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When I saw how the European Union was developing, it was very obvious what they had in mind was not democratic. In Britain, you vote for a government so the government has to listen to you, and if you don't like it you can change it.

Tony Benn

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Tony Benn
Age: 88 †
Born: 1925
Born: April 3
Died: 2014
Died: March 14
Autobiographer
Diarist
Former Member Of The European Parliament
Politician
Anthony Neil Wedgwood Benn
Government
Democratic
Voting
Mind
Vote
European
Like
Saws
Britain
Europe
Union
Listening
Unions
Listen
Developing
Democracy
Obvious
Change
Election
Governing

More quotes by Tony Benn

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If you want your debt lifted you've got to sell your school and your hospitals.
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I've made every mistake - but mistakes are how you learn.
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If one meets a powerful person--Adolf Hitler, Joe Stalin or Bill Gates--ask them five questions: What power have you got? Where did you get it from? In whose interests do you exercise it? To whom are you accountable? And how can we get rid of you?
Tony Benn
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I'd rather die on my feet making a speech than die of Alzheimer's - and that's what I'm planning to do.
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There is no moral difference between a stealth bomber and a suicide bomber. Both kill innocent people for political reasons.
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There is good and bad in all of us and the Church uses the idea of original sin to control us by saying that, if we do not obey the bishops, we will rot in Hell.
Tony Benn
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The way a government treats refugees is very instructive.
Tony Benn
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I now want more time to devote to politics and more freedom to do so.
Tony Benn
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Some of the jam we thought was for tomorrow, we've already eaten
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The crisis that we inherit when we come to power will be the occasion for fundamental change and not the excuse for postponing it
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It's the same each time with progress. First they ignore you, then they say you're mad, then dangerous, then there's a pause and then you can't find anyone who disagrees with you.
Tony Benn
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The peace movement didn't stop the Iraq but I think that Blair would not be able to go along and support an Iranian war.
Tony Benn
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If you read Mein Kampf, Hitler's book, which I have outside, I bought it when I was eleven, Hitler said, democracy inevitably leads to Marxism - now you work that one out. It's so interesting that when the poor have the vote they will use it to remove the privileges of the rich.
Tony Benn
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People in debt become hopeless and hopeless people don't vote. They always say that that everyone should vote but I think that if the poor in Britain or the United States turned out and voted for people that represented their interests there would be a real democratic revolution.
Tony Benn
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The House of Lords is the British Outer Mongolia for retired politicians.
Tony Benn
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If ever I left the House of Commons it would be because I wanted to spend more time on politics.
Tony Benn
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The New York Times said, There are two superpowers in the world: the United States and the world peace movement.
Tony Benn
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The First World War created the Second World War because that was a war between three grandsons of Queen Victoria: The King of England, the Kaiser and the Tsar married Queen Victoria's granddaughter. And that triggered Communism in Russia and Fascism in Germany and led to the Second World War.
Tony Benn
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When I think of Cool Britannia I think of old people dying of hypothermia.
Tony Benn
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If you're going to make sense of politics you have to have a historical perspective and also recognise that you have to work with people you don't agree with.
Tony Benn