Douglas Hurd Quotes

We have to find, as the Victorians found, techniques and instruments which reach the parts of our society which will always be beyond the scope of statutory schemes. I believe that the inspiring and the enlisting of the active citizen in all walks of life is the key.

Fear of racial assault or harassment still scars the lives of too many men and women, especially in the inner cities... Racial harmony could not be imposed by legislation or by ministerial acts. However, the Government should help foster greater trust and equality of opportunity between people of different ethnic origins through a gradual shift in individual attitudes and behaviour. A Conservative government and a Conservative Party are well placed for that task. A harmonious but not homogenized nation was close to the hearts of both.

There is no dread conspiracy against us. There is simply an argument, and no reason why we should be scared or defeatist in that argument. We must continue to fight our corner for British interests. But we can do that without frightening ourselves with ogres.

Prison is an expensive way of making bad people worse.

We have learnt that one cannot suppress nationalist feeling or force it into a framework against which it revolts.

The case for European solidarity has never been stronger than it is today because the pressures piling up on Europe are themselves strong and varied. At the moment the headlines in our newspapers concentrate on certain trading arguments with the United States. Clearly we in Europe deal better with these problems when we work together, and where pressures become unacceptable we can best secure their relaxation by reacting together. Of course we should remind ourselves that our aim is not to confront the United States with our own economic strength, great though that is if we work together. Our aim must be to work out a common view with the United States, based in the case of the pipeline on a common analysis of the role of trade in East–West relations.

The idea of Active Citizenship is a necessary complement to that of the enterprise culture. Public service may once have been the duty of an elite, but today it is the responsibility of all who have time or money to spare. Modern capitalism has democratised the ownership of property, and we are now witnessing the democratisation of responsible citizenship.

[Politicians have a right to respond to the] presence or absence of the churches, and their sometimes bizarre choice of priorities for discussion.

Lord Rothschild roamed like a condottiere through Whitehall, laying an ambush here, there breaching some crumbling fortress which had outlived its usefulness... He respected persons occasionally but rarely policies.

People are very interested in politics, they just don't like it labelled 'politics'.

There will be shifts of sovereignty but only in specific areas which I consider debatable. The [European] Community should lead as external trade negotiator... But there must be basic areas of national sovereignty. Peace and war; law and order; foreign policy; fiscal policy. You can cooperate, but these are not matters for Community competence. Our resistance was entirely justified in the case of the Social Charter... I do not believe in the European glacier, that there is something irresistible about European integration.

There is a danger that we legislate to feel good, not to do good. Nowhere is this truer than in social legislation. The warm glow comes quickly after passing a piece of law which is designed to raise standards for those in jobs; the chill of lost jobs because of lost competitiveness is felt more slowly... We should make our labour markets more flexible and job-friendly, and secure greater skill levels and cost control. That means not introducing new limitations on the labour market.

The recent local elections revealed concern about the quality of some public services which the Government will need to weigh carefully in the coming consideration of our national spending priorities. As people become personally better off their expectations of services naturally rise too and we need to take this into account... We should continue to aim at a further reduction in the level of taxation. But many of our supporters will be looking for us to strike a balance in terms of the realities of 1986.

The fruits of economic success could turn sour unless we can bring back greater social cohesion to our country.

Thatcherism is not Tutankhamun's tomb, which you've got to seal up and guard. It has to fructify. It's an investment. Take what has been achieved and go on from there. Thatcherism breaks into different things: privatisation, the extension of individual responsibility, education. But the course is certainly set. I want to keep it, not change it.