As long as the number one worry for people, keeping them up at nights, is whether they're going to have a job in the morning, then they are less likely to resist unfair changes, or unfair treatment, or cuts in real pay at work.

I want a society that provides decent jobs for those who can work and decent security for those can't.

Ordinary people who have lots of good ideas want more than a suggestion box, and they need a union to represent that thinking.

There is this sense of David Cameron leading a Government that's badly out of touch with ordinary people's lives. I'd absolutely welcome the opportunity to show all political leaders what life is like for most people.

I cherish the creation of public space and services, especially health, housing and the comprehensive education system which dared to give so many of us ideas 'above our station.'

My first hero, as a teenager, was James Connolly. I remember discovering that he was a feminist, and that was an eye-opener, coming from a man of such poverty.

Governments of all stripes want to deliver growth and rebalance their economies now that they have learned the hard way that, left to their own devices, markets pick expensive banking losers.