Tony Benn
Tony Benn
Anthony Neil Wedgwood Benn, originally known as Anthony Wedgwood Benn or Wedgie Benn, but later as Tony Benn, was a British politician who was a Member of Parliamentfor 47 years between the 1950 and 2001 general elections and a Cabinet minister in the Labour governments of Harold Wilson and James Callaghan in the 1960s and 1970s. Originally a "moderate", he was identified as being on the party's hard left from the early 1980s, and was widely seen as a key...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPolitician
Date of Birth3 April 1925
party thinking years
I've been a member of the Labour Party sixty five years, and I remain in it, but I think it's all about campaigning for justice and peace, and if you do that, you get a lot of support.
appreciate people age
The exhaustion of old age is something people who are younger don't fully appreciate.
teacher men thinking
I see myself as an old man and an unqualified teacher to the nation. I think being a teacher is probably the most important thing you can be in politics.
loyalty party eight
The general election of 1983 has produced one important result that has passed virtually without comment in the media. It is that, for the first time since 1945, a political party with an openly socialist policy has received the support of over eight and a half million people. This is a remarkable development by any standards and it deserves some analysis ... the 1983 Labour manifesto commanded the loyalty of millions of voters and a democratic socialist bridge-head in public understanding and support can be made.
thinking majority lord
When we have a majority we will do it. I think the days of the Lords are quite genuinely numbered.
party radical conferences
The 1973 Labour Conference will have before it the most radical programme the Party has prepared since 1945.
responsibility media class
I sometimes wish the trade unionists who work in the mass media, those who are writers and broadcasters and secretaries and printers and lift operators of Thomson House would remember that they too are members of our working class movement and have a responsibility to see that what is said about us is true.
rights water people
People say that if we work for the Single European Act, women will get their rights, the water will be purer, and training will be better. That is rubbish. It is part of the attempt to consolidate the EEC.
tabloids campaigns thanks
Thanks to the tabloid campaigns I have many death threats and I was very pleased to get another one the other day.
house would-be more-time
If ever I left the House of Commons it would be because I wanted to spend more time on politics.
people political democracy
It is not surprising that more and more people are coming to the conclusion that the ballot box is no longer an instrument that will secure political solutions... They can see that the parliamentary democracy we boast of is becoming a sham.
media essentials one-thing
The one thing that is absolutely essential is that there shouldn't be any governmental control [of the media] directly or indirectly.
views liberty share
I do not share the general view that market forces are the basis of personal liberty.
president want constitution
I don't want to commit myself in advocating a definite republican constitution which will get bogged down with the question of who would elect the President and when.