Nick Clegg

“I wish more people knew that the only one of the three main parties where not a single MP flipped from one property to the next, and not a single MP avoided capital-gains tax, where every si...”

“If there's one thing I'm not going to apologise for as the leader of the Liberal Democrats in government after 60 or 70 years of being out of government, it's that you just cannot avoid but...”

“I am a passionate believer in freedom of speech. I would not support anything which would impinge on aggressive robust freedom of the British press, but when things go wrong and there has be...”

“I will not accept a new wave of fiscal retrenchment, of belt-tightening, without asking people at the top to make their contribution, to make an additional contribution. I don't think you ca...”

“Joining the Liberal Party was a no-brainer for me... And when you are a young man, you don't get a calculator out saying, 'Am I going to get to power?' You get propelled forward by idealism.”

“We need to teach our kids, because there is such a celebrity culture at the moment, that however rich you are, however famous you are, however glamorous you are, everyone has to live by the...”

“The British political system and the whole clapped out Westminster architecture, and the language that we use about politics, it's completely unsustainable. You either decide to be part of t...”

“I don't want to clip on the armour every morning. I've seen some politicians do this and they get a bit mangled and bitter. I just refuse to do that. I refuse to be angry or bitter or compla...”

“The choices politicians make must be based on values - not an arbitrary, axe-wielding approach to public spending or a dismal exchange between Gordon Brown and David Cameron about percentage...”

“I would be open about the fact that, clearly, politicians should be able to speak to each other. David Cameron doesn't seem to accept this, but if the British people have voted then of cours...”

“Liberalism is a really old British tradition and it has a completely different attitude towards the individual and the relationship between the individual and the state than the collectivist...”

“Most people in this country are very fair-minded; they understand we're in the middle of a very difficult journey of repairing, rescuing, restoring our British economy, and they want us, and...”

“I've just been away for a week, and I dropped my BlackBerry in the sea while I was messing around with the kids, so no one can reach me. Blissful. I heartily recommend it.”

“I totally accept that it's a legitimate criticism that when you are involved in the day-to-day scrum of government... that what can get lost is the narrative, the hymn sheet... the song that...”

“You have a political and media elite who have an idiom by which they describe politics. It's highly, highly polarised. It's right, left, red, blue, up, down, victorious, crushed.”

“The UK is not going to leave the European Union. Of course not. We are inextricably wound up with Europe. In terms of culture, history and geography, we are a European nation.”

“Liberal Democrats in government will not follow the last Labour government by sounding the retreat on the protection of civil liberties in the United Kingdom. It continues to be essential th...”

“The Labour Party has become consumed by collective bile towards... the Liberal Democrats. That portrays a rather nasty arrogance.”

“Grown-up politicians talk to each other across party lines. Over the last few weeks I have had lengthy conversations with Ed Miliband, David Miliband, with Tony Blair, with Peter Mandelson.....”

“I didn't become leader to transform the Liberal Democrats into an enlarged form of the Electoral Reform Society. It's not the be all and end all for us. There are other very, very key ambiti...”