Quotes By John Major

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

Recovery begins from the darkest moment.

Well, I have concerns about the effectiveness of Europe to compete.

Well what would happen is that if Greece defaulted and couldn't pay its debts, all the Greek bonds that are held in other banking systems across Western Europe would suddenly have no value. You could as a knock-on effect create a banking crisis in Western Europe.

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.

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

Well, I think there's a distinction between sexing-up the intelligence and sexing-up the presentation of the intelligence.

Life is full of surprises.

The British don't runaway from terrorism. We have had 30-odd years of terrorism in our own country from the Irish Republican Army. We're used to it.

The politician who never made a mistake never made a decision.

You've had an extremely weak euro on the foreign exchange markets, you've had a very dubious policy being followed.

I have a huge admiration for the House of Lords, I have a huge admiration for the people who work in the House of Lords, they're great public servants and they do an absolutely tremendous job.

Of course there are regrets. I shall regret always that I found my own authentic voice in politics. I was too conservative, too conventional. Too safe, too often. Too defensive. Too reactive. Later, too often on the back foot.

A consensus politician is someone who does something that he doesn't believe is right because it keeps people quiet when he does it.

My mother was the center of the family.

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

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

My father was 64 when I was conceived, my mother 38, which was late for babies in the 1940s.

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

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

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

Whatever efforts for peace President Gorbachev had in mind, they were pretty substantially undercut very swiftly by Saddam Hussein.

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.