There can be no liberty unless there is economic liberty.

I do not know anyone who has got to the top without hard work. That is the recipe. It will not always get you to the top, but should get you pretty near.

I seem to smell the stench of appeasement in the air.

If my critics saw me walking over the Thames they would say it was because I couldn’t swim.

Being prime minister is a lonely job… you cannot lead from the crowd.

I have no interest in sailing around the world. Not that there is any lack of requests for me to do so.

To cure the British disease with socialism was like trying to cure leukaemia with leeches.

Europe was created by history. America was created by philosophy.

This lady is not for turning.

Pennies do not come from heaven. They have to be earned here on earth.

Abhorrence of apartheid is a moral attitude, not a policy.

Platitudes? Yes, there are platitudes. Platitudes are there because they are true.

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...

If you want anything said, ask a man. If you want something done, ask a woman.

Standing in the middle of the road is very dangerous; you get knocked down by the traffic from both sides.

We may be a small island, but we are not a small people.

One of the things being in politics has taught me is that men are not a reasoned or reasonable sex.

I am in politics because of the conflict between good and evil, and I believe that in the end good will triumph.

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...

What is success? I think it is a mixture of having a flair for the thing that you are doing; knowing that it is not enough, that you have got to have hard work and...

A diplomat is a man who thinks twice before he says nothing.

It pays to know the enemy – not least because at some time you may have the opportunity to turn him into a friend.

Democratic nations must try to find ways to starve the terrorist and the hijacker of the oxygen of publicity on which they depend.

I don’t mind how much my Ministers talk, so long as they do what I say.

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.

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 owe nothing to Women’s Lib.

You and I come by road or rail, but economists travel on infrastructure.

If you want something said, ask a man; if you want something done, ask a woman.

I usually make up my mind about a man in ten seconds, and I very rarely change it.

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.

I’m extraordinarily patient provided I get my own way in the end.

You don’t tell deliberate lies, but sometimes you have to be evasive.

The battle for women’s rights has been largely won.

Nothing is more obstinate than a fashionable consensus.

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.

We were told our campaign wasn’t sufficiently slick. We regard that as a compliment.

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.

To wear your heart on your sleeve isn’t a very good plan; you should wear it inside, where it functions best.

It may be the cock that crows, but it is the hen that lays the eggs.

It’s a funny old world.

If you just set out to be liked, you would be prepared to compromise on anything at any time, and you would achieve nothing.

A world without nuclear weapons would be less stable and more dangerous for all of us.

There are still people in my party who believe in consensus politics. I regard them as Quislings, as traitors… I mean it.

If you lead a country like Britain, a strong country, a country which has taken a lead in world affairs in good times and in bad, a country that is always reliable, then you have...

It is not the creation of wealth that is wrong, but the love of money for its own sake.

I like Mr Gorbachev, we can do business together.

If you want to cut your own throat, don’t come to me for a bandage.