Tony Benn

“You have to try to build support around causes. It is uniting to campaign on a single issue, and it is never just a single issue; it's always more than that.”

“Making mistakes is part of life. The only things I would feel ashamed of would be if I had said things I hadn't believed in order to get on. Some politicians do do that.”

“All war represents a failure of diplomacy.”

“I've got four lovely children, ten lovely grandchildren, and I left parliament to devote more time to politics, and I think that what is really going on in Britain is a growing sense of alienation. People don't feel anyone listens to them.”

“At the end of my life, I was told to vote for it for pensioners; I' m not in favour of means tests for pensioners or anybody.”

“Someone comes every morning at nine o'clock to see if I am still alive. I do get lonely, yes, but I have the children who come and see me. I see all my children every week, and there are the grandchildren, too.”

“I can't go to bed if I haven't done my diary. I always record them just as I've always recorded all my interviews and speeches.”

“Normally, people give up parliament because they want to do more business or spend more time with family. My wife said 'why don't you say you're giving up to devote more time to politics?'. And it is what I have done.”

“The uncut diaries are 16 million words. It's very tiring to do your diary every night before you go to bed.”

“I believe the more difficult the circumstances, the more people will be inclined to trust those in charge at the moment.”

“The Marxist analysis has got nothing to do with what happened in Stalin's Russia: it's like blaming Jesus Christ for the Inquisition in Spain.”

“I am on the right wing of the middle of the road and with a strong radical bias.”

“The exhaustion of old age is something people who are younger don't fully appreciate.”

“My filing system is messy but orderly.”

“I think if you're going to be committed to doing anything, you really have to care about it, and I suppose that is a romantic idea.”

“I see myself as an old man and an unqualified teacher to the nation. I think being a teacher is probably the most important thing you can be in politics.”

“I've had a very full life, and I've enjoyed it very much. I've learned a great deal and feel indebted to all the people who have worked so hard.”

“We are not just here to manage capitalism but to change society and to define its finer values.”

“If you file your waste-paper basket for fifty years, you have a public library.”

“I've made every mistake - but mistakes are how you learn.”