Harold Wilson Quotes

I'm an optimist, but I'm an optimist who takes his raincoat.

He who rejects change is the architect of decay. The only human institution which rejects progress is the cemetery.

A week is a long time in politics.

The labour party is like a stage-coach. If you rattle along at great speed everybody inside is too exhilarated or too seasick to cause any trouble. But if you stop everybody gets out and argues about where to go next.

If the Tories get in, in five years no one will be able to afford to buy an egg.

He who rejects change is the architect of decay.

One man's wage increase is another man's price increase.

The Labour Party is a moral crusade or it is nothing.

We are redefining and we are restating our Socialism in terms of the scientific revolution ... The Britain that is going to be forged in the white heat of this revolution will be no place for restrictive practices or outdated methods on either side of industry.

Everybody should have an equal chance - but they shouldn't have a flying start.

Given a fair wind, we will negotiate our way into the Common Market, head held high, not crawling in. Negotiations? Yes. Unconditional acceptance of whatever terms are offered us? No.

The only limits of power are the bounds of belief.

From now on, the pound abroad is worth 14 per cent or so less in terms of other currencies. That doesn't mean, of course, that the Pound here in Britain, in your pocket or purse or in your bank, has been devalued.

I get a little nauseated, perhaps, when I hear the phrase 'freedom of the press' used as freely as it is, knowing that a large part of our proprietorial press is not free at all.

The ambition of the present Labour government is that every worker in the country will have a greater than average income.

Debating against him is no fun, say something insulting and he looks at you like a whipped dog.

Tories never actually talk about getting rid of their leader, then suddenly there us a flash of steel between he shoulder-blades and rigormortis sets in.

Whichever party is in office, the Treasury is in power.

It is quite clear to me that the Tory Party will get rid of Mrs Thatcher in about 3 years time.

At home and abroad I have repeatedly been asked what are the main essentials of a successful prime minister. Over and above communication and vigilance, there are two factors I have always mentioned. They are sleep, and a sense of history.

There is something utterly nauseating about a system of society which pays a harlot 25 times as much as it pays its prime minister, 250 times as much as it pays its members of Parliament and 500 times as much as it pays some of its ministers of religion.

I believe the greatest asset a head of state can have is the ability to get a good night's sleep.

On 5 September, when the TUC unanimously rejected wage restraint, it was the end of an era, and all the financiers, all the little gnomes in Zürich and other finance centres about whom we keep on hearing, had started to make their dispositions in regard to sterling.

The monarchy is a labor intensive industry.

The cumulative effects of the economic and financial sanctions might well bring the rebellion to an end within a matter of weeks rather than months.