I have no time for the endless nostalgia: 'Oh gosh I used to . . . ' Life is too short; I don't have any time for sitting and saying I miss things. What's the point? Go and do something else.'

I was timid and frightened as a child. Yours truly did not shin up mountains or do any other kind of adventurous stuff.

I've never been one to sit around and eat my heart out. Life's too short.

The better the information it has, the better democracy works. Silence and secrecy are never good for it.

Beslan, where the Russian authorities stopped live coverage of the school being stormed, was an illustration of the progress we still have to make.

On the Northern Ireland question, for instance, the British and Irish governments prohibit media contact with members of the IRA, but we have always gone ahead, believing in the right to information.

I was sent to a nice Church of England girls' school and at that time, after university, a woman was expected to become a teacher, a nurse or a missionary - prior to marriage.