A History of Modern Britain Quotes

“The left tended to think people’s private lives should be their own, even if they made choices traditional Christian society regarded as immoral; but that people’s working lives, from how much they earned to where they worked, were fit for State interference. The right had a reverse view, that the State should uphold traditional moral codes with the full rigour of the law, but keep out of the economy as much as possible.”
― Andrew Marr, A History of Modern Britain

“To what extent was this David Cameron’s fault? It’s hard to think of a more complete definition of political failure than an essentially pro-EU Prime Minister who plots to defeat his enemies on the right, and by doing so ejects his country from the EU by mistake,”
― Andrew Marr, A History of Modern Britain

“The one economic medicine so bitter that no minister in the seventies had thought of trying it was duly uncorked and poured into the spoon. It was time for Britain to grimace and open her mouth.”
― Andrew Marr, A History of Modern Britain

“The great background question about the Labour governments of the sixties is whether with a stronger leader they could have gripped the country's big problems and dealt with them. How did it happen that a cabinet of such brilliant, such clever and self-confident people achieved so little? In part, it was the effect of the whirling court politics demonstrated by 'In Place of Strife'.”
― Andrew Marr, A History of Modern Britain

“Androgynous fashion, long hair, the Pill, a new interest in the inner psychological life - an unabashed sloppiness, if you will - really marks the sixties. It was when Britain went girlie. And what do girls do? Girls shop.”
― Andrew Marr, A History of Modern Britain

“When they finally went home, they left behind an unstable, unhappy part of the world, with borders like wounds scored across it.”
― Andrew Marr, A History of Modern Britain

“Alternatively, the railway could be split vertically, so that the State owned the track, some companies owned the stations, and others the trains. This could be called the Complete Horlicks option.”
― Andrew Marr, A History of Modern Britain

“The majority of British people did not want the arrival of large numbers of blacks and Asians, just as they did not want an end to capital punishment, or deep British involvement in the European Union, or many of the other things the political elite has opted for.”
― Andrew Marr, A History of Modern Britain

“Immigration has changed Britain more than almost any other single social event in post-1945 Britain – more than the increase in longevity, or the Pill, the collapse of deference or the spread of suburban housing. The only change which eclipses it is the triumph of the car.”
― Andrew Marr, A History of Modern Britain

“Events – dear boy – duly forced the devaluation option into centre stage. Decade by decade, government by government, the impact of energy policy on British politics is a constant theme. One could write a useful political history which did not move beyond the dilemmas posed by energy supply.”
― Andrew Marr, A History of Modern Britain

“Androgynous fashion, long hair, the Pill, a new interest in the inner psychological life – an unabashed soppiness, if you will – really marks the sixties. It was when Britain went girlie. And what do girls do? Girls shop.”
― Andrew Marr, A History of Modern Britain

“being sacked. Major’s hopes for central regulation withering away echo Lenin, who hoped for a ‘withering away’ of the Soviet”
― Andrew Marr, A History of Modern Britain