There was, of course, a global financial crisis. But our Labour predecessors left Britain exceptionally vulnerable and damaged: more personal debt than any other major economy; a dangerously inflated property bubble; and a bloated banking sector behaving as masters, not the servants of the people.
Apex predators are good for an environment in terms of biodiversity and trophic cascade - we have very few. But realistically, only a few areas could sustain free-roaming wolves in Britain, mostly in Scotland.
Politically at that time, with Thatcher in Britain and Reagan in the White House, it wasn't looking too great for the Left. And we were always on the left.
I personally hope and wish that Britain will stay part and parcel of the European Union.
Smoking is the now the principal avoidable cause of premature death in Britain. It hits the worst off people hardest of all. Smoking is one of the principal causes of the health gap which leads to poorer people being ill more often and dying sooner.
Whoever would have guessed that in the land of cheap sausages and mashed potatoes there could be such a change which would actually bring the French from Paris every weekend to invade Britain en masse to eat great food and drink great wine.
I know some of my parents' friends think 'Little Britain' is in incredibly poor taste. But swimming the Channel? You can't really say anything negative about that, can you? There's nothing better than making your parents happy. The glee on my father's face that day was amazing.
Herbert, my father, was born in Britain but went out to Africa in his teens to join his father and built up an 18,000-acre ranch in what was then Northern Rhodesia, providing work for the locals. He was my hero when I was a boy.
My dad was fairly well-off, so I was raised in a very comfortable environment: the very nice suburbs of Paris. It was a very idyllic life. I also spent nearly all my summers in Britain, and Christmas, too, because my grandparents lived there.
I hope there will be continued U.K. investment in human spaceflight to enable Britain to benefit from space travel in the longer term and that many more Britons - women and men - will travel into space.
Dizzee's just my childhood hero. He's definitely the inspiration. He's got himself to a very good place. He's defied the expectations of what British black urban music was like. He was the first person who made the rest of Britain realise it wasn't just a one-album-type situation. You've got to take your hat off to somebody like that.
First of all, when you live in a country like Canada, it's quite different from America in the sense that it's very tied to traditions that were born in Britain.
Unemployment is due to the large import of goods from Britain and other countries. The Government haven't used the powers which they have for the benefit of the country.
I think the Canadian sense of humor is dryer than America's and juicier than Britain's. I think it's a cross between the two of them, really.
Writers in Britain aren't really celebrities. You become kind of a darling of a small set.
I live a perfectly happy and comfortable life in Blair's Britain, but I can't work up much affection for the culture we've created for ourselves: it's too cynical, too knowing, too ironic, too empty of real value and meaning.
When people say England, they sometimes mean Great Britain, sometimes the United Kingdom, sometimes the British Isles, - but never England.
I think Britain can be one of the great success stories of the 21st century - we've got the talent, the drive, the connections around the world. But if we vote to Leave, then we lose control. We lose control of our economy, and if you lose control of your economy you lose control of everything. That's not a price worth paying.
In plain words: now that Britain has told the world that she has the H-Bomb she should announce as early as possible that she has done with it, that she proposes to reject in all circumstances nuclear warfare.
'Doctor Who' is, unavoidably, a product of mid-twentieth-century debates about Britain's role in the world as its empire unravelled.
Most independent filmmakers in Britain and North America work for commercial crews and then have their own projects when they've got enough money saved up to do so.
The choice is not normally between the north and south. It might be between Britain and Europe.
Yes, look, social class is definitely an issue in Britain, it is definitely an issue and I think that most people across the country would sympathise with the idea that there are lots of people with talent and ability all across this country who want to make more of themselves and part of the responsibility of government is to make that happen.
Contemporary Britain seems an endlessly fascinating place to me - but if I knew a little bit more about other places, and other times, maybe it wouldn't.
Britain is characterized not just by its independence but, above all, by its openness.
Colonialism is an idea born in the West that drives Western countries - like France, Italy, Belgium, Great Britain - to occupy countries outside of Europe.
You lose power in Britain and you are just Joe Public again.
We need Britain not only to stay in the E.U. but to be very active in it.
In Britain, the big supermarkets dominate our food chain. British supermarkets are some of the best in the world at controlling, manipulating and delivering cheap food.
There's a civic nationalism in Britain and dozens of other countries.
I think the Brexit vote in Great Britain informing this populist movement of nationalism is kind of a global thing, and I think it's no particular political party's fault. People have been left behind, and in America, we're used to going forward. It's always like we're going to be better; the next generation's going to be better.
In Great Britain the price of food is at a higher level than in any other country, and consequently, the British artisan labours at a disadvantage in proportion to the higher rate of his food.
I had always been told by my parents, not implicitly told, but every inference was that Britain was the hub of the universe.
L.A. is the opposite of Britain in a lot of respects, and that's what draws so many British people here.
Like many people in Britain, I have an affectionate respect for the Queen, and am surprised that I should be having such republican thoughts.
I will stay living in Staffordshire. Other people would be moving offshore. I am reasonably happy to help support the British economy. I have done very well out of Britain.
