Margaret Thatcher citations (354 citations, Page 8)

Speech to the Conservative Political Centre Summer School ("The Renewal of Britain") (6 July 1979) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/104107
First term as Prime Minister

“Constitutions have to be written on hearts, not just paper.”

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Margaret Thatcher livre Statecraft: Strategies for a Changing World

Source: Statecraft: Strategies for a Changing World, p. 256

“I should therefore prefer to restrict my guidelines to the following:”

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Margaret Thatcher livre Statecraft: Strategies for a Changing World

Don't believe that military interventions, no matter how morally justified, can succeed without clear military goals
Don't fall into the trap of imagining that the West can remake societies
Don't take public opinion for granted – but don't either underrate the degree to which good people will endure sacrifices for a worthwhile cause
Don't allow tyrants and aggressors to get away with it
And when you fight – fight to win.
Source: Statecraft: Strategies for a Changing World, p. 39

“Difficult days lie ahead, but Britain will face them in the conviction that our cause is just and in the knowledge that we have been doing everything reasonable to secure a negotiated settlement. The principles that we are defending are fundamental to everything that this Parliament and this country stand for. They are the principles of democracy and the rule of law…Britain has a responsibility towards the islanders to restore their democratic way of life. She has a duty to the whole world to show that aggression will not succeed and to uphold the cause of freedom.”

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Margaret Thatcher

Speech in the House of Commons (20 May 1982) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/104943
First term as Prime Minister

“Having consulted widely among colleagues, I have concluded that the unity of the Party and the prospects of victory in a General Election would be better served if I stood down to enable Cabinet colleagues to enter the ballot for the leadership. I should like to thank all those in Cabinet and outside who have given me such dedicated support.”

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Margaret Thatcher

Statement http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/108254 announcing her intention to resign the premiership (22 November 1990).
Third term as Prime Minister

“I came to office with one deliberate intent: to change Britain from a dependent to a self-reliant society – from a give-it-to-me, to a do-it-yourself nation. A get-up-and-go, instead of a sit-back-and-wait-for-it Britain.”

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Margaret Thatcher

Speech to Small Business Bureau Conference (8 February 1984) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/speeches/displaydocument.asp?docid=105617
Second term as Prime Minister

“Under the Socialists, rapid strides have been taken towards the Iron Curtain State. We have seen increased nationalisation measures, increased powers of central Government over both large and small companies, increased levels of tax on the pay packet and on savings alike, and an increased proportion of the national income spent not by the wage-earner but by the Government or Government agencies. In the result, the Prime Minister has become the first Socialist Minister since the Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1951 to say that his policies will mean a reduced standard of living for our people…it is clear that Socialist systems are not good at creating wealth; they can only spend the wealth that others create.”

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Margaret Thatcher

Speech in the House of Commons (9 June 1976) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/103046
Leader of the Opposition

“This is not a confrontation between ‘left’ and ‘right’. I am trying to represent the deep feelings of those many thousands of rank-and-file Tories in the country—and potential Conservative voters, too—who feel let down by our party and find themselves unrepresented in a political vacuum.”

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Margaret Thatcher

Speech in Finchley (31 January 1975) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/102605
Shadow Secretary for Environment

“There is not and cannot possibly be any hard and fast antithesis between self-interest and care for others, for man is a social creature, born into family, clan, community, nation, brought up in mutual dependence. The founders of our religion made this a cornerstone of morality. The admonition: love they neighbour as thyself, and do as you would be done by, expresses this. You will note that it does not denigrate self, or elevate love of others above it. On the contrary, it sees concern for self and responsibility for self as something to be expected, and asks only that this be extended to others. This embodies the great truth that self-regard is the root of regard for one's fellows.”

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Margaret Thatcher

Speech to Greater London Young Conservatives (Iain Macleod Memorial Lecture - "Dimensions of Conservatism") (4 July 1977) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/103411
Leader of the Opposition

“Not that this appears to affect the intentions of the political-bureaucratic elite, which in Britain as elsewhere in Europe believes that it has an overriding mission to achieve European integration by hook or by crook and which is convinced that History (with an extra-large 'H') is on its side.”

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Margaret Thatcher livre Statecraft: Strategies for a Changing World

Source: Statecraft: Strategies for a Changing World, p. 388

“Iraq's invasion of Kuwait defies every principle for which the United Nations stands. If we let it succeed, no small country can ever feel safe again. The law of the jungle would take over from the rule of law.”

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Margaret Thatcher

Speech to the Aspen Institute ("Shaping a New Global Community") (5 August 1990) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/108174
Third term as Prime Minister

“It is not our policy to suppress success.”

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Margaret Thatcher

The Path To Power (1995)

“We all see these great calamities with different eyes, and so their impact upon us is different.”

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Margaret Thatcher

The Path To Power (1995)

“What do you think of those two?”

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Margaret Thatcher livre The Downing Street Years

(She was holding out The Sun newspaper and was referring to 2 editorials on page 2. Page 3 of The Sun is known for having nude women on it.) Quoted in the first episode of the documentary Thatcher: The Downing Street Years.
First term as Prime Minister

“Those who want the country to have a strong and sure defence can't rely on the Labour Party, the SDP or the Liberals. They can rely on us. By the end of this century it is predicted that several more countries will have acquired nuclear weapons. Labour wants Britain to give them up. At the very time when any sensible person would be renewing his insurance cover, Labour wants to cancel Britain's policy altogether. Moreover, they want to get rid of American bases from Britain and all nuclear weapons from British soil. Does anyone who has witnessed Mr. Gorbachev's performance thinks that he respects weakness? No. Mr. President, it is recognition of the West's strength and cohesion that has brought the Soviet Union back to the negotiating table. Our wish is to see substantial reductions in nuclear weapons, provided they are balanced and verifiable. I know that will be President Reagan's objective at his meeting with Mr Gorbachev, and he has our full support and good wishes as he goes to Geneva. The West could not have a better or a braver champion.”

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Margaret Thatcher

Speech to Conservative Party Conference (11 October 1985) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/106145
Second term as Prime Minister

“We were the first country to attempt and to succeed in rolling back the frontiers of socialism, which is the first cousin to communism.”

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Margaret Thatcher

Post-Prime Ministerial

“I never hugged him, I bombed him.”

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Margaret Thatcher

Referring to Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, specifically to pictures of Tony Blair embracing him
Related by Conor Burns MP at Young Britons' Foundation Reception, via <i>The Telegraph</i>, 13th March 2011, Richard Eden http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/libya/8378222/Libya-Margaret-Thatcher-gives-Colonel-Gaddafis-Labour-friends-a-history-lesson.html
Post-Prime Ministerial

“Our opponents like to try and make you believe that Conservatism is a privilege of the few. But Conservatism conserves all that is great and best in our national heritage.”

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Margaret Thatcher

The Path To Power (1995)

“The fact is that the two major nuclear powers have not gone to war against each other—because, I believe, nuclear weapons are achieving their purpose as a deterrent that makes the prospect of war too horrific. It is noteworthy that, since the last world war, there have been 140 conventional wars, fought with ordinary weapons, which are themselves horrific, and that nuclear weapons have been a deterrent to war. I therefore believe that we should keep them.”

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Margaret Thatcher

Prime Minister's Questions (15 June 1982) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/104968
First term as Prime Minister

“The trouble with you John, is that your spine does not reach your brain.”

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Margaret Thatcher

On Conservative backbencher John Whittingdale after being summoned to her room to urge MPs to vote against the Maastricht Treaty. Whittingdale was reported to have emerged from the room in tears. (The Times 26 November 1992)
Post-Prime Ministerial

“They are all a rotten lot. Schmidt and the Americans and we are the only people who would do any standing up and fighting if necessary.”

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Margaret Thatcher

Remark to President of the European Commission Roy Jenkins on her European Community colleagues (22 October 1979), quoted in Roy Jenkins, European Diary, 1977-1981 (London: Collins, 1989), p. 511
First term as Prime Minister

“The economic success of the Western world is a product of its moral philosophy and practice. The economic results are better because the moral philosophy is superior. It is superior because it starts with the individual, with his uniqueness, his responsibility, and his capacity to choose. Surely this is infinitely preferable to the Socialist-statist philosophy which sets up a centralised economic system to which the individual must conform, which subjugates him, directs him and denies him the right to free choice. Choice is the essence of ethics: if there were no choice, there would be no ethics, no good, no evil; good and evil have meaning only insofar as man is free to choose.”

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Margaret Thatcher

Speech to the Zurich Economic Society “The New Renaissance” (14 March 1977) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/103336
Leader of the Opposition

“The feminists hate me, don't they? And I don’t blame them. For I hate feminism. It is poison.”

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Margaret Thatcher

As quoted by Paul Johnson in Failure of the Feminists http://www.spectator.co.uk/features/6766663/failure-of-the-feminists/, The Spectator, 12 March, 2011.
Attributed

“We are not asking for a penny piece of Community money for Britain. What we are asking is for a very large amount of our own money back, over and above what we contribute to the Community, which is covered by our receipts from the Community.”

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Margaret Thatcher

Press Conference after Dublin European Council (30 November 1979) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/104180 when she was trying to renegotiate Britain's EEC budget contribution at the EEC Summit in Dublin. Often quoted as "I want my money back".
First term as Prime Minister

“I might have preferred iron, but bronze will do. It won't rust. And, this time I hope, the head will stay on.”

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Margaret Thatcher

" Statue of Margaret Thatcher unveiled at British Parliament http://legacy.utsandiego.com/news/world/20070221-1456-britain-thatcher-statue.html", Associated Press, 21 February 2007.
On the unveiling of a statue of her in the Members' Lobby of the House of Commons. Baroness Thatcher referred to a previous marble statue which was decapitated http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/2091200.stm in 2002.
Post-Prime Ministerial

“They don't patronize me for being a woman. Nobody puts me down.”

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Margaret Thatcher

Interview for Daily Express (8 August 1980) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/104260 on male heads of state, quoted in Chris Ogden, Maggie: An Intimate Portrait of a Woman in Power (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1990), p. 341.
First term as Prime Minister