Patricia Hewitt Quotations

People are not perfect... very often the relationships that are strongest are those where people have worked through big crises, but they've had to work through them. So the challenge to us is to work through that.

You don't repair that relationship by sitting down and talking about trust or making promises. Actually, what rebuilds it is living it and doing things differently - and I think that is what is going to make the difference.

So there clearly is a sense in which the Labour Party here, certainly at State level is reaching out and connecting with people and reflecting the aspirations and needs of, you know the mass of ordinary Australians.

The accusation that we've lost our soul resonates with a very modern concern about authenticity.

And some of what we're doing in Government even now, some of the welfare reform programs that are helping lone mothers come into work are based on things that were very new under the Labour Government in the eighties.

We just have to be crystal clear that if we were to abandon all the reforms made over some very painful years in the Labour party, we would be consigned back to opposition.

A modern health and social care system has to be completely focussed on the needs of its users.

The 2 million people who work in the NHS and social care are also themselves patients and users. I know they all want to treat patients and users the way they and their families would want to be treated and that is the purpose of our reforms.

I have very real concerns about the civil liberties implications of ultimately requiring every resident to submit themselves for compulsory fingerprinting or some other biometric test.

As patients and consumers, we are better informed today about our health care than any previous generation.

But getting your party structure right may also be a precondition for getting your policies right.

Barbara Castle should have been Labour's - and Britain's - first female prime minister. What a role model she would have been: passionate, fiery, and absolutely committed to social justice.

We're seeing quite a lot of people who really would like a return to class-based politics.

And I hope very much that the ALP will become increasingly engaged in the international discussions that are taking place amongst centre-left parties generally.

And it seems to me in that experience may lie at least some of the clues for policy development perhaps constitutional changes as well that Labour will need to make at the national level too.

Certainly we know from our own experience how very difficult it is when you've lost an election that perhaps a lot of people were expecting you to win.

Well I think all I would say on that is, when we were in opposition in Britain and Hawke and then Keating were in power here, Labor was in power here, we learnt a huge amount from the ALP's experience here.

Barbara Castle was a hero to millions of British women. She inspired a new generation of women to become active in Labour politics, including, of course Labour's deputy leader, Harriet Harman.

But clearly at the same time you've got to get out there and connect with voters and actually respond to the needs, the frustrations, whatever problems their now saying are not being adequately solved.

You've got to respond to that and of course thinking through the role of a left party in the modern world, in the modern economy and society and having a policy response to that.

There is no question of the NHS being privatised.

Many of us would have liked to go that little bit further and faster.

I think he was absolutely right not to go to UN last week... First things first - that is, values and people here in their local communities, and remembering all politics is local, and trusting people more.

I suppose the one very striking thing, you know, to a British observer is the fact that Labour is in power in every State in Australia.

We are trying to find out what patients need, rather than what it suits us to provide. And the people are saying: 'We want services to work together.' They ask: 'Why do I have to tell my story over and over again to different people; why can't I see the same person, or if that's not possible, why can't they pass the information on to other people.'

We are monitoring the situation literally day by day, ... We will review the funding in the light of this work.

We want to ask people how services can more effectively promote good health, as well as treat disease, and how we can empower people to have more say in the care they receive in the community and their homes.

Extending prescribing responsibilities is an important part of our commitment to modernize the NHS,

I very much hope entrepreneurial GPs from neighbouring areas may want to expand,

This bill is going to save thousands of people's lives.

Although people are very happy with the service they receive from their GP, they are less happy with access and convenience. Patients are telling us with the health service, you either see your GP or, out-of-hours, go to accident and emergency. We need to make sure that GP surgeries become more accessible.

There is total agreement on 99 percent of the policy. On the 1 percent, not only in government but I think across the country, there was real disagreement,

The merger would be against the public interest and should be prohibited,

I'm satisfied that we are making exactly the preparations that we need.

in order to avoid the issuing of redundancy notices at Rover while efforts are made to keep the business together.

By the summer of 2007 almost everybody in the workforce, 99% of people, will be in a completely smoke-free environment,

By expanding traditional prescribing roles, patients can more easily access the medicines they need from an increased number of highly trained health professionals.

Fifty per cent of the public doesn't know what 'fifty per cent' means.

I think he was absolutely right not to go to UN last week... First things first - that is, values and people here in their local communities, and remembering all politics is local, and trusting people more.

Business leaders must not cling to old ways of doing business, or allow inertia or complacency to prevent them from making the decisions that they will eventually be forced to make.

The Health Bill will include a ban on smoking in enclosed workplaces and public places which will cover 99 percent of the workforce,