Tony Benn Quotes

Imagine what would happen if the government were to take the wealth of 200,000 of India's richest people and redistribute it amongst 2 million of India's poorest? We would hear a lot about socialist appropriation and the death of democracy. Why should taking from the rich be called appropriation and taking from the poor be called development?

Well, it all began with Democracy. Before we had the vote all the power was in the hands of rich people. If you had money you could get health care, education, look after yourself when you were old, and what democracy did was to give the poor the vote and it moved power from the marketplace to the polling station, from the wallet...to the ballot.

I noticed that democracy was broken and tried to work on fixing that in Japan. Then I realized that it was broken all over the place and decided to work on that too.

Distribution of the wealth of the world is something for which no one sees a practical solution

Democratic socialism means that we must reform a political system that is corrupt, that we must create an economy that works for all, not just the very wealthy.

I think people are very focused on the economic issues. They want an economy that works for everybody.

People in debt become hopeless and hopeless people don't vote. They always say that that everyone should vote but I think that if the poor in Britain or the United States turned out and voted for people that represented their interests there would be a real democratic revolution.

We want the government to be controlled by all the people, not by the richest 1%. That's always been the first demand. That's a simple enough message, and I think it's pretty clear now, even though much of the media has been disingenuous in its coverage. We don't want the heads of the biggest industries to make all the decisions, because they're not for the people. They're for the corporations. Power to the people!

Rejecting the notion that democracy and markets are the same, young people are calling for an end to the poverty, grotesque levels of economic inequality, the suppression of dissent and the permanent war state.

I think the socialist movement, by removing many, many people from grinding stagnation and poverty and overwork, does enable people not just to lead better lives but to be better people.

Governance should be designed as an equalizer. Democrats are more inclined towards working families and those who are struggling for a better life.

Any health care funding plan that is just, equitable, civilized and humane must - must - redistribute wealth from the richer among us to the poorer and the less fortunate. Excellent healthcare is by definition re-distributional.

Economic issues are a subset of social justice. Social justice is unimaginable without economic justice. Isn't that obvious?

Make the people sovereign and the poor will use the machinery of government to dispossess the rich.

I started out young and idealistic, and it was all about social justice and fair distribution of resources. I didn't understand why everybody couldn't be equally prosperous.

It's not my fault that there is this gap between rich and poor, it is the fault of governments. I want a different world. One where I don't wake up thinking I'm so lucky to be able to feed my daughter.

A true revolution of values will soon look uneasily on the glaring contrast of poverty and wealth.

I'm interested in illuminating the enormous disparity between vast poverty and the tiny upper class... This vast inequity is unfair by definition, and I am interested in illuminating that and, where possible, changing that.

No one should be richer than a ten millionaire and no one should be without a home.

A strong economy is perfectly consistent with concern for equity and economic justice.

Fair Shares for All, is Labour's Call

The curse of poverty has no justification in our age. It is socially as cruel and blind as the practice of cannibalism at the dawn of civilization, when men ate each other because they had not yet learned to take food from the soil or to consume the abundant animal life around them. The time has come for us to civilize ourselves by the total, direct and immediate abolition of poverty.

We’ve taken care not to penalize the wealthy but we have to redistribute some income …It is through reform that we can obtain fairness in the modern world…A reformed welfare state is the only way to obtain social justice.

For the good of Spain, I should like there to be rather fewer rich people and rather fewer poor.

The wealth of this land must be immediately redistributed among its 125 million people if America is to be saved as a country.