Election '97: QUOTES OF THE DAY

Trust is not a question of personality, it's a question of consistency. You can't ... publish a manifesto one day and before the ink is dry rewrite large sections of it and then appeal to people to trust you. It would be like Moses coming down from the mountain with the 10 commandments and then being told by spin doctors to ditch three of them because focus groups say they are not going down well with the Israelites - Paddy Ashdown on Tony Blair and Labour

It is sad that Mr Martin Bell appears to have allowed himself to be cynically manipulated by the Labour and Liberal Democrat parties' spin doctors - Alan Barnes, chairman of Tatton Conservative Association

This is, even for somebody who is accustomed to scary experiences, extreme - Martin Bell

He made a sweeping visit ... and he will go straight back down to cosy Hampstead to do his press conference. He could not even be bothered to stay up here - Christine Hamilton, talking about Martin Bell

The ... election has probably made people think more deeply about moving to somewhere more attractive - Doug Elkins, of South Australia, explaining why large numbers of people have been inquiring into the possibility of emigrating