Quotes of the week: From sinking ships to gutless bastards and the NUJ singing along to The Clash

Bob Smith from Bradford, speaking at the NUJ delegates meeting in Southport about Newsquest chief executive Paul Davidson: "Newsquest is heading for an iceberg, but you can be sure that Captain Davidson will not go down with his ship. He will be on the first life raft out of there."

Allison Pearson in The Word magazine: "As I get older, I don't really like opinions. I always think that any sane person has about five opinions a year, and at the Mail I was supposed to have five a week. It is a recipe for lunacy."

Dominic Lawson in the Independent: "My sister, Nigella, copes with her occasionally grotesque coverage in the press ("Getting much fatter!" "Going bald!" "High Calorie Killer!") by deciding that the person being written about, though sharing her name, is nothing to do with her, at all. That acquired imperviousness is clearly a much better approach than to cry out: "If you prick us, do we not bleed?" These days, any politician who attempts such an appeal to a common humanity will muster as much sympathy as the demonised Jew could expect from a nation of anti-Semites."

Sunday Times City editor James Ashton on Trinity Mirror chief Sly Bailey: "Bailey desperately needs to find deals like her acquisition of the Guardian’s regional titles last year to squeeze out more savings. Northcliffe, the Daily Mail’s regional arm, is the pick of the bunch, but Trinity’s share price only makes a tie-up harder. If Northcliffe is broken up, Trinity could pick off some bite-sized chunks."

Tim Luckhurst and Ian Reeves, of the Centre for Journalism, University of Kent, in a letter to the Independent about Kelvin MacKenzie's call for all journalism colleges to be closed: "The world has changed a lot since print skills alone made a good journalist. Today's reporters need computer and broadcast skills Kelvin has never acquired. Perhaps he would like to learn. We'd be pleased to help."

George Brock, head of journalism at City University, London, on his blog: "Kelvin is talking bollocks".

Former BBC director-general Greg Dyke, speaking at the NAPA awards, on the behaviour of some BBC governors over the sexed-up dossier affair which cost him his job: "Gutless bastards".

Former Northern Echo editor Peter Sands on the selling of the paper's famous Priestgate office: "This weekend it was announced that The Northern Echo and Darlington and Stockton Times are to leave the building after 150 years. It will be consumed by the shopping centre and probably become Debenhams. Who can blame Newsquest from selling it? It is no longer necessary to have such a huge town centre building to produce a newspaper. And if I was sitting on a multi-million pound asset that was surplus to requirements, I would cash it in too. But that doesn't mean it isn't a sad day and that a big chunk of North-East history will disappear with it."

NUJ general secretary-elect Michelle Stanistreet on the musical performance of outgoing general secretary Jeremy Dear backed by a Clash tribute band: "Sing-along numbers like ‘Janie Jones’ are certainly popular with the older delegates, but it may be that our younger members would prefer something more modern and fab groovy, as I understand they say."