There is only one opinion poll that I am interested in and that is the one that will take place on election day.

I am happy to debate the past with the Prime Minister... I have a big dossier on his past, and I did not even have to sex it up.

We cannot possibly take them all into this country [asylum seekers] - it is a completely unrealistic expectation.

People often of masterful intelligence, trained usually in law or economics or perhaps in political science, who have led their governments into disastrous decisions and miscalculations because they have no awareness whatever of the historical background, the cultural universe, of the foreign societies with which they have to deal.

The important thing when you are going to do something brave is to have someone on hand to witness it.

History is what we read, write and think about the past.

What is Parliament for if it is not to be a means to make ministers accountable for the services for which they are responsible.