Johann Lamont Quotes

Separation and devolution are two completely different concepts which cannot be mixed together. One is not a stop on the way to the other.

I love hard political debate and I love beating somebody on a political point but what I'm more frustrated by is the politics where you play the man not the politics.

Scotland cannot be the only 'something for nothing' country in the world.

My Scottish Labour Party is a crusade - to fight poverty, inequality and injustice.

What I will say will not always please you, but what I say will always be honest and true and how I genuinely see it.

Maybe I was just born to argue with men.

The test is can you do something, rather than have a theoretical argument - can you make a difference?

I will not promise what I cannot deliver. And I will never hide the cost of what I propose.

I've got a very deep and abiding passion about education being far more than buildings and textbooks; it's what children bring into school with them.

If I have learned one thing in life, it is never to take any man's own estimate of himself. He could very well be mistaken.

It's true across the U.K. that those who had least to do with causing the economic crisis are carrying the heaviest burden. That's unacceptable.

My biggest ambition is to bring together what happens in the real world with what politicians talk about.

Progressive politics is not something to be bolted on to another cause.

The government don't want to talk about the consequences of the choices they make. They pretend there aren't any consequences.

I'm pretty proud of having completed a marathon myself, so I can only imagine the pride that real athletes feel when they are picked for the Olympic or the Paralympic Games.

While I'm leader, nothing will be off limits - there will not be one policy, one rule, one way of working which cannot be changed.

We must listen and learn, show humility and seek again to talk for and to people's ambitions and concerns.

We do students a great disservice by implying that one set of students is more important than another.

The Scottish Labour Party, while I have breath in my body, will listen to the views of trade unionists.

Schools are not exam factories for the rat race.

I got a very strong sense from my mother, in particular, that we are all equal in the sight of God.

My working life has always been wrapped up in doing my job to the best of my abilities and doing the best for my family. It is not a contest between the two.

We shall seek debate without division or rancour.

Telling the truth, and confronting the challenge, is what politics is about.

I spent ridiculous amounts of time as an activist and volunteer and was a teacher for 20 years.

I've taught fifth-year Christmas leavers last thing on a Friday afternoon. Basically, if you can face that you can face anything.