Politics Quotes

If I had been an Italian I am sure that I should have been whole-heartedly with you from the start to finish in your triumphant struggle against the bestial appetites and passions of Leninism.

From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the Continent.

Everybody has always underrated the Russians. They keep their own secrets alike from foe and friends.

Neville Chamberlain looked at foreign affairs through the wrong end of a municipal drainpipe.

A politician needs the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month, and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn't happen.

By noon it was clear that the Socialists would have a majority. At luncheon my wife said to me, 'It may well be a blessing in disguise.' I replied, 'At the moment it seems quite effectively disguised.'

I have lived my life in the House of Commons, having served there for 52 out of the last 54 years of this tumultuous and convulsive century. I have indeed seen all the ups and downs of fate and fortune there, but I have never ceased to love and honour the Mother of Parliaments, the model of the legislative assemblies of so many lands.

If I had been properly supported in 1919, I think we might have strangled Bolshevism in its cradle, but everybody turned up their hands and said, 'How shocking!'

Personally, I am always ready to learn, although I do not always like being taught, but I shall not attempt to foreshadow the proposals which will be brought before the House tomorrow. Today it will be sufficient and appropriate to deal with the obvious difficulties and confusion of the situation as we found it on taking office.

The Family Allowance Act was passed by the Conservative Caretaker Government. School milk was started in 1934 by a Conservative Parliament. The idea of welfare foods was largely developed by Lord Woolton. The Education Act was the work of Mr Butler... These facts should be repeated on every occasion by those who wish the truths to be known.

In the twinkling of an eye I found myself without an office, without a seat, without a party, and without an appendix.

The choice was clearly open: crush them with vain and unstinted force, or try to give them what they want. These were the only alternatives, and though each had ardent advocates, most people were unprepared for either. Here indeed was the Irish spectre - horrid and inexorcisable.

I decline utterly to be impartial as between the fire brigade and the fire.

Kremlin political intrigues are comparable to a bulldog fight under a rug. An outsider only hears the growling, and when he sees the bones fly out from beneath it is obvious who won.

I was myself so smitten in public opinion that it was the almost universal view that my political life was at last ended.

Battles are the principal milestones in secular history. Modern opinion resents this uninspiring truth, and historians often treat the decisions of the field as incidents in the dramas of politics and diplomacy.

In the end a curious and characteristic solution was reached. The Admiralty had demanded six ships: the economists offered four: and we finally compromised on eight.

There is a kind of intolerant spirit now abroad which arises out of the growing power of party and other machinery - a spirit which resents individual opinion, which clamours for uniformity and political Test Acts.

Criticism in the body politic is like pain in the human body. It is not pleasant, but where would the body be without it?

It is a fine game to play the game of politics and it is well worth a good hand before really plunging.