A willingness to change.

Question: What needs to change most in British politics?

Jeffrey Archer: Well there is so much, the trouble with the revolving and moving world, on a world that moves faster than it as ever moved in the past, your politicians have to be very fast thinking. And they have to be watching legislation in every country on earth. They have to see what the Americans are doing, the French are doing, the Germans are doing, Italians are doing, and they are making a different transport policy, they are making a different health policy, they are making a different education policy; is it working?

So, you continually must be willing to change. But of course, at the same time, you must be cautious of making mistakes. So the modern politicians faces many more challenges.

[Benjamin] Disraeli, when he was the Prime minister of Great Britain at a time when everybody thought England was changing during the industrial revolution in Britain, changing during the industrial legend; truth is, he used to take an eight week holiday in the summer, and a four week holiday at Christmas.

Prime Ministers are luckier to getting a couple of days off nowadays.

Recorded on: March 15, 2008.