Vipassana is fine until it becomes a technique that has many stages and that takes time to develop. That can be okay for people for a while, but then you have to leave the technique behind.

"London is—after Athens and Rome—the third most influential city in history."

"Obama's extraordinary political skills suggest he is more than capable of rising above any personal historical grudges he may have inherited."

"We can find our voice in the world again: a voice that is commensurate with the fifth-biggest economy on Earth."

"I've done eight years as mayor of London. I enjoyed it hugely; it was a massive privilege."

"This is an absolute turning point in the story of our country because I think if we go on with being enmeshed in the E.U., it will continue to erode our democracy. That is something that worries me."

"The Italians, who used to be a great motor-manufacturing power, have been absolutely destroyed by the euro - as was intended by the Germans."

"I believe in immigration. But I feel people think it would be better if there was an Australian-style points based system so we could actually get a good system."

"Huge numbers of people in London depend on their cars. Fuel duty is becoming a big factor in people's cost of living. I believe in trying to ease these burdens."

"I'm not one of those people who believes in going endlessly around finger wagging and ticking people off for occasional colourful use of language."

"What I really think about Banksy is I think he's a genius; he's a great artist, and I like his stuff. But he's got to accept it if, from time to time, someone will need to paint over his work."

"I suppose with houses and assets, then I guess I would be a millionaire. But so are a lot of people."

"It would be a sad day if we British stopped being cynical, but you sometimes wonder whether we overdo it."

"Most people would accept that people come to London from across the world, from all kinds of backgrounds, and are accepted here irrespective of their origins."

"One thing you have got to do politically is to identify the ties that bind society together and try to strengthen them."

"I always believe writing is an indispensable part of one's political armoury."

"I think people have a legitimate right to minimise their tax obligations if they can, but they should pay their fair whack. I do think it's important to be transparent."

"I've always sort of thought that politics was a high and noble calling and a good thing to do."

"The beauty and riddle in studying the motives of any politician is in trying to decide what is idealism and what is self-interest, and often we are left to conclude that the answer is a mixture of the two."

"I think the risks that people see of terrorism are incredibly important but we are very confident we have got the right people on it and the risks have been minimised."

"Times have been tough, the economy has been tough. But I want to bring forward a fantastic manifesto for taking the city forwards."

"London is a fantastic creator of jobs - but many of these jobs are going to people who don't originate in this country."

"What I worry about is that people are losing confidence, losing energy, losing enthusiasm, and there's a real opportunity to get them into work."

"I have not been more robust towards female rather than male assembly members and I do not believe I have been remotely sexist."

"I love swimming in rivers, and well remember once jumping in at Chiswick."

"But if people want to swim in the Thames, if they want to take their lives into their own hands, then they should be able to do so with all the freedom and exhilaration of our woad-painted ancestors."

"I want London to be a competitive, dynamic place to come to work."

"It just happens I write fast and always have done."

"Some people play the piano, some do Sudoku, some watch television, some people go out to dinner parties. I write books."

"I'd like thousands of schools as good as the one I went to, Eton."

"I want to win and I want to be in office."

"I love tennis with a passion. I challenged Boris Becker to a match once and he said he was up for it but he never called back. I bet I could make him run around."

"I have as much chance of becoming Prime Minister as of being decapitated by a frisbee or of finding Elvis."

"London is the most commercially important city in Europe, and it's the most populous city. It should be for the whole of the European continent what New York is to America. That's what it should be."

"I am hoping very much to get re-elected but it is going to be a tough fight."

"The job of mayor of London is unbelievably taxing, particularly in the run-up to the Olympics."

"We are experiencing such large support for the Olympic relay that our advice is to stay in your neighbourhood, stay in your borough and wait for it to come near you."

"The euro has become a means by which superior German productivity is able to gain an absolutely unbeatable advantage over the whole eurozone territory."

"There's an idea that London is a planet on its own: that it's starting to diverge from the rest of the solar system. We need to combat that."

"So I'm definitely in favour of stimulating the dynamic wealth creation sectors of the economy."

"I'm made up of immigrant stock. I went to a primary school in London. I grew up eating Spangles, why shouldn't I be as well placed to speak for Londoners as anyone else?"

"I'm not particularly politically correct, so I tend to reflect what I think are the terrible realities of life, which I think are, generally speaking, conservative."

"The Lib Dems are not just empty. They are a void within a vacuum surrounded by a vast inanition."

"That is the best case for Bush; that, among other things, he liberated Iraq. It is good enough for me."

"I'm a one-nation Tory."

"If we judged everybody by the stupid, unguarded things they blurt out to their nearest and dearest, then we wouldn't ever get anywhere."

"The dreadful truth is that when people come to see their MP they have run out of better ideas."

"The idea that the EU is somehow the guarantor of peace on the continent - that is in itself rash, in my view, and risks undermining the vital role of Nato."

"It is possible to have a pretty good life and career being a leech and a parasite in the media world, gadding about from TV studio to TV studio, writing inconsequential pieces and having a good time."