Every family should have the right to spend their money, after tax, as they wish, and not as the government dictates. Let us extend choice, extend the will to choose and the chance to choose.
— Margaret Thatcher
If... many influential people have failed to understand, or have just forgotten, what we were up against in the Cold War and how we overcame it, they are not going to be capable of securing, let alone enlarging, the gains that liberty has made.
People think that at the top there isn't much room. They tend to think of it as an Everest. My message is that there is tons of room at the top.
You and I come by road or rail, but economists travel on infrastructure.
It pays to know the enemy - not least because at some time you may have the opportunity to turn him into a friend.
Disciplining yourself to do what you know is right and important, although difficult, is the highroad to pride, self-esteem, and personal satisfaction.
Platitudes? Yes, there are platitudes. Platitudes are there because they are true.
This lady is not for turning.
I owe nothing to Women's Lib.
I seem to smell the stench of appeasement in the air.
I love argument, I love debate. I don't expect anyone just to sit there and agree with me, that's not their job.
It's passionately interesting for me that the things that I learned in a small town, in a very modest home, are just the things that I believe have won the election.
You don't tell deliberate lies, but sometimes you have to be evasive.
Nothing is more obstinate than a fashionable consensus.
Standing in the middle of the road is very dangerous; you get knocked down by the traffic from both sides.
We were told our campaign wasn't sufficiently slick. We regard that as a compliment.
No woman in my time will be prime minister or chancellor or foreign secretary - not the top jobs. Anyway, I wouldn't want to be prime minister; you have to give yourself 100 percent.
The spirit of envy can destroy; it can never build.
The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other peoples' money.
One of the things being in politics has taught me is that men are not a reasoned or reasonable sex.
Being prime minister is a lonely job... you cannot lead from the crowd.
There can be no liberty unless there is economic liberty.
Democratic nations must try to find ways to starve the terrorist and the hijacker of the oxygen of publicity on which they depend.
It may be the cock that crows, but it is the hen that lays the eggs.
I've got a woman's ability to stick to a job and get on with it when everyone else walks off and leaves it.
The battle for women's rights has been largely won.
To me, consensus seems to be the process of abandoning all beliefs, principles, values and policies. So it is something in which no one believes and to which no one objects.
I don't mind how much my Ministers talk, so long as they do what I say.
If you set out to be liked, you would be prepared to compromise on anything at any time, and you would achieve nothing.
To cure the British disease with socialism was like trying to cure leukaemia with leeches.
If my critics saw me walking over the Thames they would say it was because I couldn't swim.
Ought we not to ask the media to agree among themselves a voluntary code of conduct, under which they would not say or show anything which could assist the terrorists' morale or their cause while the hijack lasted.
Of course it's the same old story. Truth usually is the same old story.
A world without nuclear weapons would be less stable and more dangerous for all of us.
We Conservatives hate unemployment.
No one would remember the Good Samaritan if he'd only had good intentions; he had money as well.
It is not the creation of wealth that is wrong, but the love of money for its own sake.
There is no such thing as society: there are individual men and women, and there are families.
I usually make up my mind about a man in ten seconds, and I very rarely change it.
To wear your heart on your sleeve isn't a very good plan; you should wear it inside, where it functions best.
I am in politics because of the conflict between good and evil, and I believe that in the end good will triumph.
Any woman who understands the problems of running a home will be nearer to understanding the problems of running a country.
Europe was created by history. America was created by philosophy.
It's a funny old world.
There are still people in my party who believe in consensus politics. I regard them as Quislings, as traitors... I mean it.
You may have to fight a battle more than once to win it.
Pennies do not come from heaven. They have to be earned here on earth.
I am extraordinarily patient, provided I get my own way in the end.
I just owe almost everything to my father and it's passionately interesting for me that the things that I learned in a small town, in a very modest home, are just the things that I believe have won the election.
What Britain needs is an iron lady.
