Further Education should be about the ability to learn, not the ability to pay - everyone who is able should have the opportunity, regardless of their family background. I don't want to see students struggling with huge debts or frightened off even going to university in the first place.

For any new leader of any party at any given time it takes time if you are not in government to establish yourself.

Politics is much too serious to be taken too seriously; equally, there are many aspects of it so laughable as to be lamentable.

I should do something about the cigarettes; I quite accept that it's bad for your health, but you know a moderate tipple is positively beneficial and, at certain times, absolutely essential.

The quicker we get rid of the lobby system the better for all of us. I don't think in this day and age it is tenable to have these nods and winks, and on-the-record and off-the-record briefings.

I will go out of this world feet first with my Lib Dem membership card in my pocket.

Actually, I think it's quite sensible not to take yourself too seriously.