John Major Quotes

I want to see us build a country that is at ease with itself, a country that is confident and a country that is able and willing to build a better quality of life for all its citizens.

That must be the first agreement in history that was signed by people who decided it was useless in the first place.

Oh, Lord, if I must die today,
Please make it after Close of Play.
For this, I know, if nothing more,
I will not go – without the score.
The God of cricket, high above,
Clearly heard this plea of love.
And so the Reaper did not come
Until the game was lost and won.

Whether you agree with me, disagree with me, like me or loathe me, don't bind my hands when I am negotiating on behalf of the British people.

I would like the public to have a crusade against crime and change their attitude from being forgiving of crime to being considerate to the victim. Society needs to condemn a little more and understand a little less.

Their approach is profoundly un-Conservative and, whatever its short-term effect, will do permanent damage to the reputation of the Conservative Party.

If the answer is more politicians, you are asking the wrong question.

All my adult life I have seen British governments driven off their virtuous pursuit of low inflation by market problems or political pressures. I was under no illusions when I took Britain into the ERM. I said at the time that membership was no soft option. The soft option, the devaluer's option, the inflationary option, that would in my opinion be a betrayal of Britain's future.

Democracy in action is more than satisfying the material demands of the majority, or honouring the promises of an election manifesto. Democratic government must govern for the future as well as the present. A governing party must govern for political opponents who did not vote for them – and may never do so. It must govern for the unborn, and the country they will inherit. For minorities. For the wider international community. And all governments have a responsibility to themselves for the manner in which they govern. One has only to set out these responsibilities to see that no government, perhaps ever, has met this ideal – government by men and women, not saints, is an imperfect vehicle for perfection. But that does not mean their imperfections should be ignored or accepted.

The protocol is a mess. It was very poorly negotiated [...] I think some of the promises made after the protocol that there would be no checks on trade from Britain and Northern Ireland, how those promises came to be made I cannot imagine because they were patently wrong. The protocol needs changing. I am baffled as to how we could have reached a situation where that protocol was accepted.

Summers simply won't be the same without him.

The right hon. and learned Member is the man who likes to say yes in Europe — Monsieur Oui, the poodle of Brussels.

If the implication of his remarks is that we should sit down and talk with Mr. Adams and the Provisional IRA, I can say only that that would turn my stomach and those of most hon. Members; we will not do it. If and when there is a total ending of violence, and if and when that ending of violence is established for a significant time, we shall talk to all the constitutional parties that have people elected in their names. I will not talk to people who murder indiscriminately.

Fifty years on from now, Britain will still be the country of long shadows on county grounds, warm beer, invincible green suburbs, dog lovers and pools fillers and, as George Orwell said, 'Old maids bicycling to holy communion through the morning mist' and, if we get our way, Shakespeare will still be read even in school.

A soundbite never buttered any parsnips.