Neil Kinnock Quotes

We keep looking at democratization as an event—like the fall of the Berlin Wall—but it’s actually a process.

The Seanad question was one element of a process of change and reform to politics that government has been pursuing.

We must restore faith in politics. Reform of the House of Lords is only one part of the answer, but it is a vital one.

If the House does not reform itself, it will be reformed from outside with a vengeance.

Political reform need not go hand in hand with economic liberalization. I do not believe that if you are libertarian, full of diverse opinions, full of competing ideas in the market place, full of sound and fury, therefore you will succeed.

For politics to change … culture must change too --- and that takes much more than dispatching troops, holding elections, and writing constitutions.

The House of Lords must go - not be reformed, not be replaced, not be reborn in some nominated life-after-death patronage paradise, just closed down, abolished, finished.

How much reform do you think this institution [Congress] can take?

The period of radical reform is finished.

Canadians understand that our Senate, as it stands today, must either change or … vanish

What we need is someone to abolish the House Of Lords, get rid of the Royal Family.

When we have a majority we will do it. I think the days of the Lords are quite genuinely numbered.

The problem with the West is that they start with political reform going towards democracy.

I cannot... perceive any ground for hoping that any practical good would, while the funding system exists in its present extent, result from the adoption of any of those projects, which have professed to have in view what is called Parliamentary Reform... when the funding system, from whatever cause, shall cease to operate upon civil and political liberty, there will be no need of projects for parliamentary reform. The parliament will, as far as shall be necessary, then reform itself.

During the last 100 years, the House of Lords has never contributed one iota to popular liberties or popular freedom, or done anything to advance the common weal; but during that time it has protected every abuse and sheltered every privilege.

I care more about getting this right [NHS reform] than I do about getting it done.

The most dangerous moment for a bad government is when it begins to reform.

Nothing matters for a drastic change in Ukraine more than political transformations.

I hope that Republicans in the House and Mr. Cantor will embrace that as part of immigration reform.

A mood of constructive criticism being upon me, I propose forthwith that the method of choosing legislators now prevailing in the United States be abandoned and that the method used in choosing juries be substituted. That is to say, I propose that the men who make our laws be chosen by chance and against will of all the rest of us, as now.

There's a different leader in Syria now. Many of the members of Congress of both parties who have gone to Syria in recent months have said they believe he's a reformer.

We are not politicians. We made our revolution to get the politicians out.

The fundamental question facing Iraq government is whether or not we will stand with reformers across the region. It's really the task. And we're going to stand with this government.

It would be a fine thing if ... parents would have in every bedroom in their house a picture of the temple so [their children] from the time [they are] infant[s] could look at the picture every day [until] it becomes a part of [their lives]. When [they reach] the age that [they need] to make [the] very important decision [concerning going to the temple], it will have already been made.