YouSaid · the spoken record

David Lidington

lines on the record: 51
first: 2019-06-14
most recent: 2019-06-14
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“I try to follow rules say 100% frankness in the room and 100% loyalty outside the room. And I think when you move away from that as your objective, you will end up with policy discussions going into secret places, into little restricted meetings because people don't trust each other. And that's when the cohesion of government starts to fall apart. It's great for the press, makes a bad government, and I think we need colleagues who can trust each other to be frank, but also to be discreet.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“If they don't rediscover basic self-discipline and observance of collective responsibility, then the quality of decision-taking is going to be very severely damaged. I think one of the things that's done great harm in this government has been the habit of cabinet ministers in particular who have no excuse of leaking the content of cabinet discussion or the purported content sometimes of selected content of cabinet meetings to the media. The point about cabinet is that you should be able to have frank disagreements and arguments between colleagues. You should test each other's case and you usually then come out with a better, more robust decision at the end of the day. But our system of government only works if ministers, particularly cabinet ministers, absolutely stick together. I try it. I don't want to sound sort of arrogant.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Conservative Party started having elections for its leaders in 1965 only once in that time has the favourite won and that's when Michael Howard was unopposed after Ian Duncan Smith had to resign. But if you look at the history Heath wasn't the favourite, Thatcher wasn't the favourite, Major wasn't the favourite, Hague wasn't the favourite, Duncan Smith wasn't the favourite, Cameron May were not the favourites at the start. So I think it's still very open. No candidate can take things for granted and shouldn't. It would be very arrogant and complacent of anybody to take things for granted.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Asking that question is in my mind when I look at all the candidates, not just Boris Johnson, but it's a question I think that my colleagues in Parliament and the party membership, when we get to that stage, need to have in mind about the choice they make. This is not somebody we're electing only to be a campaigning political party leader. It's not somebody even we're electing only to run a vigorous forward-looking, creative domestic policy. It is somebody who will be the ultimate decision taker for the most fundamental security decisions that any democratic government has to take.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Who can take that decision? And you are accountable for the consequences of that. If you get it wrong, and maybe you've taken that decision on the best possible advice and evidence as best you have it and thinking this is the right thing, and it goes horribly wrong, you are the one that's going to have to stand the dispatch box in the House of Commons and justify it. You are the one who is going to have to speak to the families and write the letters to the widows.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think those questions of judgment and temperament matter a great deal. I've sat in the room with both David Cameron and then Theresa May when they've had to take decisions of this type. I've occasionally, when Theresa May's been abroad, I've had delegated responsibility as the first political responder to a security crisis in the Prime Minister's absence. Those are times you don't want the phone to ring. The decisions that you have to take almost inevitably have to be taken with limited time and on the basis of intelligence information which is likely to be incomplete and uncertain to a degree. But you are the only person”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Boris Johnson, doesn't it? That sounds like the sort of Waspish journalistic comment that I might have expected from you and your colleagues in it.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Send people to arrest. Yeah, they did. Absolutely. And he was unseated more than once and then triumphantly re-elected by then Middlesex rather than Aylesbury he was sitting for. He's a fair list of predecessors. I mean, my own...”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Andrew Gibbs, of course, talking about John Wilkes, great champion of freedom of the press. I always say when I look at the press scatter, I can see his disciples there en masse.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“About sacrificing their interests for a big state that's leaving would be a damaging one. So I think that that internally you reason they're not going to go down that path. But they're going to be very concerned about the integrity of the EU single market. I mean, the backstop negotiation was as much about Brussels, Paris and Berlin wanting to protect the integrity of the single market as it was about something specifically Irish.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think that there will be a moment when the new Prime Minister, whoever he or she, comes into office, that the Europeans at least will feel they have a duty to give that person a hearing. And I think they will be wanting to know what it is that that new prime minister wants to deliver an orderly UK departure. And they will want to be confident that such a concession, if they make it, will be enough to provide a clear majority in the House of Commons. Now, there will obviously be a political decision on the EU side as to whether what is being sought is something that they are willing to concede. So, for example, I don't believe that they will simply say, oh, you can cut the Northern Ireland Protocol out of the withdrawal agreement altogether. I think the message that would send to all the small states in the EU.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I already think that the pressures on the United Kingdom are greater than I've known at any time in my life. And I think that those pressures would be significantly worsened if we were to have a no-deal exit.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“If they think that Brexit is being handled, they don't like Brexit at all, but they think it's being handled in a way that somehow jeopardizes their sense of Irishness, which includes the border existing in jurisdiction, but not having any practical impact on their day-to-day lives. And I see a separatist government in Scotland elected, so it has a mandate in Scotland, but elected wanting to follow a single strategic objective which is independence for Scotland and who will use Brexit to try to justify seeking independence.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think that is certainly possible. My prime argument is that no deal is contrary to the national interest, and that's partly because I look at the harm that would be done to our manufacturing sector in particular, and every time I talk to somebody from the manufacturing sectors of our country, they tell me that a no deal is the last thing they want, the damage to farming, but also I really do worry about the constitutional impact. It's a very difficult situation to manage in which two countries in the UK have voted to remain and two have voted to leave. And I see that an active movement in Northern Ireland for Irish unification, and I certainly see that people who have thought of themselves as Irish were happy to let sleeping dogs lie, are becoming more willing to contemplate Irish unification.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, exactly, exactly. So, you know, all you need is one of those countries, perhaps for domestic political reasons unrelated to what they think of the UK, to say, look, we've had enough of this, we've just got to bring it to a conclusion because we've got politics of our own to concentrate on, and then you're out.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Some have said so openly, and others I know have talked about it privately. But also I think no one knows for certain how the new Prime Minister is going to act or how the House of Commons will respond. I was quite amused when a recent pamphlet, I think it was the Institute for Government, said that it was almost impossible for the House of Commons to stop a no-deal exit, but almost the first sentence was unless the Speaker is prepared to adopt some innovative practices where anybody who's watched John Burkhow in action in the last decade knows that he is certainly capable of innovations in House of Commons procedure. But actually, The reason I don't think it is a false argument to say you can rule out no deal is it isn't just a matter of us. There's 27 other countries, all of which have to agree unanimously to any extension.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“My view is that ultimately governments in the United Kingdom only remain in office if they have the confidence of the House of Commons. At the moment, the combined Conservative and DUP majority over all others is five. The margins are very, very narrow. And my fear is that we end up crashing into a premature general election that I think could do real harm, such as my own party, but also to the nature of politics in this country.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“The only way to solve it is that you have to assemble a parliamentary majority for an orderly departure. I think that the problem with no deal is not only the economic dispute. But also because it doesn't actually take you anywhere except the starting block. World Trade Organization terms are the absolutely bog standard, basic terms for world trade. It's not what you want with your biggest trading partner. That's why everybody says FTA is free trade agreements are a really good thing. And you're going to sit down with the EU. They say, oh, that's very fine. We'll talk about a Canada-style deal with you. Now we're going to start with citizens' rights with the financial settlement. We say you owe us and with the Irish border. So we can't avoid those questions.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Brazil's going to be a vast player. And all the medium-sized countries, not even Germany in Europe, is going to be able to cope on its own. They need to fight a way of collaborating. And I think even though we're going to leave the European Union, I think that we will then need still to find structures and arrangements for cooperating with other European countries, which is one reason I have always very strongly supported having departure settled on an orderly basis, because I think that is the best start to forge that future partnership.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“With the idea of multiple identities. Frankly, the Union of the United Kingdom is only going to survive if people can feel confident about being both Scottish and British or Welsh or Northern Irish or English and British as well. And we will only be a cohesive society if people can feel that they are Indian or Pakistani or African heritage but also buy in to a British or United Kingdom project as well. And I look at Europe as being another dimension of that. I'm very, very proud of this country's history and I look at our involvement with and our contribution to European civilization over the centuries. But I look at how the world is changing and I think Angela Merkel gets this right. We're entering an age of continental sized powers. United States, China, India.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“There are deep cultural roots, and I think some of the tensions in the debate over Europe derive from the sense of dislocation that is being forced on many assumptions about our country and our society by a combination of changes in the geopolitical balance, but also far-reaching economic and technological changes. The PM got this actually in her first conference speech when she talked about how the referendum was in many cases sort of lightly or a catalyst for other kinds of discontent with our political and economic arrangements, people who'd felt left behind, left out. And I think there was an important truth in what she was saying there. But I think what Geoffrey said, but I think there's an awful lot of people within the United Kingdom who have a very different experience, who are comfortable.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Bureaucratic is not flexible enough, it's too centralized, what maintains the degree of political support and public support for the idea of Europe.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“An Estonian foreign minister saying to me, We had lunch in Tallinn, and we're talking about differences between the UK's perception of the 1940s and most of Europe's perception of the 40s. And I said for us, it's the apotheosis of national solidarity institutions, what saved us from tyranny. And he said, look, we lost a quarter of our population between the Hitler-stalin pact and the partisans being crushed in 46-47. We were fought over by the Nazis and the Red Army. We then lived under Soviet rule for half a century. He said, when you've gone through that experience, you grab every little bit of European integration that is going to try to stop that ever happening to you again. And you talk to politicians in many European countries. That is what drives them. And what still, despite all the flaws in the EU, and I completely agree with those who say this is too...”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“No, I think I don't think that that is a fair criticism. I think what is a fair criticism of successive British governments is that they have not explained sufficiently to British audiences and sometimes does not realise themselves that for most European countries, the EU has not been primarily about economics and building prosperity for its own sake, but it is a peace building project that derives from the experience of most of continental Europe in the mid-20th century, devastating warfare, the creation of fascist and communist regimes, the displacement of millions of people swirling around Europe in 1945, pogroms in 1945 to 47. And having gone to...”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Is that he always every day tried to read something that was nothing to do with politics and work or listen to some music, even if it was just five minutes before he fell asleep at night to remind him that there was a world out there. And I've tried to follow that. What are you reading at the moment? I'm reading Adam Zamoisky's biography of Napoleon that was published a few months ago, having just...”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“There are things he advised me, and there are things that I've noted, and I've tried to follow. And I think the things that I noted and followed were treatment of civil servants. If you have the privilege of becoming a minister, Douglas always treated his officials with respect. He knew they were the experts, but he would then question them, and he was never afraid to overrule them, but to take responsibility for the decisions and basically to take a decision on his judgment of the national interest. And then the communications come afterwards. And the communications are about putting the best explanation, justification you can on the decision you think is right. And I think sometimes where politics has gone wrong in the last 20 years or so is where the communications have been put in front of the policy. And you get policy distorted by perceived communications needs. The other thing Douglas said to me”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And you say things Socrates would just vaguely pick this up and you'd sound clever and then we'd let Bridget get on the other. The thing that gave us real pleasure as oldsters at that session was one of the rounds we beat the then immediate champions one of the Oxford college teams and we beat them and they were very good. We beat them by 390 to 90. And we didn't quite get the 400 but it was but actually it just worked. The questions were ones that”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, it was we won it. It's a team effort. And, you know, I always say it was the four of us then, not just me, by any manner of means. And we went at Fair and Square students. And then for the 40th anniversary of the show 2002, they got back as many of the former champions as they could find who were still alive and compost mentis and Ran has shown that the proudest boast I have for that week is the producer saying to me your final was the top-rated show got more viewers than anybody else on BBC Two that week was shown on BBC2 at the time and I can honestly say Nick I had more viewers than the Simpsons that week at least but it was it was actually I was had great doubts I was in parliament by the time and I had great doubts at doing it again and actually the rest of the team wanted to do it and I was doing it not as an MP that's what I'd happen to end up doing but because we won it fairly astute”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, well, I'm afraid, you know, for Tory party selections, you know, detailed knowledge of Russian revolutionaries is not obligatory.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But twice. Yeah, that's an ability to pick up the scraps of information that's lying around on the floor of your brain and sort of propel them into your mouth. Okay, David.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I would not say I would not put myself in the sort of intellectual category of a Joseph or a Powell. You've won universal.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“People will have to come to their own verdict on that. It's not something that's easy for me to comment on. I mean, what I would say is the rule I've always tried to adopt is that you may disagree with people. If you're in democratic politics, you meet lots of people you disagree with, but you should listen to their argument with respect and try to answer it seriously. I always get impatient when I get drafts of answers to written parliamentary questions or to letters from MPs that just sidestep the question rather than expressing disagreement with giving reasons for doing. Do it head on but courteously. My rule of thumb is that all of us in House of Commons are equal from the point of view we're only there, any of us, because we've been sent there by our constituents. We're all legitimized by election.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, I'm very, very struck by William's books on Pitt the Younger and on Wilberforce. The chap I'd like to write about if I ever have time, it's a massive material, is William Sass or Lord Burley, who was effectively Elizabeth I prime minister, was as Burley Lord High Treasurer, but for about 40 years. How did this guy manage to stay at the top of the political tree for four decades at a time when something worse than reshuffles that you had to fear with your favour? So, you know, and actually trying to understand as a politician how political powers made. I just like to dig into that bit further and see if the more that can be felt. Well, it seems to me you've not.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“There, but it was very interesting to do. And once I'm out of politics, I'm intended to go back to this. I do think that... Non to academia, full. I want to do a bit more research, a bit more writing.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Lydington PhD. I did my PhD was more narrow than that. It was on the enforcement of basically social and economic legislation under Elizabeth I. So it was looking at everything from smuggling to prices and wages to usury standards of manufacture and so on. And it was just quite fascinating to see the disparity which there was between what the law was saying and whether it was actually enforced. Actually what you found was that in this time of the 16th century there was a lot of social and economic laws in place which were out of kilter with economic reality bans on middleman trading when London needed supplies from all over the country. And so there was a racket going on cooked up between informers bringing the cases to court and the court officials who basically colluded to slap fines on honest citizens.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So you were. Little does. No, no, I did know that when there were likely to be catastrophic headlines for the government that Robi Gibb at number 10 might well be on the phones. David, have you thought about doing the today program?”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, I got on further into the job. I did start to say it's keeping plates spinning and every now and then the PM hands me another plate and says, can you get that one up on the poll too, David? But I also felt I was sometimes the Minister of a Hospital passes. It did seem to me that there was a tricky debate in government. It was a bit after you, Claude going on around the cabinet table in terms of who's going to pick this one up in the chamber.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Remembered what the policy was. I did remember what the policy because at the cabinet office, we run electoral policy. So I had no excuse for not knowing what the policy was. But my PPS, Kevin Vosterden, now deservedly a junior minister, rapidly found the place in the 600-page folder, sort of pulled out the sheet, gave it to me, which had further ammunition and a record of what Labour had said or done in the past. Actually, the briefing material was there ready.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Done my homework on foreign policy, on Brexit, on poverty and inequality and universal credit, all that. No votes at sixteen. Write out the blue. And I think I had enough to give a first answer. So I knew I was okay on that.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Sometimes, yeah, usually two occasions more than once, a backbencher has come up with something which is particularly important for perhaps an individual constituent of theirs. Either you know it's in the brief somewhere but you can't pull it out of the nine inch thick volume that you've got sitting beside you in time or you're genuinely uncited or actually perhaps the question hasn't been expressed terribly concisely so it's quite difficult to know what they're getting at occasionally happens in the house of governments but then you can usually get away with saying look very very important question but I will if you're the substitute in particular say look I will take advice on that urgently and I will make sure the responsible minister either sees or writes to as rapidly as possible I remember Emily Thornbury on one occasion when she was up against me on behalf of Jeremy Corbyn went on votes at 16 and I had”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“You get question 80 thing. But the difference is with Prime Minister's questions, both the much greater sense of drama, a sense of occasion theories, but also the fact that the opposition spokesman gets six goes at you. The best advice I had from one of my briefing team was don't use up all your ammo in the first salvo. Wait, keep something in reserve always for the final burst.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It is the most daunting thing that I've ever done in politics only matched by when I was Lord Chancellor having to carry the Queen's speech up the steps of the throne on my own in full view of the cameras during the state opening. is probably the closest thing to getting into the boxing I'm ever likely to do in my life time. It is just incredibly glad editorial and the first time in particular I did it it was very nerve wracking because you knew that all your colleagues and all the opposition watching it the press gallery unusually was going to be full at that time Andrew Neal was going to pause his daily politics show to watch and then comment his usual Frank fashion and you can prep up to your eyeballs And I've been leader of the House of Commons. I had got used to the idea that you do have to mug up on a whole range of subjects.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I assumed that it was a pretty big job from the beginning. The PM made it clear to me at the start that she wanted me to act as her effective number two and to deputise her for her might be slightly too strong a way of putting, although she did say at the start, you know, when I'm not doing PMQs, you'll be doing that, thereby hangs a tale. She also... She also made it clear that things like cabinet committees and going to her morning meeting, 8.30 every day number 10, those are things she wanted me to do. But then you've got to see how the job develops.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But a political chief operating officer. I mean, I have the chief executive of the civil service who's my permanent secretary. Each department actually places its own contracts and so on, but we trientry to ensure best practice. But then I also chair umpteen cabinet committees on behalf of the prime minister. Sometimes she will send me a message via her team to say, I've got these two cabinet colleagues who are having a bit of a tiff over some subject or other. Can you take this off my desk and go and try and sort it out? And then I've got a really important in the current circuits, an overarching responsibility for constitutional affairs and devolution matters.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I said to President Trump that it was just a very ancient crown office and left it at that because as soon as you go into, oh, this was established in the 15th century to safeguard the revenues of the Duchy of Lancaster when the wars of the Roses were going on's, unless you're a keen historian, people tend to switch off at that point. But actually the two roles that I mean, the Chancellor of the Duchy, there are some rather nice ceremonial things that go with it. It's a personal crown appointment, so you are sworn in at a separate ceremony with Her Majesty not at a privy council meeting in the way that most secretaries of status sworn in. But as Minister for the Cabinet Office, I am responsible for the central functions of government. If you like, have a big... corporate HQ, you have the human resources function and the commercial function. Well, the government's functions sit in the cabinet office sojourn.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I don't think I don't, A, I don't think I ever took that terribly seriously. It obviously goes through your head, oh Lord, what happens if this invitation were suddenly to happen, the summons were to come, but also I got to know the PM. She is not somebody who is a quitter. You know, she's somebody who sticks to her guns and all these hypotheses rested on the idea that Theresa May was somehow going to chuck it all in and walk away. And I just didn't see how that was going to happen.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“There have been times when there have been these sort of, usually rather confected crises in the media, fight of dare introduce your colleagues in that way about government in imminent danger of collapse, which frankly you get in hung parliaments. You got it under the Callahan government in the 70s and you got it under the major government during John's time as Prime Minister. I can remember people coming up to me in the House of Commons and saying, oh, you know, you could be in number 10.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah. It's like, well, somebody's got to form the electorate. Otherwise, it gets a bit like those hereditary peers by elections, you know, where you have more candidates and there are voters that are available. It was very nice. I did have a number of colleagues coming and saying to me that I ought to put my hat in the ring, but I come to the view sometime earlier that this was not something that I was suited to do at the moment for the challenges I think the country and the party face. And also, having worked with Theresa for very closely for the last year and a half, frankly, that does cure you of most shreds of ambition to do that particular job. It is one thing, you know, if you're going to PM a majority of 50, you can do things great, become Prime Minister in a hung parliament and one that says as exquisitely hung as this one is, I mean, that is a pretty daunting challenge. I wish good luck to you.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Slightly sorry for the right honourable lady, the member for Islington South, who used to jousting with, who seems to have been dispatched to intellectile somewhere else on the bench. The honourable lady perhaps needs to watch out because I think there's a lesson there that anybody who at the dispatch box outshines the dear leader risks being. Risks being airbrushed out of the Politburo history at the earliest opportunity.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It is the ability to do the job that matters, not where you come from or what you are. It is the ability to do the job, what you know, what you believe and what you believe you can do. That is special about it. That is that you are from your particular Jonathan. I am not claiming special advantages. You are inviting me to claim special advantages. I am making the point that the Conservative Party, in my judgment, has three excellently qualified candidates, and they will make a judgment as to which of those candidates most suit their preferences to be leader of their party.”
2019-06-14 · Political Thinking with Nick Robinson · The David Lidington One · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source