David Blunkett
David Blunkett
David Blunkett, Baron Blunkett, PCis best known as a British politician and more recently as an academic, having represented the Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough constituency for 28 years through to 7 May 2015 when he stepped down at the general election. Blind since birth, and coming from a poor family in one of Sheffield's most deprived districts, he rose to become Education and Employment Secretary, Home Secretary and Work and Pensions Secretary in Tony Blair's Cabinet following Labour's victory in...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionPolitician
Date of Birth6 June 1947
We have a media that presents every politician as being as bad as the next. There is no distinguishing between one good idea or another; no explanation of why constitutional change should be uppermost in the minds of the people I represent.
So good on them. And whether it is a year or two years, it actually will be a sensible process of combining the talents that we have.
There has been a real change, we've done a good job in the last two years on intelligence. There are 2,700 who will not be here who are often the ringleaders,
There are some really good experiments with the youth offending service, joining up youth offending teams with the youth justice board, and good local authority and primary care trusts working together.
Balancing the common good with the freedom and liberty to exercise that individuality has been and remains a challenge for those committed to democracy while understanding that the polis ensures our participation and therefore our citizenship.
In government, you are pressed by the security agencies. They come to you with very good information, and they say, 'You need to do something.' So you do need the breath of scepticism, not cynicism, breathing on them.
the state has a role in helping people through rapid economic change. But not as a permanent safety net.
I've been fortunate when in government to have a car at my disposal, which takes away the nightmare of getting a taxi.
It would give (Conservative leader) David Cameron a boost and allow him to continue his effort to try to occupy our territory.
Crucially, I'd like to thank Labour party members up and down the country for sticking with us. For their active citizenship, their willingness to engage in our democracy, and for being there at the cutting edge of making our democracy work.
Read my lips. No selection by examination or interview.
Privacy is a right, but as in any democratic society, it is not an absolute right.
People from all over the world were killed in the attacks on the World Trade Centre. They came from many different cultural, ethnic and religious backgrounds. Christian, Jewish, Muslim and Hindu believers were killed together as they worked in the towers.
Being an MP is not a desperately hard life, like going down the pit or working in the steelworks - with which I am all too familiar, having been brought up in the city of Sheffield; and it certainly isn't badly paid compared with any of my constituents.