John Major

"Oh, Lord, if I must die today, Please make it after Close of Play. For this, I know, if nothing more, I will not go – without the score. The God of cricket, high above, Clearly heard this plea of love. And so the Reaper did not come Until the game was lost and won."

"In the next ten years we will have to continue to make changes which will make the whole of this country a genuinely classless society."

"I want to see us build a country that is at ease with itself, a country that is confident and a country that is able and willing to build a better quality of life for all its citizens."

"Robert Hughes (Labour MP for Aberdeen North): With regard to the Prime Minister's desire for a classless society and social mobility, will he explain why there are no women in his Cabinet, or is the only woman in his Cabinet the back-seat driver? John Major: In recent years, in all aspects of life in this country, women have been taking a higher profile: in the law, in commerce, in the civil service, in industry and in politics – and that will continue. As those women would wish it to be, they will reach the top on merit – oh yes, and if the hon. Gentleman is patient, he will find women aplenty in top positions in my Government. Indeed, if he had waited awhile, perhaps even to the end of today, he would not have asked that question."

"I want her [Margaret Thatcher] isolated; I want her destroyed."

"We Conservatives have always passed our values from generation to generation. I believe that personal prosperity should follow the same course. I want to see wealth cascading down the generations. We do not see each generation starting out anew, with the past cut off and the future ignored."

"Everyone who has seen the recent news reports has been shocked and moved by the suffering children in Sarajevo. At the end of last week, we told the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees that we stood ready to evacuate children from Sarajevo to the United Kingdom for medical treatment, or to send medical teams to Yugoslavia to provide treatment on the spot.If it is possible to treat the children on the spot, near to their families, with people around them who speak their language and in relatively familiar surroundings, that is obviously the best way. We have told the International Red Cross that we are willing to fly out medical personnel at very short notice if needed. I hope to meet the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in London later this week to see what further action is needed."

"All my adult life I have seen British governments driven off their virtuous pursuit of low inflation by market problems or political pressures. I was under no illusions when I took Britain into the ERM. I said at the time that membership was no soft option. The soft option, the devaluer's option, the inflationary option, that would in my opinion be a betrayal of Britain's future."

"I am walking over hot coals suspended over a deep pit at the bottom of which are a large number of vipers baring their fangs."

"I would like the public to have a crusade against crime and change their attitude from being forgiving of crime to being considerate to the victim. Society needs to condemn a little more and understand a little less."

"Fifty years on from now, Britain will still be the country of long shadows on county grounds, warm beer, invincible green suburbs, dog lovers and pools fillers and, as George Orwell said, 'Old maids bicycling to holy communion through the morning mist' and, if we get our way, Shakespeare will still be read even in school."

"John Major: What I don't understand, Michael, is why such a complete wimp like me keeps winning everything. Michael Brunson: You've said it, you said precisely that. Major: I suppose Gus will tell me off for saying that, won't you Gus? Brunson: No, no, no … it's a fair point. The trouble is that people are not perceiving you as winning. Major: Oh, I know … why not? Because ... Brunson: Because rotten sods like me, I suppose, don't get the message clear [laughs]. Major: No, no, no. I wasn't going to say that - well partly that, yes, partly because of S-H-one-Ts like you, yes, that's perfectly right. But also because those people who are opposing our European policy have said the way to oppose the Government on the European policy is to attack me personally. The Labour Party started before the last election. It has been picked up and it is just one of these fashionable things that slips into the Parliamentary system and it is an easy way to proceed. Brunson: But I mean you … has been overshadowed … my point is there, not just the fact that you have been overshadowed by Maastricht and people don't ... Major: The real problem is this ... Brunson: But you've also had all the other problems on top - the Mellors, the Mates … and it's like a blanket - you use the phrase 'masking tape' but I mean that's it, isn't it? Major: Even, even, even, as an ex-whip I can't stop people sleeping with other people if they ought not, and various things like that. But the real problem is ... Brunson: I've heard other people in the Cabinet say 'Why the hell didn't he get rid of Mates on Day One?' Mates was a fly, you could have swatted him away. Major: Yeah, well, they did not say that at the time, I have to tell you. And I can tell you what they would have said if I had. They'd have said 'This man was being set up. He was trying to do his job for his constituent. He had done nothing improper, as the Cabinet Secretary told me. It was an act of gross injustice to have got rid of him'. Nobody knew what I knew at the time. But the real problem is that one has a tiny majority. Don't overlook that. I could have all these clever and decisive things that people wanted me to do and I would have split the Conservative Party into smithereens. And you would have said, Aren't you a ham-fisted leader? You've broken up the Conservative Party. Brunson: No, well would you? If people come along and ... Major: Most people in the Cabinet, if you ask them sensibly, would tell you that, yes. Don't underestimate the bitterness of European policy until it is settled - It is settled now. Brunson: Three of them - perhaps we had better not mention open names in this room - perhaps the three of them would have - if you'd done certain things, they would have come along and said, 'Prime Minister, we resign'. So you say 'Fine, you resign'. Major: We all know which three that is. Now think that through. Think it through from my perspective. You are Prime Minister. You have got a majority of 18. You have got a party still harking back to a golden age that never was but is now invented. And you have three rightwing members of the Cabinet actually resigned. What happens in the parliamentary party? Brunson: They create a lot of fuss but you have probably got three damn good ministers in the Cabinet to replace them. Major: Oh, I can bring in other people into the Cabinet, that is right, but where do you think most of this poison has come from? It is coming from the dispossessed and the never-possessed. You and I can both think of ex-ministers who are going around causing all sorts of trouble. Would you like three more of the bastards out there? What's the Lyndon Johnson, er, maxim? Brunson: If you've got them by the balls their hearts and minds will follow. Major: No, that's not what I had in mind, though it's pretty good."

"It is time to return to those core values, time to get back to basics: to self-discipline and respect for the law, to consideration for others, to accepting responsibility for yourself and your family, and not shuffling it off on other people and the state."

"If the implication of his remarks is that we should sit down and talk with Mr. Adams and the Provisional IRA, I can say only that that would turn my stomach and those of most hon. Members; we will not do it. If and when there is a total ending of violence, and if and when that ending of violence is established for a significant time, we shall talk to all the constitutional parties that have people elected in their names. I will not talk to people who murder indiscriminately."

"Summers simply won't be the same without him."

"Something I was not aware had happened suddenly turned out not to have happened."

"The right hon. and learned Member is the man who likes to say yes in Europe — Monsieur Oui, the poodle of Brussels."

"We will do precisely what the British nation has done all through its history when it had its back against the wall — turn round and fight for the things it believes in, and that is what I shall do."

"The Conservative Party must make its choice. Every leader is leader only with the support of his party. That is true of me too. That is why I am no longer prepared to tolerate the present situation. In short, it is time to put up or shut up."

"George Foulkes: Will the Prime Minister tell us what word he would legitimately use to describe those Cabinet Ministers who, while professing loyalty to him, are setting up telephone lines in campaign offices for the second round of the election? John Major: I have no knowledge of that. I can say that the speed at which these matters can be done is a tribute to privatisation."

"Whether you agree with me, disagree with me, like me or loathe me, don't bind my hands when I am negotiating on behalf of the British people."

"I have been a Member of Parliament for 18 years. I have been a member of the Government for 14 years, of the Cabinet for ten years and Prime Minister since 1990. When the curtain falls it is time to get off the stage and that is what I propose to do. I shall, therefore, advise my parliamentary colleagues that it would be appropriate for them to consider the selection of a new leader of the Conservative Party to lead the party through Opposition through the years that lie immediately ahead."

"It is the one event in my life of which I am most ashamed and I have long feared would be made public."

"Democracy in action is more than satisfying the material demands of the majority, or honouring the promises of an election manifesto. Democratic government must govern for the future as well as the present. A governing party must govern for political opponents who did not vote for them – and may never do so. It must govern for the unborn, and the country they will inherit. For minorities. For the wider international community. And all governments have a responsibility to themselves for the manner in which they govern. One has only to set out these responsibilities to see that no government, perhaps ever, has met this ideal – government by men and women, not saints, is an imperfect vehicle for perfection. But that does not mean their imperfections should be ignored or accepted."

"Nationalism is authoritarian. It turns easily towards autocracy or – at worst – outright dictatorship. Nationalists hide their threat under an exaggerated love of country, an unthinking patriotism: “my country, right or wrong”. Its leaders view other countries – and sometimes other races – as inferior. [...] There is a great difference between nationalism and patriotism. Patriotism is more than pride in country. A mature patriotism concerns itself with the condition of the people, as well as the prestige of the country. Such a patriotism worries about deprivation, opportunity and incentive. It asks itself: how can we spread our wealth and opportunity more evenly around our country? And it is as concerned with the growth of food banks as it is with a shortage of aircraft carriers."

"The rebellious radicals of right and left argue for partisan policies that appeal to the extremes of their party base. As they do so, political divisions widen, consensus shrinks, and a minority of the party begins to manipulate the majority. This is dangerous territory. The malcontents should remember that, without some give-or-take, without some effort at consensus, our tolerant party system can become ungovernable. In politics, as in life, consensus is wise, not weak; and tolerance is a virtue, not a failing."

"Their approach is profoundly un-Conservative and, whatever its short-term effect, will do permanent damage to the reputation of the Conservative Party."

"That must be the first agreement in history that was signed by people who decided it was useless in the first place."

"The protocol is a mess. It was very poorly negotiated [...] I think some of the promises made after the protocol that there would be no checks on trade from Britain and Northern Ireland, how those promises came to be made I cannot imagine because they were patently wrong. The protocol needs changing. I am baffled as to how we could have reached a situation where that protocol was accepted."

"A soundbite never buttered any parsnips."

"If the answer is more politicians, you are asking the wrong question."

"...so unpopular, if he became a funeral director people would stop dying"

"He was a fairly competent chairman of Housing [on Lambeth Council]. Every time he gets up now I keep thinking, "What on earth is Councillor Major doing?" I can't believe he's here and sometimes I think he can't either."

"Seeing John Major govern the country is like watching Edward Scissorhands try to make balloon animals."

"[To Neil Kinnock, Labour leader at the 1992 general election, who lost] I realise you were up against the mighty charisma of John Major. That's a tough one, isn't it. The man who ran away from the circus to become an accountant."

"It may be inverted snobbishness but I don't want old style, Old Etonian Tories of the old school to succeed me and go back to the old complacent, consensus ways. John Major is someone who has fought his way up from the bottom and is far more in tune with the skilled and ambitious and worthwhile working classes than Douglas Hurd is."

"I will tell you in confidence; he was the best of a very poor bunch."

"I said, "He told me that he is the only person at the Treasury who hadn't got a double First." She [Margaret Thatcher] said, "He would have got a double First if he had been able to go to a university. But they were very poor. His father was a circus performer and he had to leave school when he was sixteen." I said, "He has got a first-class brain and he is a very solid person, very sound and very good." She said, "I am glad you like him because I think he is splendid.""

"I said [to Margaret Thatcher], "When you do finally decide to go, you will have to wait until he is in a position to take over from you." She said, "That has always been my intention, as you know.""