David Cameron Thinking Quotations

I think we need to just be very clear about what we're trying to do in Afghanistan. Frankly, we're not trying to create the perfect democracy. We're never going to create some ideal society. We are simply there for our own national security.

The biggest danger to the European Union comes not from those who advocate change, but from those who denounce new thinking as heresy. In its long history Europe has experience of heretics who turned out to have a point.

I think it true that, you know, sometimes things start to change even before a government changes and, actually, I think you can begin to see even the Labour machine beginning to understand that it has become over-reliant on targets and processes, that local governments have been over-bossed and bullied.

Cap the well, yes. Clear up the mess, yes. Make compensation - yes, absolutely. But would it be right to have legislation that independently targets BP rather than other companies? I don't think that - would be right.

I think in any organisation it's right to set out what you stand for, what you're fighting for and bring that together in one document so that people can see that the modern compassionate Conservative Party is in it for everybody - not just the rich

In the past we used to think of poverty in absolute terms - meaning straightforward material deprivation... We need to think of poverty in relative terms - the fact that some people lack those things which others in society take for granted.

I think the prospect of bringing back grammar schools has always been wrong and I've never supported it. And I don't think any Conservative government would have done it.

There are some people who seem to think that the way you reduce the cost of living in this country is for the state to spend more and more taxpayers' money. It is as if somehow you measure the compassion of the government by the amount of other people's money it can spend.

What we’re putting forward is the most radical reform of the welfare state… for 60 years. I think it will have a transformative effect in making sure that everyone is better off in work and better off working rather than on benefits.

We cannot go on as we are with 2.6 million people on incapacity benefit, 500,000 of them are under 35. Are we really saying there are half a million people in this country under 35 who are simply too ill to work? I don’t think that’s right.

I think it will help people have a better work-life balance, that's really important - that's the centre ground for me, it's the issues people care about in their lives.

The driving force behind today's terrorist threat is Islamist fundamentalism. The struggle we are engaged in is, at root, ideological. During the last century a strain of Islamist thinking has developed which, like other totalitarianisms, such as Nazi-ism and Communism, offers its followers a form of redemption through violence.

I think it was right to remove Saddam Hussein. I think it was the right decision then and I still think it was right now.

My question right now would be to Colonel Gaddafi, which is: 'What on earth do you think you are doing? Stop it.'

Look at me and think of Schwarzenegger.

Normally when people say they haven't decided, they're being polite but they're definitely not voting for you. I think it's different this time. People are thinking hard about the issues.