Britain Quotes - Page 18

• China is absolutely one of the biggest players in the world and if Britain wants to be connected to the world it has to be connected to China.

  George Osborne

  Player, Want, World

  Source: www.economist.com

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• At the moment we are hard-wired into the European markets - 50% of our exports go to Europe - and that has not been good for the UK. So I'm not saying "make Britain entirely dependent on China". I'm saying "let's diversify a bit". When I became chancellor, China was our ninth largest trading partner. This is the world's second biggest economy. China was doing more business with Belgium than it was with Britain.

  George Osborne

  Europe, World, Moments

  Source: www.economist.com

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• I think we woefully failed to connect Britain to the growing Chinese economy in the previous decade, and I have sought to remedy that. China is now the sixth biggest trading partner with the UK. We have attracted now the lion's share of Chinese investment that is going into Europe.

  George Osborne

  Thinking, Europe, Chinese

  Source: www.economist.com

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• The Foreign Office is a very important arm of the British state and I think Britain has a fantastic diplomatic service. We are the only country in the world spending 2% of our national income on defence and 0.7% of our national income on aid. We are the only country in the world doing both of those things.

  George Osborne

  Country, Thinking, Office

  Source: www.economist.com

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• What I'm interested in is Britain projecting itself abroad, and through that its values and the things it holds dear. And I don't think you do that by refusing to talk to the world's second-largest economy [China]. In fact, that is positively counter-productive in my view.

  George Osborne

  Thinking, Views, World

  Source: www.economist.com

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• I think Britain needs to get out there on the world stage and make itself heard. And for much of my political career, there has been a sense of retreat from the world stage because of what happened in the Iraq War.

  George Osborne

  War, Thinking, Careers

  Source: www.economist.com

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• I see no real argument in Britain that is concerned that an Indian company owns our most successful car manufacturer or that the sewer system under London is being renewed in part by Chinese investment. There are the odd voices that express concern but they are very marginal and they are not being listened to by the British people.

  George Osborne

  Real, Successful, Voice

  Source: www.economist.com

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• I am actually quite encouraged and I think, actually, the UK is coping with globalisation a lot better than most other European countries. And that is reflected in the fact that (whilst of course there are people who are still unemployed) our unemployment rate is low and (whilst of course we need to export more) we are attracting a huge amount of inward investment into Britain.

  George Osborne

  Country, Thinking, People

  Source: www.economist.com

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• I'm not saying "job done" but I am actually pretty confident that Britain can be one of the biggest winners from these big global changes that are taking place and indeed become the richest of the major economies in the world in this coming generation.

  George Osborne

  Jobs, Generations, Done

  Source: www.economist.com

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• Britain cannot afford to cut itself off from what is going on in the world, we are too interconnected with what is going on, we have a powerful history and tradition of taking an interest in what is going on in the world, we've also got a very real interest in the future, in remaining connected.

  George Osborne

  Powerful, Real, Cutting

  Source: www.economist.com

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• Britain is not part of the single currency. That is a decision we have taken, a voluntary decision of this country, but as a result are part of a European Union 19 of whose members are rapidly integrating, creating political, fiscal, monetary, economic union to make their currency work. And that is increasingly rubbing up against the operation.

  George Osborne

  Country, Taken, Creating

  Source: www.economist.com

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• Britain wants the single currency to be a success. It is massively in our interests that we have a stable financial system on our doorstep.

  George Osborne

  Want, Financial, Currency

  Source: www.economist.com

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• Britain should not be forced to make a choice between joining the single currency and leaving the EU, because if we're forced to make that choice we would leave the EU.

  George Osborne

  Choices, Leaving, Joining

  Source: www.economist.com

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• London had always been different. There is the old saying that Britain is ten years behind America, and the country as a whole is ten years behind London. If you have a Mayor of London working for jobs and growth and strong businesses, that is going to create opportunities for businesses and people in Burnley or Hull and places all over the UK.

  Sadiq Khan

  Country, Strong, Jobs

  Source: www.alastaircampbell.org

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• Britain cannot compete with China or Taiwan on price; we compete on skills, on arts and culture.

  Sadiq Khan

  Art, Skills, Taiwan

  Source: www.alastaircampbell.org

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• I think it would be great for football in Britain if Pep Guardiola wins leagues and dominates for a while with the way he likes to play and the players he'll bring in.

  Jamie Carragher

  Football, Thinking, Winning

  Source: www.gq-magazine.co.uk

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• Actually, the phrase "national security" is barely used until the 1930s. And there's a reason. By then, the United States was beginning to become global. Before that the United States had been mostly a regional power - Britain was the biggest global power. After the Second World War, national security is everywhere, because we basically owned the world, so our security is threatened everywhere. Not just on our borders, but everywhere - so you have to have a thousand military bases around the world for "defense."

  Noam Chomsky

  Military, War, Borders

  Source: www.commonwealmagazine.org

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• Because I don't belong entirely to Britain or the U.S. or India or Japan, I build my foundations in some way deeper than mere passports, and more in the light of where I'm going than of "where I come from."

  Pico Iyer

  Light, Japan, Way

  Source: www.macleans.ca

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• We oppress people, we make our victims small wherever they are, whether they are a black girl in a rural community in, say, America or Britain, or whether it's something happening out there in one of the countries of conflict. I mean Sri Lanka, the human rights abuse there is appalling.

  Roma Tearne

  Girl, Country, Mean

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

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• Dickens didn't have access to any other epistemologies other than those prevailing in Britain. But a novelist today cannot plausibly claim ignorance of his society's manifold connections with the wider world, the fact that prosperity and security at home, for instance, often depend on extensive violence and exploitation abroad.

  Pankaj Mishra

  Home, Ignorance, Novelists

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

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• I think 75% of the population of Great Britain are probably still de-churched. It's the younger end, the 25%, the merging generation, who have no church background at all.

  Nicky Gumbel

  Thinking, Church, Generations

  Source: www.theguardian.com

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• Television of course actually started in Britain in 1936, and it was a monopoly, and there was only one broadcaster and it operated on a license which is not the same as a government grant.

  David Attenborough

  Government, Television, Monopoly

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• I'll put it frankly - Britain has more influence in China than Norway or Switzerland, with all respect for the other countries.

  Jose Manuel Barroso

  Country, Switzerland, Norway

  "José Manuel Barroso: 'How is Britain so open to the world, but so closed to Europe?'". Interview with David Miliband, www.newstatesman.com. July 11, 2012.

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• But I am an optimist about Britain; and the difference between an optimist and a pessimist is not that the optimist believes the world is wonderful and the pessimist believes it's beset by challenges; the difference is the pessimist believes we will be defeated by them; the optimist thinks the challenges can be overcome.

  Tony Blair

  Believe, Thinking, Differences

  Tony Blair's speech at the 2004 Labour conference in Brighton, www.theguardian.com. September 28, 2004.

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• Genetic modification has many different areas, for example in medicine, and Britain is at the leading edge of this new technology. I don't know, but people tell me, it could indeed by the leading science of the 21st century. All I say to people is: 'Just keep an open mind and let us proceed according to genuine scientific evidence.'

  Tony Blair

  Technology, Medicine, People

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