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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
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Britain
Europe
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More quotes by Tony Benn

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When Blair was elected leader of the Labour Party, he said, New Labour is a new political party - that was the phrase he used, and I'm so glad he said it because he set up his own party and I'm not a member of it.
Tony Benn
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Britain today is suffering from galloping obsolescence.
Tony Benn
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Bush is actually encouraging the spread of nuclear weapons because the one thing I do know is if Iran did have nuclear weapons they wouldn't be threatening them.
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When you think of the number of men in the world who hate each other, why, when two men love each other, does the church split?
Tony Benn
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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.
Tony Benn
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If you want your debt lifted you've got to sell your school and your hospitals.
Tony Benn
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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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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.
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It would be as unthinkable to try to construct the Labour Party without Marx as it would to be to establish university faculties of astronomy,anthropology or psychology without permitting the study of Copernicus, Darwin or Freud, and still expect such faculties to be taken seriously
Tony Benn
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There may be a legal obligation to obey, but there will be no moral obligation to obey. When it comes to history, it will be the people who broke the law for freedom who will be remembered and honoured.
Tony Benn
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The Civil Service is a bit like a rusty weathercock. It moves with opinion then it stays where it is until another wind moves it in a different direction
Tony Benn
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If I were the American President I would rather be popular than have the power the destroy the world because however many puppets they have all over the Middle East - Saudi Arabia, Egypt and so on - they haven't got support from the people.
Tony Benn
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Although socialism is widely held by the establishment to be outdated, the things that are most popular in British society today are little pockets of socialism, where areas of life have been excluded from the crude operation of market forces and are protected for the benefit of the community
Tony Benn
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Most things in life are moments of pleasure and a lifetime of embarrassment photography is a moment of embarrassment and a lifetime of pleasure.
Tony Benn
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The present combination of corporate or commercial control theoretically answerable to politically appointed Boards of Governors is not in any sense a democratic enough procedure to control the power the broadcasters have.
Tony Benn
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I'm a democrat - I don't support Bush, I don't support Blair, I don't support Bin Laden.
Tony Benn
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If democracy is ever to be threatened, it will not be by revolutionary groups burning government offices and occupying the broadcasting and newspaper offices of the world. It will come from disenchantment, cynicism and despair caused by the realisation that the New World Order means we are all to be managed and not represented.
Tony Benn
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An educated, healthy and confident nation is harder to govern.
Tony Benn
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When we have a majority we will do it. I think the days of the Lords are quite genuinely numbered.
Tony Benn
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It is tempting to deny, but if you deny you confirm what you won't deny.
Tony Benn