Now, again, what the center ground has got to do is to respond to people's genuine concerns and fears.

We have a situation where we are rich really as a world overall, and yet we have the capacity to destroy ourselves, either through nuclear weapons or through environmental degradation, and we allow the life chances of hundreds of millions of people to be destroyed because we haven't found the will to tackle it

Some may belittle politics, but we know - who are engaged in it - that it is where people stand tall. And, although I know it has its many harsh contentions, it is still the arena that sets the heart beating a little faster. And if it is, on occasions, the place of low skulduggery, it is more often the place for the pursuit of noble causes.

I think the journey for a politician goes from wanting to please all the people all the time, to a political leader that realises in the end his responsibility is to decide. And when he decides, he divides.

My view is that we're entering into a situation of enormous instability, insecurity, fragility.

There are literally thousands of sites. As I was told in Iraq, information is coming in the entire time, but it is only now that the Iraq survey group has been put together that a dedicated team of people, which includes former UN inspectors, scientists and experts, will be able to go in and do the job properly.

Their barbarism will stand as their shame for all eternity.