Skip to content

Theresa May Quotes

born 1956 United Kingdom

Theresa Mary May, Baroness May of Maidenhead (née Brasier; born 1 October 1956) is a former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party who was in office from 2016 to 2019. Identifying as a One-Nation Conservative and characterised as a liberal conservative, she was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Maidenhead from the 1997 to the 2024 general elections.

United Kingdom

Random Theresa May quote

66 quotes

They [the then Labour government] planned to let bureaucrats snoop on peoples' phone and email conversations. We helped to stop that.

[In relation to the Conservatives' policy on social care costs] Nothing has changed.

There should be no general election until 2020. There should be a normal Autumn Statement, held in the normal way at the normal time, and no emergency Budget.

Speech declaring bid for the Conservative Party leadership (2016)

I continue to believe that by far the best outcome is the UK leaves the European Union in an orderly fashion with a deal. And that the deal we have negotiated is the best and indeed only deal available.

We will take back control of our money, by putting an end to vast annual payments to the EU. Instead, we will be able to spend British taxpayers' money on our own priorities, like the extra £394m per week that we are investing in our long-term plan for the NHS.

In a stand-off between Britain and the EU, 44% of our exports is more important to us than 8% of the EU's exports is to them.

Speech as Home Secretary on the UK and European Union (2016)

[I want to] build the education, skills, and social mobility to allow everyone to prosper from the opportunities of leaving the EU

I'm very clear also that the British people don't want the issue of Article 50 being triggered just being kicked into the long grass because they want to know we're getting on with the job of putting Brexit into place and making a success of it.

I will shortly leave the job that it has been the honour of my life to hold. The second female prime minister, but certainly not the last. I do so with no ill will, but with enormous and enduring gratitude to have had the opportunity to serve the country I love.

There's a lot we need to do in this party of ours. Our base is too narrow and so, occasionally, are our sympathies. You know what some people call us - the nasty party.

Overwhelmingly the British people want us to get on with delivering Brexit and also address the other important issues they care about. I believe it is my duty to deliver on the British people's instruction to leave the European Union and I intend to do so.

the UK will stand shoulder to shoulder with the EU and with Nato to face these threats together

Politics is about public service. Everything we do - in parliament, in our constituencies, here in Bournemouth - should be motivated by one goal. Improving the lives of our fellow citizens.

It is important that we deliver a Brexit that is good for the British people. It will be up to my successor to take this forward. To find the majority in Parliament that I was not able to find and to deliver the decision of the British people in 2016.

I hope that we all agree that the aim is to provide the right education for every child. For some children, that will be an education that is firmly based in learning practical and vocational skills. For others, it will be an education based on academic excellence.

You can judge me by my record.

Speech declaring bid for the Conservative Party leadership (2016)

[My plan] delivers on the vote that people gave on Brexit. We deliver that Brexit and we do it in a way that protects jobs and livelihoods and meets our commitment to Northern Ireland.

Our focus to deliver Brexit must be absolute. We must not, and I will not, frustrate what was the largest democratic exercise in this country's history. In the very final stages of this process, the worst thing we could do is lose our focus.

[A 2nd EU referendum would be a] betrayal of the vote of the British people

no deal is better than a bad deal

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Theresa May (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.