“I wasn’t lucky. I deserved it.”

“My policies are based not on some economics theory, but on things I and millions like me were brought up with: an honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay; live within your means; put by a nest egg for a rainy day; pay your bills on time; support the police.”

“Platitudes? Yes, there are platitudes. Platitudes are there because they are true.”

“I don’t think there will be a woman prime minister in my lifetime.”

“If you want to cut your own throat, don’t come to me for a bandage.”

“I usually make up my mind about a man in ten seconds, and I very rarely change it.”

“The battle for women’s rights has been largely won.”

“The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other peoples’ money.”

“What is success? I think it is a mixture of having a flair for the thing that you are doing; knowing that it is not enough, that you have got to have hard work and a certain sense of purpose.”

“I too have a certain idea of America. Moreover, I would not feel entitled to say that of any other country, except my own. This is not just sentiment, though I always feel ten years younger – despite the jet-lag – when I set foot on American soil: there is something so positive, generous, and open about the people – and everything actually works. I also feel, though, that I have in a sense a share of America.”

“Look at a day when you are supremely satisfied at the end. It’s not a day when you lounge around doing nothing; it’s when you’ve had everything to do, and you’ve done it.”

“There is no such thing as society: there are individual men and women, and there are families.”

“People think that at the top there isn’t much room. They tend to think of it as an Everest. My message is that there is tons of room at the top.”

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

“A man may climb Everest for himself, but at the summit he plants his country’s flag.”

“It is always important in matters of high politics to know what you do not know. Those who think that they know, but are mistaken, and act upon their mistakes, are the most dangerous people to have in charge.”

“Any woman who understands the problems of running a home will be nearer to understanding the problems of running a country.”

“I think we have gone through a period when too many children and people have been given to understand ‘I have a problem, it is the Government’s job to cope with it!’ or ‘I have a problem, I will go and get a grant to cope with it!’ ‘I am homeless, the Government must house me!’ and so they are casting their problems on society and who is society? There is no such thing! There are individual men and women and there are families and no government can do anything except through people and people look to themselves first… There is no such thing as society. There is living tapestry of men and women and people and the beauty of that tapestry and the quality of our lives will depend upon how much each of us is prepared to take responsibility for ourselves and each of us prepared to turn round and help by our own efforts those who are unfortunate.”

“Standing in the middle of the road is very dangerous; you get knocked down by the traffic from both sides.”

“The choice facing the nation is between two totally different ways of life. And what a prize we have to fight for: no less than the chance to banish from our land the dark, divisive clouds of Marxist socialism and bring together men and women from all walks of life who share a belief in freedom.”

“I just owe almost everything to my father and it’s passionately interesting for me that the things that I learned in a small town, in a very modest home, are just the things that I believe have won the election.”

“Whether it is in the United States or in mainland Europe, written constitutions have one great weakness. That is that they contain the potential to have judges take decisions which should properly be made by democratically elected politicians.”

“Pennies do not come from heaven. They have to be earned here on earth.”

“The defence budget is one of the very few elements of public expenditure that can truly be described as essential. This point was well-made by a robust Labour Defence Minister, Denis (Now Lord) Healey, many years ago: ‘Once we have cut expenditure to the extent where our security is imperiled, we have no houses, we have no hospitals, we have no schools. We have a heap of cinders.’”

“If… many influential people have failed to understand, or have just forgotten, what we were up against in the Cold War and how we overcame it, they are not going to be capable of securing, let alone enlarging, the gains that liberty has made.”

“Don’t follow the crowd, let the crowd follow you.”

“…The larger the slice taken by government, the smaller the cake available for everyone.”

“Nothing is more obstinate than a fashionable consensus.”

“Whether manufactured by black, white, brown or yellow hands, a widget remains a widget – and it will be bought anywhere if the price and quality are right. The market is a more powerful and more reliable liberating force than government can ever be.”

“I am in politics because of the conflict between good and evil, and I believe that in the end good will triumph.”

“There can be no liberty unless there is economic liberty.”

“A week is a long time in politics.”

“To be free is better than to be unfree – always. Any politician who suggests the opposite should be treated as suspect.”

“During my lifetime most of the problems the world has faced have come, in one fashion or other, from mainland Europe, and the solutions from outside it.”

“We Conservatives hate unemployment.”

“There is much to be said for trying to improve some disadvantaged people’s lot. There is nothing to be said for trying to create heaven on earth.”

“It is one of the great weaknesses of reasonable men and women that they imagine that projects which fly in the face of commonsense are not serious or being seriously undertaken.”

“This lady is not for turning.”

“To me, consensus seems to be the process of abandoning all beliefs, principles, values and policies. So it is something in which no one believes and to which no one objects.”

“We were told our campaign wasn’t sufficiently slick. We regard that as a compliment.”

“…Conservatives have excellent credentials to speak about human rights. By our efforts, and with precious little help from self-styled liberals, we were largely responsible for securing liberty for a substantial share of the world’s population and defending it for most of the rest.”

“If my critics saw me walking over the Thames they would say it was because I couldn’t swim.”

“Oh, but you know, you do not achieve anything without trouble, ever.”

“Defeat? I do not recognize the meaning of the word.”

“To be successful you have to be selfish, or else you never achieve. And once you get to your highest level, then you have to be unselfish. Stay reachable. Stay in touch. Don’t isolate.”

“We want a society where people are free to make choices, to make mistakes, to be generous and compassionate. This is what we mean by a moral society; not a society where the state is responsible for everything, and no one is responsible for the state.”

“The spirit of envy can destroy; it can never build.”

“I seem to smell the stench of appeasement in the air.”

“The woman’s mission is not to enhance the masculine spirit, but to express the feminine; hers is not to preserve a man-made world, but to create a human world by the infusion of the feminine element into all of its activities.”

“Ought we not to ask the media to agree among themselves a voluntary code of conduct, under which they would not say or show anything which could assist the terrorists’ morale or their cause while the hijack lasted.”