1. Quotes
  2. Authors
  3. Chris Patten

Chris Patten Quotes

Christopher Francis Patten, Baron Patten of Barnes is a British politician who served as the 28th and last Governor of Hong Kong from 1992 to 1997. He has been a crossbench member of the British House of Lords since 2005 and a former British Conservative politician until 2011, as Member of Parliament for Bath from 1979 to 1992.

Patten first became a junior British Government minister in 1986, and a member of the Cabinet from 1989 to 1992. He was Chairman of the Conservative Party from 1990 to 1992, and European Commissioner from 1999 to 2004. He was Chairman of the BBC Trust from 2011 to 2014. Currently, he is the Chancellor of the University of Oxford, a post he has held since 2003.

Patten served various junior ministerial posts under Margaret Thatcher, including at the Department of Education and Science, before joining the Cabinet in 1989 as Environment Secretary. On the succession of John Major as Prime Minister in 1990, Patten was promoted to become Chairman of the Conservative Party and Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. He orchestrated the Conservatives' unexpected fourth consecutive electoral victory in 1992, but unexpectedly, he lost his own seat in the House of Commons, in Bath.

He then accepted the final Governorship of Hong Kong until the territory's handover to China on 1 July 1997. As Governor and Commander-in-Chief, Patten presided over a steady rise in the living standards of Hong Kongers while encouraging a significant expansion of Hong Kong's social welfare and electoral system. Patten played a significant role in the Hong Kong handover ceremony with Charles, Prince of Wales and exited Victoria Harbour on HMY Britannia. Patten received national recognition for his services by appointment as Member of the Order of the Companions of Honour in the 1998 New Year Honours.

From 1999 to 2004 he served as one of the United Kingdom's two members of the European Commission. He returned to the UK and became Chancellor of the University of Oxford in 2003 and was made a life peer in 2005. On 7 April 2011 Queen Elizabeth II approved Patten's appointment as the Chairman of the BBC Trust, the governing body of the British Broadcasting Corporation. Patten held the position until his resignation on grounds of ill-health on 6 May 2014.

✵ 12. May 1944
Chris Patten photo

Works

East and West
East and West
Chris Patten
Chris Patten: 6   quotes 1   like

Famous Chris Patten Quotes

“[…] my anxiety is not that this community's autonomy would be usurped by Peking, but that it could be given away bit by bit by some people in Hong Kong.”

Chris Patten

Speech of Policy Address http://www.legco.gov.hk/yr96-97/english/lc_sitg/hansard/han0210.htm, Legislative Council of Hong Kong, 2 October 1996.

“It is not unusual for electorates to want contradictory things, and politicians often make promises accordingly.”

Chris Patten book East and West

Chris Patten, East and West: The Last Governor of Hong Kong on Power, Freedom and the Future, Pan Books, second edition, 1999, page 45.

“Nevertheless, it is true that on 1 July 1997 Hong Kong became the only example of decolonization deliberately accompanied by less democracy and a weaker protection of civil liberties. This was a cause for profound regret, especially for the departing colonial power. But it was China's doing and China's decision. I am pleased that Britain narrowly avoided complicity in the dishonourable act of denying the citizens of free Hong Kong what they had been promised in 1984.”

Chris Patten book East and West

Chris Patten, East and West: The Last Governor of Hong Kong on Power, Freedom and the Future, Pan Books, second edition, 1999, page 83.

“Asians […] put more emphasis on order, stability, hierarchy, family and self-discipline than Westerners do.”

Chris Patten book East and West

Chris Patten, East and West: The Last Governor of Hong Kong on Power, Freedom and the Future, Pan Books, second edition, 1999, page 150.

“As governor, I experienced the vitality of life in a booming and free Asian city, saw routinely the best and worst aspects of human nature, and was made to revisit some of the principles in which I have always believed but to which I had rarely given much thought previously. In the darker hours of occasionally fretful nights I found myself face to face with the moral dimensions of political action to a greater extent than ever before.”

Chris Patten book East and West

Chris Patten, East and West: The Last Governor of Hong Kong on Power, Freedom and the Future, Pan Books, second edition, 1999, page 3.

“[About Hong Kong:] No other place has quite the same blend of East and West, ancient and modern, spectacular and humdrum.”

Chris Patten book East and West

Chris Patten, East and West: The Last Governor of Hong Kong on Power, Freedom and the Future, Pan Books, second edition, 1999, page 19.

Similar authors

Margaret Thatcher photo
Margaret Thatcher 348
British stateswoman and politician
Bertil Ohlin photo
Bertil Ohlin 11
Swedish economist and politician
Les Brown photo
Les Brown 24
American politician
Arnold Schwarzenegger photo
Arnold Schwarzenegger 52
actor, businessman and politician of Austrian-American heri…
A.A. Milne photo
A.A. Milne 169
British author
Vladimir Lenin photo
Vladimir Lenin 336
Russian politician, led the October Revolution
Pietro Mennea photo
Pietro Mennea 1
Italian sprinter and politician
John Hicks photo
John Hicks 14
British economist
Alfred Hitchcock photo
Alfred Hitchcock 45
British filmmaker
J. J. Thomson photo
J. J. Thomson 8
British physicist