210 Quotes filtered by policy
I won't claim the workhouses didn't have their problems, but they were set up by people who cared.
Edwina Currie 03/10/1986
Category: Poverty
I would not say that the poor are poorer, except that they are more conscious of it.
Indira Gandhi 01/08/1982
Category: Poverty
Sydney Bidwell MP: Is the Right Honourable Lady aware that Mr Len Murray, the General Secretary of the TUC, insists that when he sees her, it is like having a dialogue with the deaf?
Margaret Thatcher: I had no idea that Mr Murray was deaf.
Margaret Thatcher
Category: Humour & Satire, Trade Unions
We introduced the Community Charge. I still call it that. I like the Poles - I never had any intention of taxing them.
Margaret Thatcher 22/11/1996
Category: Community Charge/Poll Tax
As Permanent Secretary I felt a deep sense of responsibility, not of culpability, in this area since he was a member of my staff and so his death came as a terrible shock.
Sir Kevin Tebbit 19/08/2003
Category: Hutton Inquiry
There was no point in telling us that fuel has to be expensive to save the world and that without it people cannot get to hospital.
Jeremy Clarkson 2000
Category: Cars, Environment
Anyone who can remain popular and respected while running the west coast mainline must be made of Teflon.
Matthew Taylor (IPPR)
Category: Railways
I have very strong views about Europe. We're quite the best country. We rescued them. We're not going to get entangled with them. We've got to keep our own independence. Is that clear?
Margaret Thatcher 10/1999
At a party conference fringe meeting
Category: Eurosceptic
Pensioners were not born yesterday.
Steven Webb
from the LibDems pensions spokesman.
Category: Pensions
A diplomat is somebody who can tell you to go to hell and leave you looking forward to the trip.
Alex Salmond
Category: Diplomacy
The distinctions between the higher and popular arts are meaningless.
Chris Smith 1997
defending his statement that Bob Dylan is as valid a poet as John Keats
Category: Arts & Culture
You teach a child to read, and he or she will be able to pass a literacy test.
George W Bush 20/02/2001
Category: Education
The one thing that is absolutely essential is that there shouldn't be any governmental control [of the media] directly or indirectly.
Tony Benn 1969
Category: Government & Media, Nationalisation
I exercise my right as a free citizen to spend my own money in my own way, so that I can go on the day, the time, to the doctor I choose and get out fast.
Margaret Thatcher 06/1987
On why she chooses to use private healthcare, causing a political storm during the General Election campaign
Category: Health Issues
The National Health Service is safe with us. The principle of adequate healthcare should be provided for all regardless of ability to pay must be the function of any arrangements for financing the NHS. We stand by that.
Margaret Thatcher 10/1982
Category: Health Issues
The legal system we have and the rule of law are far more responsible for our traditional liberties than any system of one man one vote. Any country or Government which wants to proceed towards tyranny starts to undermine legal rights and undermine the law.
Margaret Thatcher 10/1966
Category: Rule of Law
We are a British nation with British characteristics. Every country can take some small minorities and in many ways they add to the richness and variety of this country. The moment the minority threatens to become a big one, people get frightened.
Margaret Thatcher 30/01/1979
Category: English Identity, Immigration
Everyone in public life ought to be arrested at least once. It's an education.
Alan Clark
Category: Law & Order
