Courage is a peculiar kind of fear.
I don't actually subscribe to the view that all power corrupts. But absolute power - when secured on the back of massive parliamentary majorities, which don't reflect the balance of political opinion in the country - can corrupt absolutely.
We need less theoretical debate and more practical application and acknowledgment of what Europe can and does do so that it is brought home to people in a relevant way.
As I spread my wings in politics, I discovered many Thatcher voters down south who were the same kind of people who loathed her in Scotland. They were puzzled by the Scots' antipathy, given the Falklands war and the strong militaristic history of the Highlands and elsewhere.
For any new leader of any party at any given time it takes time if you are not in government to establish yourself.
The quicker we get rid of the lobby system the better for all of us. I don't think in this day and age it is tenable to have these nods and winks, and on-the-record and off-the-record briefings.
Of all the principles which constitute Liberal Democracy, internationalism is the clearest, the most distinctive, and the one with the longest history.
Political parties need to look at the different kinds of support that people may need, suited to their way of life, and provide cost-effective solutions.
We believe that government in Britain is there to protect people from terrorism and from the worst criminality, but never at the expense of our civil liberties and the basic tenets of our legal system.
I listened to the students on campus in Plymouth, worried about their steadily deepening debts and how on earth they would ever escape them.
As Liberal Democrats and proponents of federalism, we must put our heads above the parapet and recapture and disseminate the true meaning of federalism. We have to win the vocabulary before we succeed in the vision.
I'm not someone who dwells upon past events, taking the view that life is too short.
By common consent, most European countries support the maintenance of robust welfare states and are comfortable with taxation systems that support them.
Whatever the eventual judgment, the political implications of Hutton are already clear. A devastating indictment of Labour in power - and of our political system itself.
That 1983 general election contained the telltale seeds of eventual Scottish Tory self-destruction.
The terrorist seeks to smash the most fundamental liberty of all: the right to lead our everyday lives on the basic assumption of safety.
The one thing we can all be sure about in politics is you are as well to expect the unexpected.
We have a Scottish Parliament and National Assembly for Wales, both elected by fairer votes - involving proportional representation.
Further Education should be about the ability to learn, not the ability to pay - everyone who is able should have the opportunity, regardless of their family background. I don't want to see students struggling with huge debts or frightened off even going to university in the first place.
'Federalism', in the context of political and media usage in Britain, has come to mean the creation and imposition of a European superstate, one centralised in Brussels.
