The House Of Commons Quotes & Sayings

I appeal to the contemptible speech made lately by Sir Robert Peel to an applauding House of Commons. 'Orders of merit,' said he, 'were the proper rewards of the military' (the desolators of the world in all ages). 'Men of science are better left to the applause of their own hearts.' Most learned Legislator! Most liberal cotton-spinner! Was your title the proper reward of military prowess? Pity you hold not the dungeon-keys of an English Inquisition! Perhaps Science, like creeds, would flourish best under a little persecution. — John Joseph Griffin

Churchill: The strangling of Bolshevism at its birth would have been an untold blessing to the human race.
Mr. Seymour Cocks (Labor Party): "If that had happened we should have lost the 1939 -45 war".
Churchill: No, it would have prevented that war.
[Speech in the House of Commons, May 11,1953] — Winston S. Churchill

I am the first prime minister of this country of neither English nor French origin. So I determined to bring about a Canadian citizenship that knew no hyphenated consideration ... I'm very happy to be able to say that in the House of Commons today in my party we have members of Italian, Dutch, German, Scandinavian, Chinese and Ukrainian origin and they are all Canadians. — John Diefenbaker

Well, why do you want a political career? Have you ever been in the House of Commons and taken a good square look at the inmates? As weird a gaggle of freaks and sub-humans as was ever collected in one spot. — P.G. Wodehouse

These critics thought that the general commercialization of English life, including the rise of trading companies, banks, stock markets, speculators, and new moneyed men, had undermined traditional values and threatened England with ruin. The monarchy and its minions had used patronage, the national debt, and the Bank of England to corrupt the society, including the House of Commons, and to build up the executive bureaucracy at the expense of the people's liberties, usually for the purpose of waging war. — Gordon S. Wood

Give them a corrupt House of Lords, give them a venal House of Commons, give they a tyrannical Prince, give them a truckling court, and let me have but an unfettered press. I will defy them to encroach a hair's breadth upon the liberties of England. — Richard Brinsley Sheridan

This is the third time that, in the course of six years, during which I have had the lead of the Opposition in the House of Commons, I have stormed the Treasury Benches: twice, fruitlessly, the third time with a tin kettle to my tail which rendered the race hopeless. You cannot, therefore, be surprised, that I am a little wearied of these barren victories, which like Alma , Inkerman, and Balaclava , may be glorious but are certainly nothing more. — Benjamin Disraeli

I never aspired to be Speaker simply so I could say, 'I am the Speaker of the House of Commons,' and tell my children that. — John Bercow

I studied politics and economics at Bristol, and people always assumed that I'd go into politics or a non-government organisation when I left. I might well do this later on. I'd love to represent a West Country seat in the House of Commons. — Ben Elliot

But first, the news: The House of Commons was sealed off today after police chased an escaped lunatic through the front door during Prime Minister's question time. A spokesman at Scotland Yard said it was like looking for a needle in a haystack. — Ronnie Barker

The receipt to make a speaker, and an applauded one too, is short and easy. Take common sense quantum sufficit; add a little application to the rules and orders of the House [of Commons], throw obvious thoughts in a new light, and make up the whole with a large quantity of purity, correctness and elegancy of style. Take it for granted that by far the greatest part of mankind neither analyze nor search to the bottom; they are incapable of penetrating deeper than the surface. — Lord Chesterfield

Watching the Commons tribute to Margaret Thatcher was like being suffocated inside a gigantic sticky toffee pudding, but one with nasty bogeys planted inside. There was much of the 'Margaret Thatcher who was lucky enough to know me,' especially from her own side of the House. — Simon Hoggart

The Government have consistently made it clear that the mechanism in the United Kingdom whereby the European draft constitutional treaty could be implemented is approval by the House of Commons followed by a referendum of the people of Britain. There is no question of implementing it by the back door. — Douglas Alexander

It will be, I suppose, a foolhardy Government that tries to push through legislation making knowledge of both official languages one of the qualifications for election to the House of Commons or appointment to the Senate, but maybe it will have to come to this as a price we must pay for equality of the two great language groups of our founding fathers. — Judy LaMarsh

It is recorded how towards the end of the eighteenth century a Muslim visitor to England was taken to see the House of Commons at work. He later wrote of his astonishment at finding the that the British Parliament actually made laws and fixed punishments for their infraction - because unlike Muslims the English had not accepted a divine law revealed from heaven and therefore had to resort to such unsatisfactory expedients. Muslims still understand the expression 'the rule of law' very differently than do most Westerners. — Margaret Thatcher

If ever I left the House of Commons it would be because I wanted to spend more time on politics. — Tony Benn

Churchill was in the lavatory in the House of Commons and his secretary knocked on the door and said: Excuse me Prime Minister, but the Lord Privy Seal wishes to speak to you. After a pause Churchill replied: Tell His Lordship: I'm sealed on The Privy and can only deal with one shit at a time — Winston S. Churchill

We shall not flag nor fail. We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in France and on the seas and oceans; we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air. We shall defend our island whatever the cost may be; we shall fight on beaches, landing grounds, in fields, in streets and on the hills. We shall never surrender and even if, which I do not for the moment believe, this island or a large part of it were subjugated and starving, then our empire beyond the seas, armed and guarded by the British Fleet, will carry on the struggle until in God's good time the New World with all its power and might, sets forth to the liberation and rescue of the Old. — Winston S. Churchill

The government's instinct is to shroud itself in secrecy - to act like the office of a president instead of as a collective cabinet government held to account by the elected House of Commons. — Charles Kennedy

The House is composed of very good men, not shining, but honest and reasonably well-informed, and in time will be found to improve, and not much inferior in eloquence, science, and dignity, to the British Commons. They are patriotic enough, and I believe there are more stupid (as well as more shining) people in the latter, in proportion. — Fisher Ames

We are keenly in sympathy with the representatives of Labour. We have too few of them in the House of Commons ... The Liberal party, high and low, have discovered, if they ever forgot it, that the real road to success ... lies in adhering to the old principles of the party. — Henry Campbell-Bannerman

In politics, they found there were not enough females in the House of Commons, so they came up with the idea of shortlists having to have women on them. — Gordon Taylor

Women have worked hard; starved in prison; given of their time and lives that we might sit in the House of Commons and take part in the legislating of this country. — Ellen Wilkinson

There is no more striking illustration of the immobility of British institutions than the House of Commons. Herbert — H. H. Asquith

It was a skill useful to lawyers, and no man in all English history was more the lawyer than Coke. He personified a profession considered both so influential and so dubious that in 1372 the House of Commons had tried to bar lawyers from Parliament; little had changed when, in Coke's lifetime, Shakespeare wrote, "First, kill all the lawyers. — John M Barry

A man may speak very well in the House of Commons, and fail very completely in the House of Lords. There are two distinct styles requisite: I intend, in the course of my career, if I have time, to give a specimen of both. — Benjamin Disraeli

Really, this horrid House of Commons quite ruins our husbands for us. I think the Lower House by far the greatest blow to a happy married life that there has been since that terrible thing called the Higher Education of Women was invented. — Oscar Wilde

Now that the House of Commons is trying to become useful, it does a great deal of harm. — Oscar Wilde

It would be wholly wrong constitutionally for the unelected House of Lords to do anything, to kill anything of a financial nature that has been through the House of Commons not once but twice. — Nigel Lawson

Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.
(Speech in the House of Commons, 11 November 1947) — Winston S. Churchill

Elections exist for the sake of the House of Commons and not the House of Commons for the sake of elections. — Winston Churchill

There's no secret about my ambition, I do not want to go into the House of Commons. My only real political interest is in London and if one day I'm in a position to run for mayor, then terrific. — Trevor Phillips

It's good to remember the unburied dead and the uncollected rubbish. Most of it can now be seen on the Labour benches in the House of Commons. — Norman Tebbit

No man is regular in his attendance at the House of Commons until he is married. — Benjamin Disraeli

The essence and foundation of House of Commons debating is formal conversation. The set speech, the harangue addressed to constituents, or to the wider public out of doors, has never succeeded much in our small wisely-built chamber. To do any good you have got to get down to grips with the subject and in human touch with the audience. — Winston Churchill

A formative influence on my undergraduate self was the response of a respected elder statesmen of the Oxford Zoology Department when an American visitor had just publicly disproved his favourite theory. The old man strode to the front of the lecture hall, shook the American warmly by the hand and declared in ringing, emotional tones: 'My dear fellow, I wish to thank you. I have been wrong these fifteen years.' And we clapped our hands red. Can you imagine a Government Minister being cheered in the House of Commons for a similar admission? "Resign, Resign" is a much more likely response! — Richard Dawkins

It excites world wonder in the Parliamentary countries that we should build a Chamber, starting afresh, which can only seat two-thirds of its Members. It is difficult to explain this to those who do not know our ways. They cannot easily be made to understand why we consider that the intensity, passion, intimacy, informality and spontaneity of our Debates constitute the personality of the House of Commons and endow it at once with its focus and its strength. — Winston Churchill

When I was 14, I told my mother I intended to be in the House of Commons in the morning, in court in the afternoon and on stage in the evening. She realised then a fantasist had been born. — Helen McCrory

If Hitler invaded hell I would make at least a favorable reference to the devil in the House of Commons. — Winston S. Churchill

No hard figures are available on how much was actually paid out or how many Friends complied with the request of their Yearly Meeting. For those who did pay their slaves, it was common to use the yearly wage of the day. We do know that one Mr. F. Buxton, in an appeal before the British House of Commons to abolish slavery, said that it had cost North Carolina Friends fifty thousand pounds to release their slaves.14 For some southern Friends emancipation of their slaves meant financial bankruptcy; for many, if not most, it meant eventual migration to the North. — Richard J. Foster

I knew Otto Kahn [According to the Figaro, Mr. Kahn on first going to America was a clerk in the firm of Speyer and Company, and married a grand-daughter of Mr. Wolf, one of the founders of Kuhn, Loeb & Company], the multi-millionaire, for many years. I knew him when he was a patriotic German. I knew him when he was a patriotic American. Naturally, when he wanted to enter the House of Commons, he joined the 'patriotic party.' — Denis Fahey

It is easy to carp at colleges, and the college, if he will wait for it, will have its own turn. Genius exists there also, but will not answer a call of a committee of the House of Commons. It is rare, precious, eccentric, and darkling. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

I can't get very excited about the House of Commons these days because I don't feel the power is there. What is really bizarre is that you sense it is not in Washington either. It is now very hard even to locate the levers of power, let alone to pull them and change things. — Robert Harris

Most Canadians don't understand the House of Commons. They turn on their televisions, see us yelling at one another, and dismiss us as a bunch of fools. — Jean Chretien

I am seeking every day to restore faith in Parliament - to ensure we have a House of Commons which is representative, effective and reconnected to the people we serve. — John Bercow

I do think there is a great deal of caricature around the House of Commons. It is just that kind of place. — Charles Kennedy

The food in the House of Commons is fairly good. The cafe in Portcullis House is really very high quality, and you also have a choice of eating in the more traditional restaurants, the Churchill Room or the Members' Dining Room. I don't often eat in them, though, as I'm usually on the run. — Vince Cable

No prime minister in Britain will ever be able to go to war without the endorsement of a majority of the House of Commons. — Neil Kinnock

I. cannot stoop to reply to the folly and the slander of every poor Tory partisan who assails me, and I should not have noticed you but for the fact that you are a member of the House of Commons. — John Bright

But there's certainly only one thing I could never agree with George Galloway on. He's a teetotaller and wants to close all the bars in the House of Commons. That is just not on. — Nigel Farage

I said what do you mean by his country? A flag someone invented two hundred years ago? The Bench of Bishops arguing about divorce and the House of Commons shouting Ya at each other across the floor? Or do you mean the T.U.C. and British Railways and the Co-op? — Graham Greene

There are more hooligans in the House of Commons than at a football match. — Brian Clough

The House of Commons, refused to receive the addresses of the colonies, when the matter was pending; besides, we hold our rights neither from them nor from the Lords. — Christopher Gadsden

Have, myself, full confidence that if all do their duty, if nothing is neglected, and if the best arrangements are made, as they are being made, we shall prove ourselves once again able to defend our Island home, to ride out the storm of war, and to outlive the menace of tyranny, if necessary for years, if necessary alone. Winston Churchill, House of Commons, 4 June 1940 — Andrew Roberts

By my count, the Deputy Prime Minister has sworn an oath of loyalty and service to Her Majesty no fewer than four times in the last two years, yet he has used his position as a minister of the Crown as a podium from which to rail against our history and our heritage. The minister says that instead of the monarchy he would prefer an entirely Canadian institution, but he fails to recognize that the monarchy is as Canadian as the House of Commons itself. — Elsie Wayne

Anybody who enjoys being in the House of Commons probably needs psychiatric help. — Ken Livingstone

The Irish have played a part in every military conflict on American soil since the founding of the republic. Donegal-born Richard Montgomery was the first American general to lose his life in the Revolutionary War. In fact, one British major general at the time told the House of Commons that "half the rebel Continental Army was from Ireland. — Rashers Tierney

When I first came to the House of Commons and walked out into the lobby, men sprang to their feet. I asked them to sit down since I'd come to walk around. I didn't want them doing me favours. — Agnes Macphail

You can hardly say boo to a goose in the House of Commons now without cries of "Ungentlemanly," "Not fair" and all the rest. — Harold Macmillan

I am a child of the House of Commons. I was brought up in my fathers house to believe in democracy. Trust the peoplethat was his message. — Winston Churchill

Thirty resolute men in your House of Commons could save the world. — Felix Frankfurter

There is nowhere in the world where sleep is so deep as in the libraries of the House of Commons. — Henry Channon

He was a Labour MP so I asked him if it was true the House of Commons was a form of poor relief for the otherwise unemployable... — Robert Robinson

Only people who look dull ever get into the House of Commons, and only people who are dull ever succeed there. — Oscar Wilde

The House of Commons is called the Lower House, in twenty Acts of Parliament; but what are twenty Acts of Parliament amongst Friends? — John Selden

What the government has to do, if it wants to govern for any length of time, is it must appeal primarily to the third parties in the House of Commons to get them to support it. — Stephen Harper

For far too long the House of Commons has been run as little more than a private club by and for gentleman amateurs. — John Bercow

I'm going to reduce the size of the Cabinet, cut the number of ministers, reduce the size of the House of Commons, campaign for a European Parliament with 100 fewer members, halve the number of political advisers, and abolish a huge swathe of Labour's regional bureaucracies and agencies and their offices in Brussels. — William Hague

You see how this House of Commons has begun to verify all the ill prophecies that were made of it - low, vulgar, meddling with everything, assuming universal competency, and flattering every base passion - and sneering at everything noble refined and truly national. The direct tyranny will come on by and by, after it shall have gratified the multitude with the spoil and ruin of the old institutions of the land. — Samuel Taylor Coleridge

We have a maxim in the House of Commons, and written on the walls of our houses, that old ways are the safest and surest ways. — Edward Coke

You may scold your carpenter, when he has made a bad table, though you can't make a table yourself.' I say to you - 'Mr. Finch, you may point out a defect in a baby's petticoats, though you haven't got a baby yourself!' Doesn't that satisfy you? All right! Take another illustration. Look at your room here. I can see in the twinkling of an eye, that it's badly lit. You have only got one window - you ought to have two. Is it necessary to be a practical builder to discover that? Absurd! Are you satisfied now? No! Take another illustration. What's this printed paper, here, on the chimney-piece? Assessed Taxes. Ha! Assessed Taxes will do. You're not in the House of Commons; you're not a Chancellor of the Exchequer - but haven't you an opinion of your own about taxation, in spite of that? Must you and I be in Parliament before we can presume to see that the feeble old British Constitution is at its last gasp? — Wilkie Collins

I'm not going to play politics on the floor of the House of Commons. — John Turner

Until the late-nineteenth-century the House of Commons maintained a formal ban on the reporting of its debates. — Clive Ponting

[I]n Great-Britain it is said that their constitution relies on the house of commons for honesty, and the lords for wisdom; whichwould be a rational reliance if honesty were to be bought with money, and if wisdom were hereditary. — Thomas Jefferson

As a young man, Dickens worked as a reporter in the House of Commons and hated it. He felt that all politicians spoke with the same voice. — Claire Tomalin

On March 10, 1764, preliminary resolutions passed the House of Commons looking towards the Stamp Act. — Albert Bushnell Hart

The House Of Commons has never been a tea-party. It consists of strong-minded, often very idealistic people, who are trying to accomplish something for our country. We are inheritors of an adversarial system and that, in itself, fosters conflict. — John Allen Fraser

The House of Commons starts its proceedings with a prayer. The chaplain looks at the assembled members with their varied intelligence and then prays for the country. — Alfred Denning, Baron Denning

House of Commons: 'You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in one word: victory, victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory, however long and hard the road may be; for without victory there is no survival.' Later this speech was generally cited as a classic example of determination and courage, but the reactions at the time were not all that enthusiastic. In his diary, Harold Nicolson noted: 'When Chamberlain enters the House he gets a terrific reception, when Churchill comes in the applause is less.' Many of the British, including King George VI and most of the Conservatives, considered Churchill in those days to be a warmonger and a dangerous adventurer. There was a strong undercurrent in favour of reaching an accord with Hitler. — Geert Mak

I have never pretended to be a great House of Commons man, but I pay the House the greatest compliment I can by saying that, from first to last, I never stopped fearing it. — Tony Blair

Had the heavens fallen and mixed themselves with the earth, had the people of London risen in rebellion with French ideas of equality,* had the Queen persistently declined to comply with the constitutional advice of her ministers, had a majority in the House of Commons lost its influence in the country, - the utter prostration of the bereft husband could not have been more complete. — Anthony Trollope

It is quite clear from what has been said and written that, time after time after time, there has been a conspiracy between the Conservative Front Bench in this House and the inbuilt Conservative majority in the House of Lords to defeat legislation that has passed through the House of Commons ... I warn the House of Lords of the consequences ... it is our strong view that the House of Lords should recall that its role is not that of a wrecking chamber, but of a revising chamber. In recent weeks, it has been wrecking legislation passed by this House. — James Callaghan

There's a lot of people I've encouraged and helped to get into the House of Commons. Looking at them now, I'm not so sure it was a wise thing to do. — Edward Heath