World Is A Better And More Prosperous Place.

Europe And America

I Feel Like Everyone Else In This Country Today. I Am Utterly Devastated.

We Can Debate This Or That Aspect Of Climate Change, But The Reality Is That Most People Now Accept Our Climate Is Indeed Subject To Change As A Result Of Greenhouse Gas Emissions.

My Office Is On Twitter. I Don't Tweet Myself - At Least, Not Intentionally, But I Probably Should Do.

Enough Of Talking: It Is Time Now To Do.

Human Progress Has Never Been Shaped By Commentators, Complainers Or Cynics.

Fanaticism Is Not A State Of Religion But A State Of Mind.

The British People Are The Boss.

Terrorism Brings The Reprisal; The Reprisal Brings The Additional Hatred; The Additional Hatred Breeds The Additional Terrorism, And So On.

If We Take All This Actions And If It Turns Out Not Be True, We Have Reduced Pollution And Have Better Ways To Live, The Downside Is Very Small. The Other Way Around, And We Don’t Act, And It Turns Out To Be True, Then We Have Betrayed Future Generations And We Don’t Have The Right To Do That.

Genetic Modification Has Many Different Areas, For Example In Medicine, And Britain Is At The Leading Edge Of This New Technology. I Don't Know, But People Tell Me, It Could Indeed By The Leading Science Of The 21st Century. All I Say To People Is: 'just Keep An Open Mind And Let Us Proceed According To Genuine Scientific Evidence.'

I've Never Ruled Out The Possibility Of Going Back Into Public Service.

One Of The Paradoxes Of Globalization Is That, In The Developing World, We've Seen Massive Reductions In Property.

If There Is One Thing Britain Should Learn From The Last 50 Years, It Is This: Europe Can Only Get More Important For Us.

The 21st Century Will Not Be About The Battle Between Capitalism And Socialism But Between The Forces Of Progress And The Forces Of Conservatism.

However Much I Dislike The Idea Of Abortion, You Should Not Criminalize A Woman Who, In Very Difficult Circumstances, Makes That Choice.

Immigration Is Good For A Country. It Brings Fresh Energy.

If You've Got Communities That Feel They've Been Left Behind, If You've Got - As You Do In Britain At The Moment, You Have Communities That Believe They're Being Changed By Immigration, That They Don't Have Job Opportunities, And That They're Disregarded And That They Don't - They've Got No Stake In A Future Which Embraces Globalization, You've Got To Address That Issue.

The Biological Agents We Believe Iraq Can Produce Include Anthrax, Botulinum, Toxin, Aflatoxin And Ricin. All Eventually Result In Excruciatingly Painful Death.

Politics May Be The Art Of The Possible; But, At Least In Life, Give The Impossible A Go.

There Is No Way You're Going To Have An Event Like 9/11 And Expect Things To Remain The Same. They Killed 3,000 People In New York On That Day, And If They Could Have They Would've Killed 300,000.

There Should Not Be A Party Within A Party.

The Threat Today Is Not That Of The 1930s. It's Not Big Powers Going To War With Each Other. The Ravages Which Fundamentalist Political Ideology Inflicted On The 20th Century Are Memories. The Cold War Is Over. Europe Is At Peace, If Not Always Diplomatically.

The Moment You Stigmatize A Whole Group Of People - For Example, Muslims - Then, Obviously, You Make The Decent, Law-abiding Muslims Feel As If They're Under Threat In Some Way Or That Their Legitimacy, As Members Or Citizens Of Society, Is Brought Into Question.

Society Works By Putting Opportunity And Responsibility Together.

I Think Crime Is A Huge Issue For People. If You Were Living In The Poorest State, And You've Got Drug Dealers At The End Of The Street, And Your Life's In Misery, And You're Afraid Of Your Kids Going Out The Door. I Mean, The Job Of Progressive Politicians Is To Do Something About That.

A Challenge So Far-reaching In Its Impact And Irreversible In Its Destructive Power, That It Alters Radically Human Existence... There Is No Doubt That The Time To Act Is Now.

I'm Not Asking You To Agree With Me, But At Least Open Your Mind.

I Am Not Sure That We Would Always Want 16-year-olds To Do All The Things They Can Do. I Am Afraid That I Do Not Agree With The Hon. Gentleman On The Voting Age. I Think That It Should Remain As It Is.

Sometimes People Say To Me, 'well, What Was The Difference Between Kosovo, Which Was A Successful Intervention, And Iraq And Afghanistan That Have Been So Difficult?' And The Answer Is Perfectly Simple. In Kosovo, You Have, After The Removal Of The Loss Of Its Regime, You Had A Process Of Political And Economic Reconstruction That Took Its Part Without The Intervention Of Terrorism. If You Had The Intervention Of Terrorism, By The Way, It Would Have Been Extremely Difficult There - But We Didn't.

Most Of The Problems Of Government Come From People Being Overwhelmed By The Size And Scale Of What They Have To Do.

Saddam Was A Threat, That The Threat Had To Be Dealt With.

We Promise That The Events Of 1991 Will Not Happen Again. We Have Pledged To Remove Saddam. And We Will Deliver.

...we Must Support And Protect Individuals And Companies Engaged In Life Saving Medical Research

Nothing Is More Important To England's Arrangements For The World Cup Than The State Of David Beckham's Foot.

The Purpose Of Terrorism Lies Not Just In The Violent Act Itself. It Is In Producing Terror. It Sets Out To Inflame, To Divide, To Produce Consequences Which They Then Use To Justify Further Terror.

Real Progress Cannot Be Measured By Money Alone. We Must Ensure That Economic Growth Contributes To Our Quality Of Life, Rather Than Degrading It

I'm The F***ing Prime Minister!

People Always Think American Politics Is Very Different, But Usually It Is A Predictor Of What Happens In The Politics Elsewhere.

They Could Have Been Removed. They Could Have Been Hidden. They Could Have Been Destroyed.

Could Have Been

Some May Belittle Politics, But We Know - Who Are Engaged In It - That It Is Where People Stand Tall. And, Although I Know It Has Its Many Harsh Contentions, It Is Still The Arena That Sets The Heart Beating A Little Faster. And If It Is, On Occasions, The Place Of Low Skulduggery, It Is More Often The Place For The Pursuit Of Noble Causes.

Global Warming Is Too Serious For The World Any Longer To Ignore Its Danger Or Split Into Opposing Factions On It.

I Have Long Believed This Interdependence Defines The New World We Live In.

Interdependence

Climate Change Is Probably The Greatest Long-term Challenge Facing The Human Race.

I'm One Of These People That, Once You Have Had Your Election And You Have Elected Your Candidate, Let's See What Actually Happens.

Leaders Lead But In The End It's The People Who Deliver.

In Downing Street They Called Me 'boss'. Civil Servants Would Always Call Me 'prime Minister'.

The Iraqi Elections Struck A Blow To The Heart Of Global Terrorism.

The Iraq Survey Group Has Already Found Massive Evidence Of A Huge System Of Clandestine Laboratories.

I Think It Is Having Answers And Not Simply Anger, And Providing Solutions That People Believe Will Change Their Lives In A Radical Way But Do It In A Way That's Sensible.

If You're Living In A Community That's Become Fragmented And Left Behind, There's Not Proper Investment In It And So On, In The End, The Answer Is To Make Sure That We Go And We Help Those Communities, We Educate The People Properly, We Build The Necessary Infrastructure Of Support For People.

My View Is That We're Entering Into A Situation Of Enormous Instability, Insecurity, Fragility.

There Is No Doubt As To What Needs To Happen. There Has To Be A Complete Rejection Of The Type Of Terrorist Attacks Carried Out In India.

There Are Literally Thousands Of Sites. As I Was Told In Iraq, Information Is Coming In The Entire Time, But It Is Only Now That The Iraq Survey Group Has Been Put Together That A Dedicated Team Of People, Which Includes Former Un Inspectors, Scientists And Experts, Will Be Able To Go In And Do The Job Properly.

What We Have Got To Do Now Is Use This Event, The Resignation Of The Whole Commission, To Drive Through Root And Branch Reform.

There Are Solutions That Are Proper, But They Require The Painstaking And Difficult Work Of Building Alliances And Also Being Prepared To Analyze The Problem Realistically. And Exactly The Same Thing Is Going On My Side Of The Atlantic As Is Going On Your Side Of The Atlantic.

What We Want To See Is The Development Of Human Rights And Greater Democracy, Not Just Because It Is Our System But Because We Think That's The Best Way That Economic And Political Development Go Hand In Hand.

Saddam Hussein's Regime Is Despicable, He Is Developing Weapons Of Mass Destruction, And We Cannot Leave Him Doing So Unchecked. He Is A Threat To His Own People And To The Region And, If Allowed To Develop These Weapons, A Threat To Us Also.

Mass Destruction

I Think The Single Most Important Political Distinction Today Is Actually Between Open-minded Versus Closed-minded, And That's Why I Think This Crosses The Boundaries Of Traditional - Center-right And Center-left Have Much More In Common With Each Other Right Now Than The Right Does With The Center-right, And The Left Does With The Center-left.

Education Is The Best Economic Policy There Is.

Economic Policy

Well, We Definitely Need A Strong And Clear And Assertive America. That's For Sure. But You've Always Got To Build Alliances. And So It's Very Important That We Are Able To Build Those Alliances. And Where We Don't Do What In A Way To Extremists Want Us To Do, Which Is To Make This Into A Battle Between The West And Islam - It's Not. This Isn't A Clash Between Civilizations. It's About Whether The Values Of Tolerance And Respect For Difference Prevail.

Our Task Is Not To Fight Old Battles, But To Show That There Is A Third Way, A Way Of Marrying Together An Open Competitive Society And Successful Economy With A Just And Decent Society.

I'm A Labour Politician, But, You Know, I Can See Decent Tories With Good Ideas.

That's The Art Of Leadership. To Make Sure That What Shouldn't Happen, Doesn't Happen.

There Will Be No Peace In Our World Without An Understanding Of The Place Of Religion Within It.

The Art Of Leadership Is Saying No, Not Saying Yes. It Is Very Easy To Say Yes.

She Was The People's Princess And That Is How She Will Stay, How She Will Remain In Our Hearts And Our Memories For Ever.

We've Seen The Reality Of Saddam's Regime: His Thugs Prepared To Kill Their Own People, The Parading Of Prisoners Of War And Now The Release Of Those Pictures Of Executed British Soldiers.

Labour Is The Party Of Law And Order In Britain Today. Tough On Crime, Tough On The Causes Of Crime.

I Think We've, Again, Got To Be Extremely Careful; Otherwise We'll Misunderstand What's Going On In Iraq And In Syria Today. Of Course, You Can't Say That Those Of Us Who Removed Saddam In 2003 Bear No Responsibility For The Situation In 2015.

I Think The Center Ground Have Got To Become The People Of Change Again And Not The Guardians Of The Status Quo. And That Is The Weakness It Comes To In Our Campaign. You Can See It In Your Politics, You Can See It Everywhere.

Our Determination To Defend Our Values And Way Of Life Is Greater Than Their (terrorists) Determination To Cause Death And Destruction To Innocent People In A Desire To Impose Extremism Upon The World.

Every So Often, I Feel I Should Graduate To Classical Music, Properly. But The Truth Is, I'm More Likely To Listen To Rock Music.

There Is Good Evidence That Last Year's European Heat Wave Was Influenced By Global Warming. It Resulted In 26,000 Premature Deaths And Cost $13.5bn.

Self-interest And Mutual Interest Are Inextricably Linked. National Interests Can Best Be Advanced Through Collective Action, ... Calculate Not Just The Human Misery Of The Poor Themselves. Calculate Our Loss: The Aid, The Lost Opportunity To Trade, The Short-term Consequences Of The Multiple Conflicts; The Long-term Consequences On The Attitude To The Wealthy World Of Injustice And Abject Deprivation Amongst The Poor.

There's A Deep Affection And Respect For The Queen And The Monarchy In The U.k. But Diana Was An Extraordinary, Iconic Figure And Her Death Sparked A Fierce Reaction, Part Grief And Part Anger At Her Being Taken Away. It Was Very Fraught.

We Expected, I Expected To Find Actual Usable, Chemical Or Biological Weapons After We Entered Iraq.

The Emphasis Placed By More And More Companies On Corporate Social Responsibility, Symbolises The Recognition That Prosperity Is Best Achieved In An Inclusive Society.

After The Terrible Events Of Last Week, There Is Still The Shock And Disbelief; There Is Anger; There Is Fear; But There Is Also, Throughout The World, A Profound Sense Of Solidarity; There Is Courage; There Is A Surging Of The Human Spirit.

Terrible Events

What The Commission That Myself And Leon Panetta Is Trying To Do Is Analyze This In Two Respects. First Of All, What's The Right Military Response And Security Response?

Surely We Have The Wit And Will To Develop Economically Without Despoiling The Very Environment We Depend Upon

How Do We Deal With Not Just The Acts Of Violence, But The Extremist Ideology That Lies Behind Them? Because Though The Numbers Of Fanatics That Go And Join And Kill For A Group Like Isis Are Measured In Tens Of Thousands, Those That Support The Wider Ideology, I'm Afraid, You Measure In Tens Of Millions Or More.

I'm Not Prepared To Have Someone Tell Me There Is Only One View Of What Europe Is. Europe Isn't Owned By Any Of Them, Europe Is Owned By All Of Us.

I Do Not Seek Unpopularity As A Badge Of Honour, But Sometimes It Is The Price Of Leadership And The Cost Of Conviction.

The Kaleidoscope Has Been Shaken. The Pieces Are In Flux. Soon They Will Settle Again. Before They Do, Let Us Re-order This World Around Us.

Ask Me My Three Main Priorities For Government, And I Tell You: Education, Education And Education.

And Just As The Terrorist Seeks To Divide Humanity In Hate, So We Have To Unify It Around An Idea. And That Idea Is Liberty.

Nato's Got A Vital Role To Play. It's Very Important That We Protect Nato.

For Me, 9/11 Was A Game Changer. It Altered My Perception Of The Security Threat We Faced. I Took The Position That Britain Should Be Shoulder To Shoulder With The U.s. It Was A Big Decision; I Didn't Take It Lightly, Or In Ignorance Of Its Consequences. It's A Big Commitment For A Country To Give, But I Believed It Was The Right Thing To Do.

I Abhor Saddam's Regime, But The Basis Has To Be Disarmament.

But In Terms Of How People Live Together, How We Minimize The Prospects Of Conflict And Maximize The Prospects Of Peace, The Place Of Religion In Our Society Today Is Essential.

I Think It Is Vitally Important To Study History. If We Are Going To Lead Britain Safely Into The Future, It Is Essential That We Understand Our Country's Historical Roots. If We Can Learn The Lessons Of The Past, We Will Be Able To Avoid Making Mistakes In The Future.

I Believe The Bicentenary Offers Us A Chance Not Just To Say How Profoundly Shameful The Slave Trade Was - How We Condemn Its Existence Utterly And Praise Those Who Fought For Its Abolition - But Also To Express Our Deep Sorrow That It Could Ever Have Happened And Rejoice At The Better Times We Live In Today.

The First Rule In Politics Is That There Are No Rules, At Least Not In The Sense Of Inevitable Defeats Or Inevitable Victories. If You Have The Right Policy And The Right Strategy, You Always Have A Chance Of Winning. Without Them, You Can Lose No Matter How Certain The Victory Seems.

If You Don't See The Internet As An Opportunity, It Will Become A Threat. In Two Or Three Year's Time, The Internet Will Become As Commonplace In The Office As The Telephone.

Before People Crow About The Absence Of Weapons Of Mass Destruction, I Suggest They Wait A Bit.

Mass Destruction

I Still Think The World Is Better Off And Safer Without Saddam Hussein.

It's Not A Burning Ambition For Me To Make Sure That David Beckham Earns Less Money.

The Appalling Details Of The Campaign Of Intimidation - Which Include Grave-robbing - Show The Depths To Which The Animal Extremists Are Prepared To Stoop.

I Learnt A Lot In Government, And I've Learnt A Lot Since Leaving Government. The Kind Of Journey Of Being In Government Is That You Start At Your Most Popular And Least Capable, And You End At Your Most Capable And Least Popular.

People Divide Into Groups Where They Talk To Each Other, But Don't Talk Across The Divide. And Yet Most Of The Challenges We Face In The World Today Are Challenges That Are To Do With Trade, With Technology, With How You Make Sure That People Are Properly Educated, Reform Your Health Care System.

Your Loss We Count As Our Loss. Your Struggle We Take As Our Struggle.

The First Big Choice: A Government With The Strength To Deliver Stability, Or A Government That Takes The Country Back To Boom And Bust.

I Mean, I Went To A Church School When I Was Younger And Imbibed A Certain Amount Of Religion Then But It Was Really In University That I Got Interested In Religion And Politics At The Same Time. I Don't Think As If It Were One Moment Of Conversion But My Spiritual Journey Really Began Then.

I Just Want To Say This. I Want To Say It Gently But I Want To Say It Firmly: There Is A Tendency For The World To Say To America, ‘the Big Problems Of The World Are Yours, You Go And Sort Them Out,’ And Then To Worry When America Wants To Sort Them Out.

We Need To Develop The New Green Industrial Revolution That Develops The New Technologies That Can Confront And Overcome The Challenge Of Climate Change; And That Above All Can Show Us Not That We Can Avoid Changing Our Behaviour But We Can Change It In A Way That Is Environmentally Sustainable.

I Want To See A Publicly-owned Railway, Publicly Accountable.

We Can Only Protect Liberty By Making It Relevant To The Modern World.

I Don't Think There Is A Way Politically To Beat "insurgent Movement Of Populism".

You Only Require Two Things In Life: Your Sanity And Your Wife.

I Didn't Come Into Politics To Change The Labour Party. I Came Into Politics To Change The Country.

You Get These Insurgent Movements Of Populism, Left And Right. An Insurgent Movement Of Populism Took My Political Party Over In The Uk For Example.

The Jolt That Tony Blair Received 35,000ft Above The Pacific Ocean Was Not Normal Turbulence.

The British Are Special. The World Knows It. In Our Innermost Thoughts We Know It. This Is The Greatest Nation On Earth.

What Is Obviously Unfair Is That The Half Of The Population That Doesn't Go To University That's Often On Lower Incomes Pays More Taxes In Order To Send Other People To University, Without Them, You Know, Contributing.

The Full Horror Of What Has Happened In The United States Earlier Today Is Now Becoming Clearer. It Is Hard Even To Contemplate The Utter Carnage And Terror Which Has Engulfed So Many Innocent People. We've Offered President Bush And The American People Our Solidarity, Our Profound Sympathy, And Our Prayers. But It Is Plain That Citizens Of Many Countries Round The World, Including Britain, Will Have Been Caught Up In This Terror.

As I Have Said Throughout, I Have No Doubt That They Will Find The Clearest Possible Evidence Of Saddam's Weapons Of Mass Destruction.

Mass Destruction

Our Aim Is Not Just An Educated Nation But An Intelligent One

What I'm Really More Interested In Doing - Because I Think, In A Way That's Kind Of Obvious - And You Can See, Look Into Austria - You've Got A Far-right Candidate Who May Become The President Because He's In A Close-run Race.

If There Are Further Steps To European Integration, The People Should Have Their Say At A General Election Or In A Referendum.

My Dad Was A Militant Atheist, Or Is A Militant Atheist. My Mum Was Sort Of Bought Up In A Religious Family Because She Was A Protestant From Ireland But Wasn't Especially Religious.

Trending Author

Thomas Friedman

Thomas A. Edison

Gertrude Jekyll

Category