David Miliband

“I was always brought up that if you can make a difference, you should, and if you don't it's a waste. So we'll see if I can make a difference.”

“Everything about my politics has been about the future.”

“You know, you only get to live life once, so there are two things that that yields. One is that there's no point in crying over spilt milk, but secondly you hate wasting time, energy, and whatever talent you've got.”

“The real danger to Britain is a foreign policy that is isolationist in Europe and therefore weak in the rest of the world.”

“People feel politics isn't about their lives.”

“I can't admit to myself that the creation of a Palestinian state won't happen. What I know is that with each passing year it gets more and more difficult to happen, not least because there is more and more bloodshed, generation upon generation.”

“My favourite poem is called 'Roots and Wings' - it's a very moving poem about how if you've got real roots you can fly.”

“In the end, human history is made up of all our decisions.”

“One of the jewels in the crown of Labour's time in office was the rescue of the National Health Service. As the Commonwealth Fund, the London School of Economics and the Nuffield Foundation have all shown, health reforms as well as additional investment were essential to improved outcomes, especially for poorer patients.”

“My memories are of my dad taking me to football on Saturday mornings, and my mum taking me swimming. Those are the things I remember from my childhood, not sitting around the table debating capitalism and the profit squeeze.”

“I've learnt that, sometimes, how others see you is not the same as how you see yourself. I've learnt about how you can be multitasking - and sometimes other people see that you're multitasking. And that's not very nice for them.”

“The problems that the world faces - from nuclear proliferation to climate change - can't be tackled by the West alone. They need a coalition of not just West and East, but they need a coalition of Christian and Jew and Muslim.”

“If you want to fight against a declining trend, you've got to have a much bigger bazooka.”

“I mean, Britain is a country of successful Muslim businesspeople, teachers and educators, journalists. So, we have to say very strongly that the two million plus Muslims in Britain, the vast bulk of them make a huge contribution to our society, and they actually make it the vibrant society it is.”

“The whole of government needs to contribute to the shared goal of restructuring the British economy. But that means taking on the myth that the Treasury either knows best or can run it all. It just doesn't.”

“You have to believe that it's through politics that societies can lead social and economic and political change.”

“What is the big political issue for Britain at the moment? Without wishing to sound portentous, it is about whether we can build a social democratic settlement, whether we can lay the political and cultural foundations for the next several years.”

“The big risk to British lives in 2013 is in Afghanistan. Our troops, diplomats and aid workers have made a big contribution there. But while there is an end date for Western engagement, 2014, there isn't a proper end game.”

“We keep the terrorist threat to the United Kingdom under very careful scrutiny. We think it's right to keep the public informed about the general threat level.”

“People want more power over their own lives. That's not just true in Britain, it's true around the world.”