The number one priority now is reducing the deficit that they [Labour] left us - the biggest deficit since the Second World War.

Do not underestimate the determination of a quiet man.

All I can say to the others is, 'Look out, we're on our way.

After years of piecemeal reform the current welfare system is complex and unfair.

We do not celebrate people who have made success out of serious hard work.

A system that was originally designed to support the poorest in society is now trapping them in the very condition it was supposed to alleviate.

Over the years the political establishment has frowned if a mainstream politician mentions marriage.

I went up to the top of the career ladder and I came down again, I am past all that.

That thing, 'You must stay together for the kids,' is out of fashion but is right. It's not arguing parents that children don't like, it is having one parent.

I am not going to go round trying to make people say 'Wow!'... I'm not going to play Hollywood lookalikes.

No I'm not a great believer in getting back over things and saying if only, or if, or buts because I don't think we actually get anywhere on that.

Spring is the fountain of love for thirsty winter

The health of an enlightened and progressive society is measured by how vibrant is its science fiction, since that is where true self-critique and appraisal and hope lie.

The wiser you become, the lesser you will be surprised!

In 1980, shortly before my 11th birthday, I wrote my first essay in English.

What? Sunday morning in an English family and no sausages? God bless my soul, what's the world coming to, eh?

Society cannot exist unless a controlling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere, and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without.

Literacy is, finally, the road to human progress and the means through which every man, woman and child can realize his or her full potential.

There's a lot that you can do in television that you can't do with a film, theoretically. At the time, the only possibility was to do a movie.

One should always eat muffins quite calmly. It is the only way to eat them.

Your teammates see you through the good and the bad. They see where your foundation lies.