Francis Maude Quotes (31 Quotes)

It always seemed to me a bit pointless to disapprove of homosexuality. It's like disapproving of rain.

If we want to change what people think of us, then we have got to change.

We should be the natural home for people in our cities. But we're not. Because too often we've sounded as if we're just a countryside party.

Well we've seen the amount of money that people save in this country falling, and dramatically, by as much as a quarter already.

Our party believes in diversity, not uniformity.

We should be the natural home for the millions of Britons of immigrant origin. But we're not. Because too often we've sounded like people who wish they hadn't come here at all.

Our share of the vote overall rose by less than 1 per cent - yes, that's right: less than 1 per cent.

I grew up in this party, I'm proud of it, and I love it. I just hate the fact that we don't win that we can't serve our country in Government.

They don't think we're in touch with modern Britain, or understand modern Britain or like modern Britain.

We said in our 21st Century Party paper there are 61 mosaic groups, which the market research people use as different socio-economic categories and half of our members come from just five of those groups and that is very narrow - too narrow.

Our party's committed to tackling failing schools and cutting crime.

But if we can work with people in other parties to get the right answer for the country we'll do that.

There has not been any of that so far, ... All the contenders have been treating each other with respect and courtesy.

The party at its best has always been a modern party.

We should be the natural home for younger voters. But today we're not. Because too often we sound like people who just don't like contemporary Britain.

The chairman of the conference does feel very strongly that the platform speakers must be dealt with in a very neutral way with no one being allowed extra time.

For the most part our grassroots members are serious, nice, tolerant people.

Our members are very much maligned. Obviously the average age is 60 something, but they all have children and grandchildren, they understand what we need to do, they want to win.

We've been seen for a long time as a party which hasn't been very open to gay people. That's wrong.

What people want from Mr Blair is not more polished rhetoric about the future but practical solutions to the problems of the present.

The problem we have is not Labour, in however it is configured.

I want to make it very open. We've researched the practicalities and there are lots of innovative ways of doing it that don't cost an arm and a leg. We've looked to see if there's a way of having a very open primary election that doesn't kill us financially.

Our party has known great, great days. But we have no God-given right to survive, let alone to succeed.

If we do what we think is right, not try to point-score, people will begin to trust us.

So our problem is not Labour, it is us, is making us attractive enough to gain disillusioned Labour support and to compete effectively with the Lib Dems for those loose votes.

If you draw a line through Birmingham we lost support above that line and we lost support among voters under 35 so we are now third in that group.

Some of the lenders may not be resident in Britain but there's nothing wrong with that.

We should be the natural home for young mothers. But we're not. Because too often we sound like people who think the only good mother is a married mother.

I feel fantastically excited that we have a leader who fought for the leadership without compromising his quite challenging view that the party has to change.

It is simply the view, and a view I think shared by most members of the party, that it is very difficult to have a leader that does not command the support of the parliamentary party.

We need to show that we know and understand and can reflect today's Britain. Today we don't.