If we want to deliver opportunity for all, we need...

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.

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.

Well, I think there's a distinction between sexing-up the intelligence and sexing-up the presentation of the intelligence.

We live in an age when to be young and to be indifferent can be no longer synonymous. We must prepare for the coming hour. The claims of the Future are represented by suffering millions and the Youth of a Nation are the trustees of Posterity.

This is the first age that's ever paid much attention to the future, which is a little ironic since we may not have one.

High expectations weren't nurtured in my neck of nowhere back then - children weren't fawned over from an early age as 'gifted' and groomed for a prizewinning future self-esteem was considered something you had to pick from the garden yourself.

A great source of calamity lies in regret and anticipation therefore a person is wise who thinks of the present alone, regardless of the past or future.