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The Great Gatsby
Hamlet

John Major Quotes

I like the best of the British press. The best of the British press is very good.

– John Major

If you look back historically, admittedly a long time ago, there were three Afghan wars in which Britain didn’t even come a good second. In more recent years the Russians were there with 120,000 men for ten years.

– John Major

I don’t think it’s the role of the prime minister to court the press.

– John Major

The sight of allegedly sophisticated politicians parroting complete tripe trivialises and demeans government and it has to be stopped. It’s played a significant part in public disillusionment with politics and has led to the absurd situation where more people vote for ‘Strictly Come Dancing’ than voted in the general election.

– John Major

Let’s turn British inventions into British industries, British factories and British jobs. Let them make pounds for us, not dollars marks or yen for others.

– John Major

The argument that someone is a bad man is an inadequate argument for war and certainly an inadequate and unacceptable argument for regime change.

– John Major

I’m not about to write my memoirs. Not for a long time.

– John Major

I think the biggest mistake I made was this wretched ability to see both sides of an argument.

– John Major

I think we can get respect for Parliament back providing governments and oppositions are frank.

– John Major

You don’t forget crises and neither does the Queen.

– John Major

What happens when there is a conflict between the Scottish parliament, if it was established, and the Westminster parliament? Who is supreme?

– John Major

My mother was the center of the family.

– John Major

Disunity costs votes.

– John Major

Ronnie Barker will forever be remembered as one of the great comic actors.

– John Major

There are more myths about Black Wednesday than the Greeks ever created.

– John Major

I have been reading the press more regularly than others over 50 years and it seems to me that there are things that have changed in the press that have changed its character.

– John Major

September the 11th was a huge shock in the United States. It was the first time you had been hit at home in your own territory by terrorist on this scale.

– John Major

I don’t think nations can stand aside for ethnic cleansing and genocide.

– John Major

I think it’s extremely unlikely that the European Union will fracture with nations dropping off the edge.

– John Major

I want Britain to punch its weight in the European Community.

– John Major

When the euro was born, it was born in the wrong economic circumstances.

– John Major

Society needs to condemn a little more and understand a little less.

– John Major

I mean if you have ever found a politician who says, ‘No, no, I would do everything exactly as I did,’ then you can tell when he is lying because his lips are moving.

– John Major

Too many people looked to me in the eye and did not tell me the truth.

– John Major

I think the majority of the British people are still sanguine about the need for war.

– John Major

I thought I could do something different from any Conservative prime minister before me. But I couldn’t.

– John Major

Only in Britain could it be thought a defect to be too clever by half. The probability is that too many people are too stupid by three-quarters.

– John Major

I inherited a sick economy and passed on a sound one. But one abiding regret for me is that, in between, I did not have the resources to put in place the educational and social changes about which I cared to much; I made only a beginning, and it was not enough.

– John Major

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

– John Major

The first requirement of politics is not intellect or stamina but patience. Politics is a very long run game and the tortoise will usually beat the hare.

– John Major

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