Words matter. These are the best John Major Quotes, and they’re great for sharing with your friends.
Well British troops are superb in the field in terms of conflict.
I thought I could do something different from any Conservative prime minister before me. But I couldn’t.
If you look back historically, admittedly a long time ago, there were three Afghan wars in which Britain didn’t even come a good second. In more recent years the Russians were there with 120,000 men for ten years.
You don’t forget crises and neither does the Queen.
In housing in the fifties in Britain and the sixties, we pulled down the terraces – destroyed whole communities and replaced them with tower blocks and we built walkways that became rat-runs for muggers. That was the fashionable opinion. But it was wrong.
I don’t have a shred of regret about entering the exchange-rate mechanism.
When I was in office the fundraising was done by the party treasurers.
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.
I have been reading the press more regularly than others over 50 years and it seems to me that there are things that have changed in the press that have changed its character.
The first requirement of politics is not intellect or stamina but patience. Politics is a very long run game and the tortoise will usually beat the hare.
I have a huge admiration for the House of Lords, I have a huge admiration for the people who work in the House of Lords, they’re great public servants and they do an absolutely tremendous job.
I like the best of the British press. The best of the British press is very good.
Certainly we’ve seen the enormous changes across the whole of the Middle East. The democratic genie is out of the bottle.
I’m not about to write my memoirs. Not for a long time.
I don’t think nations can stand aside for ethnic cleansing and genocide.
Society needs to condemn a little more and understand a little less.
My mother was the center of the family.
Ronnie Barker will forever be remembered as one of the great comic actors.
Well, I think there’s a distinction between sexing-up the intelligence and sexing-up the presentation of the intelligence.
The politician who never made a mistake never made a decision.
Let’s turn British inventions into British industries, British factories and British jobs. Let them make pounds for us, not dollars marks or yen for others.
If you look at things that really affect people’s lives – sport, the arts, charities – they were always at the back of the queue for government money – health, social security, defence, pensions were all way ahead. And each of those areas – sports, the arts, the lottery – got relatively petty cash from the government.
September the 11th was a huge shock in the United States. It was the first time you had been hit at home in your own territory by terrorist on this scale.
I don’t think it’s the role of the prime minister to court the press.
I think we can get respect for Parliament back providing governments and oppositions are frank.
You’ve had an extremely weak euro on the foreign exchange markets, you’ve had a very dubious policy being followed.
‘Government gets things right’ does not encourage sales. ‘Government makes another blunder’ does encourage sales, so there’s a commercial imperative that pushes sensationalism.
I want Britain to punch its weight in the European Community.
Too many people looked to me in the eye and did not tell me the truth.
It is time to return to core values, time to get back to basics, to self-discipline and respect for the law, to consideration for the others, to accepting responsibility for yourself and your family – and not shuffling it off on other people and the state.
Well, I have concerns about the effectiveness of Europe to compete.
What happens when there is a conflict between the Scottish parliament, if it was established, and the Westminster parliament? Who is supreme?
I think the biggest mistake I made was this wretched ability to see both sides of an argument.
I think the majority of the British people are still sanguine about the need for war.
Life is full of surprises.
