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
Without the political parties and the volunteering work of their members day in, day out, we would have a very different sort of politics and society.
If, in the name of liberty, we allow individuals to act in a way that damages the wellbeing of the whole, it will inevitably mean the breakdown of mutuality, thereby changing the very nature of our society.
We need to use all the resources at our disposal in order to prosper. We need more employment, and we need employment to be spread more fairly across society.
Changes to parliamentary procedure won't transform the lives of the people whom I represent. Decentralising, devolving decision-making and renewing civil society will.
In an ageing society, it makes sense to support older adults to develop new skills, prolonging their working lives.
Being home secretary involves having to face some of the worst of human behaviour and challenges of modern society.
Privacy is a right, but as in any democratic society, it is not an absolute right.
We've got to get back to old-fashioned politics that's in touch with the people we seek to represent and to avoid self-inflicted wounds.
With the commissioning of new schools undertaken by a local director of school standards, decisions will be fair and transparent, rooted in the needs of the local community. The admissions code and the role of the adjudicator will also be strengthened to provide fairness for all children.
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,
We rightly pride ourselves on the safe haven we offer to those genuinely fleeing terror. But our moral obligation and love of freedom does not extend to offering hospitality to terrorists.
We have put over £2bn in the last three years into counter-terrorism and we are developing the electronic border surveillance and identity cards
I personally guarantee that now that bear wouldn't get past Dover without being shot.
And we think that our citizens and yours would be very angry if they thought that we hadnt taken every possible step for prevention and then for joint action in the likelihood of those who threaten our lives and our well- being, taking action at the same time.