John Howard

I accept that in a free society you have to justify reductions in people's liberties. I accept that, bearing in mind my starting point is that the most important human right is the right to life...

— John Howard

The most important civil liberty... is to stay alive and to be free from violence and death...

— John Howard

I think when people talk about civil liberties, they sometimes forget that action taken to protect the citizen against physical violence and physical attack is a blow in favour and not a blow against civil liberties.

— John Howard

Truth is absolute, truth is supreme, truth is never disposable in national political life.

— John Howard

I have had the view that cutting wages is not the path to prosperity, and one of the great myths propagated about my attitude to industrial relations is that I believe in lower wages. I've never believed in lower wages. Never. Never believed in lower wages, I've never believed in lower wages as an economic instrument.

— John Howard

I've never believed in lower wages. Never. Never believed in lower wages, I've never believed in lower wages as an economic instrument.

— John Howard

The 'black armband' view of our history reflects a belief that most Australian history since 1788 has been little more than a disgraceful story of imperialism, exploitation, racism, sexism and other forms of discrimination. I take a very different view. I believe that the balance sheet of our history is one of heroic achievement and that we have achieved much more as a nation of which we can be proud of than which we should be ashamed.

— John Howard

Leadership of the Liberal Party is a great honour, of which I remain profoundly conscious. It is, moreover, the unique gift of the party room.

— John Howard

I think history will judge him very harshly for not having seized the opportunity in the year 2000 to embrace the offer that was very courageously made by the then Israeli Prime Minister, Ehud Barack, which involved the Israelis agreeing to 90 per cent of what the Palestinians had wanted.

— John Howard

There is much in American society which I admire, but I have long held the view that the absence of an effective safety net in that country means that too many needy citizens fall by the wayside. That is not the path that Australia will tread. Nor do we want the burdens of nanny state paternalism that now weigh down many economies in Europe.

— John Howard

In the end, young people are at risk of being disinherited from their community if that community lacks the courage and confidence to teach its history.

— John Howard

I accept that climate change is a challenge, I accept the broad theory about global warming. I am sceptical about a lot of the more gloomy predictions.

— John Howard

We spent too much time in the first half of the nineties pondering whether we had to become less European so we could become more Asian, whether we had to become less British so we could become more multicultural. We had this perpetual seminar on our national identity, contributed to overwhelmingly by the cultural dietitians. I never thought Australians had any doubt as to what their identity was. And I think we’ve moved on from all of that.

— John Howard

If I were running al-Qaeda in Iraq, I would put a circle around March 2008 and be praying as many times as possible for a victory not only for [Barack] Obama but also for the Democrats.

— John Howard

A conservative is someone who does not think he is morally superior to his grandfather.

— John Howard

I don't think it is wrong, racist, immoral or anything, for a country to say 'we will decide what the cultural identity and the cultural destiny of this country will be and nobody else'.

— John Howard