Michael Portillo

A wood carving of Quixote on his nag Rocinante graced my childhood home.

— Michael Portillo

I love a good meal on a train, and if I'm travelling on a discount ticket, the challenge is to eat more…

— Michael Portillo

A parliamentary democracy that has developed its delicate balances over hundreds of years will not give up its sovereign rights.

— Michael Portillo

My own father was a refugee from the Spanish civil war in the 1930s, later going on to become a BBC radio…

— Michael Portillo

I can never thoroughly appreciate meals on ships because, away from land, I feel my autonomy is restricted.

— Michael Portillo

I have never served on a jury because MPs were exempted - or banned, I think.

— Michael Portillo

As a politician, I spent a lot of time in Washington and New York, cities that are familiar to Europeans.

— Michael Portillo

Were we ever to find ourselves living under a totalitarian regime, place no faith in the mercy of your fellow citizens.

— Michael Portillo

They say travel enables you to encounter your opposite. If this is true, I think I may have met mine in a…

— Michael Portillo

Of all the places I've visited in my life, Egypt has been the most fascinating. I've explored almost the whole country: Cairo…

— Michael Portillo

Conservatives are wary of change. We have respect for things that have lasted a long time and have been proved to work.…

— Michael Portillo

My grandfather was a great advocate of Scottish art at a time when Scottish artists struggled to be taken seriously. They were…

— Michael Portillo

King Edward VIII was forced to abdicate because he was determined to marry a divorced woman. As a result of that decision,…

— Michael Portillo

One enjoyable consequence of being in the Scouts was that, at the start of each new school year, we had to camp…

— Michael Portillo

Before my teens, my contemporaries were reading Tolkien and were absorbed by his works, but try as I might, I could not…

— Michael Portillo

Ask anyone where they were when they heard of Diana's death, and they won't hesitate, because nobody can forget. Along with 9/11,…

— Michael Portillo

I'm nothing to do with the Conservative Party; I'm not a member of the Conservative Party. I stopped being a member shortly…

— Michael Portillo

Non-fictionalised accounts of horrific accidents, bereavement, and the outrages of officialdom tend to move us deeply.

— Michael Portillo

Pablo Picasso first entered my consciousness when I was a boy of about eight years old.

— Michael Portillo

My Scottish grandfather, John W. Blyth, was a man addicted to paintings. A manufacturer of linen, he spent all his surplus money…

— Michael Portillo

What's extraordinary about Cobra Mist, and so much of what went on at Orford, was that the public were completely oblivious to…

— Michael Portillo

I was brought up in a house where I was so aware of a life that had been broken by politics and…

— Michael Portillo

People are obviously very interested in travel, including travel in Britain.

— Michael Portillo

The true symbolism of every facet of 'Guernica' can only be guessed at, but we do know that it haunted Picasso.

— Michael Portillo

My grandfather, who was always keen to promote living artists, staged an unprecedented exhibition of Peploe's works at Kirkcaldy in 1928.

— Michael Portillo

Television brings with it two dangerous hazards: the worship of celebrity and the blurring of reality and fantasy.

— Michael Portillo

The disease of debt has reached the top. And once it reaches the top it has no-where else to go.

— Michael Portillo

Three letters send a chill down the spine of the enemy: SAS. Those letters spell out one clear message. Don't mess with…

— Michael Portillo

Some people are born to trains, and some have trains thrust upon them. Fortunately, I can be included in this latter category.

— Michael Portillo

I enjoyed dressing in Indian clothes. I loved those long, single-piece garments that come down to the knees and the white pyjamas…

— Michael Portillo

You never quite know what you do in life that leaves a seed behind that grows into an oak tree.

— Michael Portillo

I don't think I've got a thick skin, but I've not felt particularly humiliated by the things which people think I would…

— Michael Portillo

People have said to me, 'Oh, you are much nicer making documentaries than you were in politics.' So I should be. If…

— Michael Portillo

I feel opera is an expression of artistic excellence. To do it is expensive, as there's a requirement for an orchestra, good…

— Michael Portillo

For good or ill, communism transformed the globe, but how many of us realise the crucial role played by a Manchester public…

— Michael Portillo

One of the reasons that Thatcher promoted home ownership is that it promoted responsible citizens with a stake in society. But another…

— Michael Portillo

There's much about the British Raj which I think is disreputable. It was rapacious; it was a sort of kleptocracy, and it…

— Michael Portillo

We must have a welfare system that we can afford, which will mean giving greater attention to directing the welfare program toward…

— Michael Portillo

My favourite British line is the West Highland line. It was built across moorland where no one had succeeded in building a…

— Michael Portillo

The two biggest legacies of the Raj are the unification of India and the English language. Moreover, without the railways, India would…

— Michael Portillo