The Foreign Office is a very important arm of the British state and I think Britain has a fantastic diplomatic service. We are the only country in the world spending 2% of our national income on defence and 0.7% of our national income on aid. We are the only country in the world doing both of those things.
I was shocked to see that some of the very wealthiest people in the country have organised their tax affairs, and to be fair it's within the tax laws, so that they were regularly paying virtually no income tax. And I don't think that's right.
I find China such a fascinating and interesting country. Each time I come back something has changed and it's moved on in leaps and bounds.
Put on top of that the fact that the whole world is looking at Britain and saying how is this country going to pay its way in the future. They are looking at other countries like Greece who can't pay their way in the future and you see savage spending cuts, big cuts in pay.
Each time I come it's amazing to watch the development of this incredible country [China].
Britain has no divine right to be one of the richest countries in the world.
I am actually quite encouraged and I think, actually, the UK is coping with globalisation a lot better than most other European countries. And that is reflected in the fact that (whilst of course there are people who are still unemployed) our unemployment rate is low and (whilst of course we need to export more) we are attracting a huge amount of inward investment into Britain.
Britain is not part of the single currency. That is a decision we have taken, a voluntary decision of this country, but as a result are part of a European Union 19 of whose members are rapidly integrating, creating political, fiscal, monetary, economic union to make their currency work. And that is increasingly rubbing up against the operation.
We need a coalition in this country. A coalition of change. People who have had enough of this.
One of the big problems we have in this country is that not enough people understand how important it is to save, understand the details of credit card statements, to be able to compare different APRs and the like. I support the idea.
There are those people who don't want change. Well there needs to be a coalition for change amongst the hard-working mainstream majority of the country to crack on and sort out Britain's problems.
There is a big problem. The problem is the country borrowed too much. We went on a borrowing binge, there was a housing boom. You want to help people de-leverage and deal with those debts over time.
[Banks] have a clear obligation to help get this country off its addiction to debt because they sure as hell helped to get this country addicted to debt.
I think it is absolutely central to our economic plan as a country not only that we put our own house in order but that we better connect ourselves with other parts of the world, particularly the faster growing parts of the world.
