David Blunkett
David Blunkett
David Blunkett, Baron Blunkett, PCis best known as a British politician and more recently as an academic, having represented the Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough constituency for 28 years through to 7 May 2015 when he stepped down at the general election. Blind since birth, and coming from a poor family in one of Sheffield's most deprived districts, he rose to become Education and Employment Secretary, Home Secretary and Work and Pensions Secretary in Tony Blair's Cabinet following Labour's victory in...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionPolitician
Date of Birth6 June 1947
I am not a parliamentarian. I am a politician. Some MPs leave and are itching to get back. I don't feel that. This is just a work environment.
It is certainly true that as we grow older, our need for healthcare also grows. It is also true that those who have lived their lives in the most difficult circumstances and experienced the most exhausting and challenging work places need healthcare the most.
Crucially, I'd like to thank Labour party members up and down the country for sticking with us. For their active citizenship, their willingness to engage in our democracy, and for being there at the cutting edge of making our democracy work.
People from all over the world were killed in the attacks on the World Trade Centre. They came from many different cultural, ethnic and religious backgrounds. Christian, Jewish, Muslim and Hindu believers were killed together as they worked in the towers.
I encouraged Tony to serve out as much of this term as he can as PM. I think that's what he'll do, and I hope he'll want me to do this job through that period. I think he will.
Human nature is you get carried away, so we have to protect ourselves from ourselves.
So good on them. And whether it is a year or two years, it actually will be a sensible process of combining the talents that we have.
That is why with enormous regret I have tendered my resignation to the prime minister today.
In an ageing society, it makes sense to support older adults to develop new skills, prolonging their working lives.
I don't like prolonged, highly expensive commissions, especially if they are chaired by judges. We seem to have overwhelming faith in judges.
I didn't come into politics to have to deal with the issue of clandestine entry, illegal working, or an asylum system that allows a free run for right-wing bigots.
I prefer a positive view of freedom, drawing on another tradition of political thinking that goes all the way back to the ancient Greek polis.
the state has a role in helping people through rapid economic change. But not as a permanent safety net.
If you have a sense of irony or humour, you're usually cut down, as you're usually distorted or misinterpreted. So it does lead to us being slightly more dour and staid and predictable than would otherwise be the case, which I personally find quite frustrating - because if you don't laugh occasionally in my job, you cry most of the time.